Corinne Bailey Rae News: Letterman, Kimmel Performances, New Tour Dates

News

GRAMMY® winning artist Corinne Bailey Rae will perform “Closer,” her latest single, on “Late Show with David Letterman” this Friday and appear on the outdoor stage of “Jimmy Kimmel Live” on Monday, March 8th.

The U.K. singer-songwriter will return to the States next month, launching her first North American tour in three years on April 6th with a benefit show for Santa Monica-based public radio station KCRW (89.9 FM and KCRW.com). This special evening at Vibiana, a historic cathedral located in downtown Los Angeles, will feature a performance by Corinne as well as an interview with Jason Bentley, KCRW’s Music Director and host of Morning Becomes Eclectic. It will be taped for broadcast on Morning Becomes Eclectic on April 9th. Tickets for the concert go on sale to KCRW members tomorrow and to the general public on March 9th. Bailey Rae will perform on “The Tonight Show with Jay Leno” on April 7th before continuing the tour, which will take her to both intimate venues and festivals. She’ll perform at the Coachella Music and Arts Festival (April 17th), the St. Lucia Jazz Festival (May 8th) and on select Lilith Fair dates (to be announced). See below for itinerary.

The Sea, the follow up to Bailey Rae’s 2006 self-titled debut, entered The Billboard 200 in the Top 10 in January and has elicited stellar reviews. “The album is a major creative leap from her debut,” said The New York Times while People noted in a four-star, Critic’s Choice review: “she captivates with a haunting, heartbreaking set that’s almost painfully exquisite.” The Los Angeles Times called it “a remarkable accomplishment” in a four-star review while Rolling Stone observed: “Her latest is both reckoning and rebirth Fragile arrangements guitar, auto-harp, orchestra – suggest indie rock (‘Are You Here’) as much as R&B (the Isley Brothers-ish ‘Closer’). Rae also celebrates love and, on ‘The Blackest Lily,’ even rocks a funky vocoder, confronting death with the greatest weapon: life, fully lived.”

Tomorrow HULU will launch a full Corinne Bailey Rae channel where fans can view her latest videos, clips from her debut album, a “Live From The Artists Den” featurette from the upcoming episode airing on Public Television this spring and footage from a 2006 New York City concert:

The video for “Paris Nights/New York Mornings” has just been added to mtvU, Centric and VH1 Soul while “I’d Do It All Again,” the first single/video from The Sea, was added earlier at Centric, mtvU, VH1 Soul, Music Choice and Logo. Bailey Rae’s “Closer” is #15 at Urban AC radio and climbing at Smooth Jazz and AC formats while another album track, “The Blackest Lily,” was #1 Most Added at AAA radio last week. Bailey Rae will guest on several nationally syndicated radio shows, including “The Tom Joyner Morning Show” (April 20th), “The Steve Harvey Morning Show” (date to be announced) and Keith Sweat’s “The Sweat Hotel” (date to be announced).

Bailey Rae’s first album entered the U.K. album chart at #1 in June 2006 and she was the first British female singer-songwriter in decades to have her debut enter The Billboard 200 in the Top 20. By year’s end, it was RIAA-certified Platinum. She won a Q award, a MOJO award, an Image award and two MOBO awards and was nominated for three GRAMMY awards – “Record Of The Year” and “Song Of The Year” for her first single, “Put Your Records On,” and “Best New Artist.” After Bailey Rae’s performance on the 2007 GRAMMY Awards telecast, the album rocketed into the Top 5 of The Billboard 200. In 2008, “Like A Star,” her second single, was nominated for “Song Of The Year” and Herbie Hancock’s River: The Joni Letters, on which Corinne sang the title track, won the GRAMMY for “Album Of The Year.”

Corinne Bailey Rae – North American Tour

Date City Venue
4/6 Los Angeles, CA Vibiana
4/9 Vancouver, BC Commodore Ballroom
4/11 Portland, OR Roseland Theatre
4/12 Seattle, WA Moore Theatre
4/15 San Francisco, CA Regency Ballroom
4/17 Indio, CA Coachella Music and Arts Festival
4/22 Chicago, IL Vic Theatre
4/24 Detroit, MI St. Andrews Hall
4/26 Toronto, ON Queen Elizabeth Theatre
4/28 Montreal, QC Club Soda
4/30 Boston, MA House of Blues
5/1 Philadelphia, PA Theatre of Living Arts
5/3 New York, NY Webster Hall
5/4 Brooklyn, NY Music Hall of Williamsburg
5/8 St. Lucia St. Lucia Jazz Festival
5/11 Atlanta, GA Center Stage
5/13 Washington, DC 9:30 Club
5/14 Baltimore, MD Rams Head Live

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0uStujQOBXA

Jonathan Widro is the owner and founder of Inside Pulse. Over a decade ago he burst onto the scene with a pro-WCW reporting style that earned him the nickname WCWidro. Check him out on Twitter for mostly inane non sequiturs