HAWKSLEY WORKMAN - March 23 in Kingston!

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Rock Crew Productions and CFRC 101.9 FM are very proud to present HAWKSLEY WORKMAN on Thursday, March 23 at Sydenham Street United Church (82 Sydenham Street). It's an all-ages show, doors open at 7 PM, no opening act, just Hawksley and a piano player (Mr. Lonely).

Tickets are on sale now at:

Destinations (JDUC)

Grand Theatre Box Office

- 185 Sydenham Street

- 613.530.2050

- www.grandtheatre-kingston.com

or

www.rockcrew.ca

Hawksley's new album 'Treeful of Starling' is in stores now! Here's a review from JAM!

If there's one thing you can always count on Hawksley Workman to do, it's the thing that you never counted on him to do.

Which is to say: After the sexed-up, hammy glam-pop of his last couple of discs, you would not expect Workman to dish up a set of introspective and unironically beautiful piano balladry.

So that's precisely what the iconoclastic singer-songwriter cooks up for his fifth full-length Treeful of Starling. Wiping away the mascara and discarding his sequined hot pants, Workman settles down and gets back to basics with nine delicate and poetic odes that ponder the passage of time, the meaning of life and the fleeting nature of love instead of being jealous of your cigarette.

As usual, aside from the occasional horn line or string part, Hawksley does all the heavy lifting here, playing all the instruments and producing himself. But as always, the most impressive achievement is Workman's superior songcraft, which has never sounded more mature or honest. Is he growing up? Getting over a breakup? Only he knows what prompted him to change his tune.

But as he puts it: "The one certainty of living is that you're gonna die, so why not stand in awe of it instead of asking why?"

We would suggest approaching Treeful of Starling the same way.

From http://jam.canoe.ca/Music/2006/03/02/1471263-sun.html

www.hawksleyworkman.com

www.ssuc.org

www.cfrc.ca

www.rockcrew.ca

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Hawksley Workman having a good time

By ALLAN WIGNEY -- Ottawa Sun

Charismatic. Flamboyant. Compelling

They're words that accurately describe the larger-than-life onstage persona of the man born Ryan Corrigan, and known to us as Hawksley Workman.

The singer/songwriter/multi-instrumentalist's live performances draw from the gifted artist's theatrical training, and from an innate desire to ham it up.

And Workman makes no apologies for his 'Mak shau!' approach to performing.

"The shoe-gazing grunge era did very little for me even when it was happening; it does even less for me now that it's gone," Workman explains.

"I think I'm very much an artist but I also think I'm very much a performer. The two don't cancel each other out, in my opinion. They just enhance each other.

"It is your job to put on a show. The alleged great saviours of rock of the grunge era presented this idea that if you add entertainment to the music somehow you're decreasing the artistic importance of it. I never really bought into that, and still don't.

"I think it's my job to take people on a journey; if I didn't do that I personally wouldn't be having a good time and I wouldn't have the kind of live following I have."

That following is loyal, and ever-expanding. (Witness the fact that even a decidedly-modest show such as Workman's return to Ottawa this weekend has twice been relocated to a larger venue.)

It's also well-earned, for not only is he a dynamic performer, but Workman is also a songwriter of uncommon ability -- a reality that was arguably obscured amid the bombastic presentation of his 2003 release Lover/Fighter. The recently released, low-key Treeful of Starling, recorded mostly at home and featuring sparse instrumentation, removes all doubt. Restrained, melodic gems like Rain and Goodbye to Radio are the work of an accomplished tunesmith.

Of course, straying from the world of balls-out rock may inevitably mean limited airplay for Treeful. Or, the optimistic Workman insists, it may not.

"I think every song on this record is a hit," Workman says. "I think I only ever write hits, when it comes right down to it, because I've never gone out to try and reinvent the wheel. I love the structure of songwriting. I love pop music. I love verse-chorus-verse-chorus-bridge-chorus. And I've always been surprised when people say, 'Oh, he's an eccentric,' or, 'He's writing with an esoteric style.' I've never figured that out, because I've always been very true and honest to the simple pop structures.

"Are there any hits on Treeful of Starling? The whole record's a hit. Is it fashionable? It's not particularly fashionable. But sometimes with the way the world is becoming tightly corporatized you have to tell the corporate machine that it's fashionable. If you're able to get the corporate machine to believe it's fashionable, it is fashionable."

From http://jam.canoe.ca/Music/Artists/W/Workman_Hawksley/2006/03/15/1489196-sun.html