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Jonathan Bree

The work of multi-talented New Zealand musician, producer, and label head Jonathan Bree balances between cheerfully melodic and darkly artistic, and the results have led to numerous successes. He began his musical career in the late '90s with the Brunettes. The chamber pop group signed to Sub Pop, toured the world, and released a run of sunny, witty albums during the 2000s. After that, Bree continued to co-run Lil' Chief Records, worked on albums by Princess Chelsea, and released albums under his own name, beginning in 2013 with The Primrose Path. His solo career is marked by well-planned visual aesthetics and thematically rich albums like 2015's classical music-inspired A Little Night Music and 2020's gently debauched, post-breakup After the Curtains Close. 2023's Pre-Code Hollywood found Bree dipping into the melodramatic sounds of '80s pop with the help of Nile Rodgers. The Brunettes' sound was built around contrasting sweet (sung by Heather Mansfield) and sour (Bree) vocals, sickly sweet pop melodies, and inventive arrangements. The band released their first EP, Mars Loves Venus, in 1998. It was a lathe-cut record of which only 30 copies were pressed. While working on more Brunettes music and finding the prospect of convincing a record label to sign them daunting, Bree and his friend Scott Mannion of the band Tokey Tones decided to form their own label to release music by their respective bands, plus any other New Zealand acts playing the kind of orchestrated pop they liked. The first record on Lil' Chief was the Brunettes' Holding Hands, Feeding Ducks, which came out in 2002. Throughout the rest of the decade, the label released records by Alec Bathgate, the Ruby Suns, the Tokey Tones, and of course, the Brunettes, whose 2014 album Mars Loves Venus and 2005 EP When Ice Met Cream helped them build an international following. The group signed with the legendary Sub Pop and released their next album, 2017's Structure and Cosmetics, in the U.S. The deal proved short-lived, though, and the Brunettes were back to putting out albums on Lil' Chief with 2009's Paper Dolls. The band ceased recording after this, leaving Bree to continue working on Lil' Chief, and in 2011, he and former Brunettes member Chelsea Nikkel collaborated on her album Lil' Golden Book, which was issued under the name Princess Chelsea. It was the result of over three years of work and featured the single "The Cigarette Duet," which was viewed over 20 million times on YouTube. While working on keeping Lil' Chief going with releases by Sheep, Dog & Wolf and the Icypoles, Bree also concentrated on his own music, and in 2013 his first solo album, The Primrose Path, was released. It featured a much more stripped-down sound than the Brunettes had utilized, but his unerring sense for a catchy melody hadn't dimmed at all. At the same time, he and Nikkel were working on the second Princess Chelsea album, The Great Cybernetic Depression, which hit the airwaves in 2015. It was followed quickly by Bree's second album, A Little Night Music, which had a classical influence inspired by a stack of cast-off Tchaikovsky and Béla Bartók albums Bree was given. He blended this newfound influence with his own style and came up with a unique and challenging sound. Bree discarded most of this approach for 2018's Sleepwalking, keeping some of the strings while crafting less Baroque sounds. The videos surrounding the album featured Bree and his band clad in face coverings and wigs; the result was a creepy blend of the Beatles and mannequins come to life. He kept the look for the next album while changing the musical approach to include some mainstream pop production and slickness. 2020's After the Curtains Close featured vocal turns by Princess Chelsea and Britta Phillips and delved lyrically into post-breakup sadness and debauchery. Bree and his band played a handful of shows over the next two years, while also beginning work on another album. During the early stages, Bree realized a couple songs were very much in the vein of early-'80s Nile Rodgers productions, so he emailed the man responsible and received a favorable reply. Rodgers ended up producing and playing guitar on two songs on 2023's Pre-Code Hollywood. The record blended together elements of disco, majestic '80s pop, and chilly synth pop, along with a set of typically barebones lyrics and guest vocals from long-time contributor Princess Chelsea.
© Tim Sendra /TiVo
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Discographie

21 album(s) • Trié par Meilleures ventes

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