By Keith Walsh
When Tom Cridland prepares for a tour, he does it with style. Currently, the British singer/songwriter is staying at a villa on the Italian island of Capri, along with the rest of his four piece band and his partner and manager Debs Marx.
On October 26, Cridland and his band will join legendary R & B group The Stylistics, for a six week tour of the U.K. to sold out crowds. His band consists of Andy Baker on bass, Justin Woodward on guitar, and Harry Michael on drums, with Cridland on vocals and piano. The rental of the villa is on part with what it would cost to put everyone up in a hotel and rent a separate practice space, according to Cridland.
His latest release will be a reworking of his single from 2020, “I Wanna Be Home Alone,” featuring a guitar solo by the legendary Davey Johnstone of Elton John’s band. Also in the works is a new version of Cridland’s first single as a solo artist, “Falling Off The Rails,” from 2019, with the new version being a duet with Alison Thorsteinsen.
Previously Cridland wrote, recorded and released 107 songs over a very short period of time. Now he’s trying a different approach. “I mean to be releasing three singles,” he said. “One to be timed with the tour, and then the next over the course of the next year. So it’s going to be sort of the next year marketing these singles.”
“They’re all going to be duets. So they’re going to be me with somebody featuring on three of my tracks, basically. And I’m going to be doing this whilst I focus on doing a new album. So I’ll still be working and writing songs, but the idea being to just give the songs a bit more time to breath with people. And I’ve chosen three songs that are really strong and I’ve really put a bit more time into having them mixed.”
Cridland excitedly spoke about the remix of “Falling Off The Rails,” a vocal duet with Alison Thorsteinsen, “She appeared recently on Elton John’s radio show, and that’s how I got kind of turned on to her music, and it’s kind of old school stuff. Her album really sounded like a 70s album, nice trip back. It was kind of a bit like Carole King and Fleetwood Mac.” Cridland also interviewed Thorsteinsen on his Greatest Music Of All Time, for an episode to be aired soon.
In addition to “I Wanna Be Home Alone,” and “Falling Off The Rails,” Cridland will release a new version of “Take Me Back,” for which he plans to approach one of his very favorite musical artists ‘of all time‘ — the name of whom I am sworn to secrecy. For these singles, Cridland plans to focus on marketing, promotion, and what he calls “some Tik Tok bulls$#%.”
I asked Cridland if he used any of the heavily-advertised Spotify promotion companies that market heavily to musicians for his previous releases. “I haven’t been using them for a long time,” he said. “The last time I was using them, my listening figures on Spotify were something like 20,000 monthly listeners, but I suspect that they were all Ukrainian bots, and it was costing me an arm and a leg. My plan is to, once I get these singles done and dusted, there three strongest tracks, I’m going to see about pitching some labels and management, inviting them to the tour.”
Starting with The Stylistics tour, Cridland will put his growing skills prowess on pianos and synths to work, playing a Nord Stage 2 (he says he may swap it for one with 88 keys). He said he is hoping to bring his longtime collaborator in The Tomicks, keyboardist Nick Whitehead, on stage for a song or two. “On the off chance that he can make it,” Cridland said,” we have rehearsed the song, ‘Debs’ from The Tomicks’ Jailbound Fool album, which we will only play if Nick is onstage with us. As my earliest musical collaborator and best friend in the business, it would mean a lot to me if he was on the tour with me.”
Cridland said he’s looking forward to getting into the studio to craft an new album. “Now that I’m playing keys,” he said, “I’m kind of looking to making one album quite slowly…and make something that’s more soulful….You know, the hundred and seven singles project was really geared towards the idea of doing as much as possible. Working with a lot of different players, there’s a lot of great musicianship on it, but I want to do something that’s really personal, maybe more stripped back.”
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