Chicago "sultry dirge" duo Redgrave release their debut 'National Act' [Video]

Chicago "sultry dirge" duo Redgrave release their debut National Act this June via Lovitt Records.

Vocalist/guitarist Angie Mead and drummer Stephen Howard generate a massive sound thanks to Mead's powerful, soaring voice and sludgy open tunings backed by Howard's refined rhythmic stomp.

Redgrave's songs have the sort of smoldering intensity shared by PJ Harvey and Led Zeppelin alike that is hard to categorize, but immediately easy to feel.

National Act was recorded by revered engineer Greg Norman (Russian Circles, Pelican).

Watch a live in-studio performance video shot at the band's first ever live show.

Redgrave Live at Strobe Recording, Chicago - "Custom A":

Mead started writing and recording Redgrave songs in marathon stretches beginning August 2010 from her home in Chicago after furniture was moved into storage and replaced with recording equipment, drums and guitars. She sent these demos to Chicago musician Stephen Howard, whose work she'd admired as guitarist and drummer in Pinebender.

A working musician since the age of 13, Howard had grown up playing local Chicago blues clubs; his teachers included Willie Smith, John Primer and Eddie Clearwater, his classrooms in music included stages across the U.S., Europe and Africa.

Mead has always played a right-handed guitar upside down - a backwards model mimicking Albert King that roughens up her playing. But through playing with Howard, she discovered a way of singing that made her voice crest above his gale-storm drumming. They've been playing together as Redgrave since January 2011.

Redgrave released a debut 2-song 7" in Fall 2011 on Lovitt Records.

Tim Rutili of Califone/Red Red Meat fame lends his guitar prowess to the track "Gone To Wither" on the single, with art design by David Yow of The Jesus Lizard.

Produced by Stephen Howard, recorded and mixed by Greg Norman at his studio in Chicago. Lovitt will issue National Act on 12" vinyl and download on June 12th, 2012.

Redgrave 2012 tour dates:

(Dates and information subject to change.)

May 26 2012 Chicago, IL @ Quenchers
June 09 2012 Chicago, IL @ Martyrs
June 13 2012 Chicago, IL @ The Whistler (record release show)
June 22 2012 Dubuque, IA @ The Lift
June 23 2012 Clive, IA @ Bombay Bicycle Club
June 29 2012 Chicago, IL @ Lincoln Hall (w/ Pelican, Anatomy of Habit)

Artist: Redgrave
Album: National Act
Label: Lovitt Records
Release Date: June 12th, 2012

01. D**k Moves
02. Custom A
03. Assault Song
04. Lik-M-Aid
05. Taunt

"A scorching new band...they play howling hard rock with undercurrents of doom and blues." ­-- Chicago Reader

"Sultry dirges" -- Time Out Chicago

"This Chicago duo sounds like they're preying on you, with their slow, deliberately plodding, simmering, stalking kind of stomp, with spare drum parts by Stephen Howard (Ambulette, Pinebender) that are nonetheless proto-metal mean, and a guitar from singer Angie Mead that spits, burps, and subverts the blues like The Move did on "Brontosaurus" nicking the nascent Led Zeppelin, while she bellows like a Robert Plant gone girl for good like My Brightest Diamond's Shara Worden." -- The Big Takeover

Redgrave Official Website