Billie Davies | On Hollywood Boulevard | CD Baby Music Store

"As a bandleader, Davies delivers an ambitious program that incorporates r&b-flavored vocals, propulsive bass lines, drum patterns with a swing feel, occasionally blues-tinged keyboard work, growling trombone, epic prog-rock synthesizer washes and brief bouts of hip-hop turntableism, 
all tied together with an improviser's approach." Bobby Reed - DownBeat Magazine

"Clearly Billie Davies and A Nu Experience are a class act, one full of bold inventive and inspired interplay. Let us hope "On Hollywood Boulevard" won't be their only project together, and that there will be more adventurous music to come."
Sacha O'Grady - All About Jazz

Preview & Get the new album by Billie Davies below:

Billie Davies | On Hollywood Boulevard | CD Baby Music Store

BILLIE DAVIES - A NU EXPERIENCE -On Hollywood Boulevard - Jazz Views

Corrected link to a beautiful review of #OnHollywoodBoulevard on Jazz Views​.

#JazzBuzz​ #Jazz​

http://www.jazzviews.net/billie-davies---a-nu-experience--on-hollywood-boulevard.html

BILLIE DAVIES - A NU EXPERIENCE -On Hollywood Boulevard 

Self Release

Billie Davies: electronic drums; IRIS P: vocals; Oliver Watkinson:  electric bass; Evan Oberla:  keyboards, synth, trombone.
Recorded New Orleans, September 26, 2016

On the one hand this set represents a very new direction for Billie Davies, working in Nu Jazz, which bridges jazz and contemporary R&B and hip hop.   Her choice of an electronic drum kit also lends some really interesting textures to the sounds she produces.  On the other hand, the drumming is as solid, nuanced and captivating as ever.  Interestingly, the approach taken to recording was similar to that of her ‘Hand in Hand in the Hand of the Moon’ CD; the music is recorded in front of a small, live audience in a single take with images relating to the music projected behind the band.  This captures an exciting, slightly edge-of-the-seat performance that conveys the sense of improvisation while maintaining a well-balanced interplay between the artists.
​
The lyrics, written by Davies, reminisce on her time living on Hollywood Boulevard, and have that blend of story-telling and heartfelt poetry that you find in, say, Joni Mitchell.  During this time (in 2013), Davies was awarded the Los Angeles Music Awards Jazz Musician of the Year, and moved to New Orleans the following year. The delivery of the lyrics by IRIS P (Catherine Poree) is beautifully jazzy, and she sings soulfully across the rhythm in an understated way that gives a sardonic edge to some of the stories and memories and a bittersweet longing to others.  This could easily have been a duet between IRIS P’s singing and the swing of Davies’ drumming.  Davies relishes the electronic drum kit, moving from snare and toms to harsher metallic sounds, and uses it creatively to add texture to the vocals.  You can almost get the stories from the drumming alone. The playing of Watkinson and Oberla, who have played and recorded regularly with Davies over the past few years,  bring a driving edge to the music and work superbly off the mood of the lyrics and the subtle shifts in emphasis that Davies gives from her drum seat.  Throughout the set, Davies leads the music, pushing the pulse and emphasising the words in ways that encourages keys and bass to find the gaps and cleverly work around and within them.  I particularly liked the evocative playing of Oberla on trombone on several of the tracks.  The group is a winning combination and one that promises an exciting change of direction for Davies.

Reviewed by Chris Baber

BILLIE DAVIES - A NU EXPERIENCE -On Hollywood Boulevard - Jazz Views

Billie Davies, "A Nu Experience: On Hollywood Boulevard" (Independent) - OffBeat Magazine

Billie Davies, "A Nu Experience: On Hollywood Boulevard" (Independent) - OffBeat Magazine

OffBeat Magazine
Billie Davies, “A Nu Experience: On Hollywood Boulevard” (Independent) 
By Robert Fontenot
Published: February 08, 2017
Despite the best efforts of James M. Cain, Chinatown and BoJack Horseman, L.A. noir still doesn’t get the respect it deserves next to what goes on in Gotham. This is doubly true for jazz, where a combo of experimentalism, perceived lack of gravitas and the general laid-back vibe of West Coast Cool doom it to second-fiddle status, seemingly forever. All these years later, and when folks want to feel how La La Land destroys the dreams of its citizens, they dig out “Hotel California,” not Chet Baker. Shame, really.
If anyone could change that perception, it’s pioneering avant-garde drummer Billie Davies, a disciple of fellow “California Hard” stylist Max Roach and someone who, true to her gypsy resume, actually lived on Hollywood Boulevard for a time. Her latest release is typically daring, capturing the perfectly frightening freedom of being lost in El Lay, largely thanks to the cool glissandos and lonely brass of keyboardist Evan Oberla and the kind of youthful energy you need for this sort of piece: new vocalist IRIS P, who brings some R&B flair to tracks like “Jacaranda” and “Yellow Sunshine” (which is not the kind of nature you’re thinking of, maybe). Meanwhile, Billie as usual plays counterpoint, creating the menace simmering under the surface naiveté that makes all that ambition seem weighted down, if not doomed, by reality. The set’s only major flaw is her decision to use electronic drums on half the album, augmenting and sometimes replacing her usual setup entirely; they just don’t have the expressiveness of a trap kit, turning Billie’s wise Greek chorus into a drunken party crasher. Ironically, a little more traditionalist grounding is just what the album and its subjects need most.
~Robert Fontenot, OffBeat Magazine

Free MP3: “The Girl In The Window” by Billie Davies

Free MP3: “The Girl In The Window” by Billie Davies


Featured Download of the Day on All About Jazz.

Billie Davies – ‘On Hollywood Boulevard’ – Skope Entertainment Inc

Billie Davies – ‘On Hollywood Boulevard’ – Skope Entertainment Inc

Billie Davies – ‘On Hollywood Boulevard’
by Admin • December 19, 2016

“On Hollywood Boulevard” is a glamorous, gorgeous mixture of jazz and funk displaying Billie Davies’s deft skill. Luxurious textures dominate the collection as Billie Davies draws from a wide variety of sources. Everything simply glistens as the attention to tone and texture are of the utmost importance. Bass works wonders alongside the rather loose, careful rhythms that adorn the album. Mood serves an important function as Billie Davies explore vast terrains, oftentimes delving into surreal, otherworldly soundscapes.

Things start off on an impassioned note with the phenomenal opener “On Hollywood Boulevard 1”. With almost a noir take on jazz, the mysterious shadowy nature of the piece results something deeply compelling. Vocals accompany the laid-back attitude of “The Girl In The Window”. Delivered with a sultry sensibility, the way the song builds itself up is quite wonderful as the song unfurls in a rather celebratory spirit. Careful grooves define the ritualistic work of “Jacaronda”. Some of the detail, such as the tactile percussion, gives the song a quiet intimate feeling. Funk dominates over the spirited performance, as the synthesizer sweeps give the song a chilled hue to it. Electronics and jazz come together on the narrative of “Hollywood Boulevard” where its hip-hop structure adds to the song’s cache. Returning to the album’s beginnings in jazz is the spacious sprawl of “On Hollywood Boulevard 2”.

https://itunes.apple.com/us/album/on-hollywood-boulevard/id1174033049

Billie Davies offers a cool confident update on jazz with the playful nature of “On Hollywood Boulevard”.

http://www.billiedavies.com/

By – beachsloth.com

Billie Davies - Dec 10 Release of Her Nu Experience - "On Hollywood Boulevard"

On JazzCorner.com News

http://www.jazzcorner.com/news/display.php?news=7681

- A Nu Experience! -

An Electrifying Musical Adventure

- December 10 Release Date! -

CD Release party at The Prime Example, New Orleans.

Dec. 8th, 2016 - 8 PM

- "On Hollywood Boulevard" -

- BILLIE DAVIES -

Since recording, releasing and performing "Hand In Hand In The Hand Of The Moon" as an ode to the work of her dearest friend, Belgian artist Serge Vandercam (1924 - 2005), and performing with Billie & The Bad Boyzzzz and the Billie Davies Trio in 2015- 2016 it slowly became time for her new album project "On Hollywood Boulevard", for which Billie wrote the melodies and lyrics, to become a reality.
After 20 years of playing, producing and releasing instrumental jazz, Billie Davies is turning a page and is bringing us a Nu Vocal and Electric Experience, "On Hollywood Boulevard".

"On Hollywood Boulevard" was born while Billie Davies lived at 6533 Hollywood Blvd. at The Historic Hillview Hollywood in Hollywood, Los Angeles. She lived there for several years and her many experiences in and impressions of Hollywood Boulevard resulted in a recorded album of 5 songs that Billie Davies wrote melodies and lyrics for and 2 improvisations of which one has improvised lyrics by IRIS P.. It took from 2012 in Hollywood, the initial conception, to September of 2016 in New Orleans for the album to become a reality.
Billie and her husband/producer Mike Davies chose Evan Oberla, with whom she has recorded and performed since February of 2015, on keys/synth and trombone and Oliver Watkinson, who became her bass player in the summer of 2015, on electric bass. Billie Davies met IRIS P through an introduction by Evan Oberla, during one of their performances at The Dragon's Den, and was rejoiced to find the perfect vocalist, the perfect chemistry, to record and perform the "On Hollywood Boulevard" lyrics and experience.




Read more here:  http://www.jazzcorner.com/news/display.php?news=7681

Hollywood Boulevard (Billie Davies) - BILLIE DAVIES - A Nu Experience

BILLIE DAVIES - A Nu Experience
In the recording studio...
Recording the new album "On Hollywood Boulevard"
Hollywood Boulevard (Billie Davies)
L to R:
Evan Oberla - piano/synth/trombone
Billie Davies - drums
Oliver Watkinson - bass
Iris P - vocals
Mike Davies - sound & video
Recorded at Billie Davies studio - Cobra Basement

Palm Trees (Billie Davies) - BILLIE DAVIES - A Nu Experience

BILLIE DAVIES - A Nu Experience
In the recording studio...
Recording the new album "On Hollywood Boulevard"
Palm Trees (Billie Davies)
L to R:
Evan Oberla - piano/synth/trombone
Billie Davies - drums
Oliver Watkinson - bass
Iris P - vocals
Mike Davies - sound & video
Recorded at Billie Davies studio - Cobra Basement

Jacaranda 2 (Billie Davies) - BILLIE DAVIES - A Nu Experience

BILLIE DAVIES - A Nu Experience
In the recording studio...
Recording the new album "On Hollywood Boulevard"
Jacaranda 2 (Billie Davies)
L to R:
Evan Oberla - piano/synth/trombone
Billie Davies - drums
Oliver Watkinson - bass
Iris P - vocals
Mike Davies - sound & video
Recorded at Billie Davies studio - Cobra Basement