Blake Paul
Edmonton, Alberta, Canada | SELF
Music
Press
Come inside the mind of local singer-songwriter Blake Paul on Saturday, Oct. 23, at Calvary Baptist Church, 7215 97th St.
That's when he'll be releasing his EP, Come Inside, featuring five snappy Americanaflavoured tunes about hope and home.
Tickets are $10 at the door. The show starts at 7 p.m. with sets by Jill Hagen and Linnea Salte.
Two of Paul's tracks, Hope Is All I Have and You Can Always Come Home, are available on his Facebook fan group, MySpace page, and blakepaul.bandcamp.com.
Paul, who grew up in rural Saskatchewan and is now a worship arts pastor, was one of the finalists in last year's Gospel Music Association's Cross Canada Talent Search.
Read more: http://www.edmontonjournal.com/entertainment/Inviting+tunes/3656517/story.html#ixzz16uETUGDi - Edmonton Journal
Musician Blake Paul does not believe in balance, he thinks in terms of harmony of seasons.
Growing up on a farm, Paul learned life has seasons. And so he doesn't try to balance being a husband, a worship arts pastor, musician, music teacher and all his other roles — he just makes time for each.
"Life on a farm is incredibly unbalanced at times," he said. "When you're in a harvest season, you're going 16, 18, 19, sometimes 24 hours a day if you can. You grow up with this sense that when there's work to do, you get it done, knowing that in other seasons, in another two or three weeks, you're not going to have much to do."
The Patio Series show at Festival Place, this Wednesday, July 21 at 7:30 p.m., will be Paul's first gig with a full band for the new songs.
Usually, Paul performs acoustically as a singer-songwriter.
Paul is a multi-instrumentalist and plays everything but drums, so he has most of the songs mapped out.
"I still look to my band members to give input, give ideas," he said. "There's this really great feel of collaboration and community on stage."
He said performing with a full-band brings out an energy and chemistry missing with solo acoustic shows, but performing in coffee shops has a more intimate feel.
"I'm going to do at least one song with just me on my acoustic, my friend, Bill, on guitar doing acoustic and our keyboard player," he said.
Paul said real life is the biggest inspiration to his music, and has recently been writing about stories and narratives.
He points to the track "Goen Gone," on his most recent self-titled EP, as an example of life's influence.
"I'm living down on 118 Avenue at the time, which is a pretty rough area of the city, and my office window overlooked the street," he explained. At about 5 p.m. he looks out. "Here's one of the working girls and she was just in this little white cotton dress and she didn't have any shoes on and the light hit her at such a weird angle that she almost looked like a ghost, an apparition."
Thinking about her story, who she was and where she came from, led Paul to imagine who she left behind and the guy she left.
"I'm hugely influenced by spirituality and that story, after I reflected on it, mimics and mirrors a story in scripture in the book of Isaiah," he said.
His most recent EP is in the works, of which Paul did much of the arranging, engineering, playing, and organizing.
The singer-songwriter aspect of his career came about a year and a half ago with the now shutdown songwriter stage at Hulberts.
After encouragement from that stage, he went on to sign up for the Gospel Music Association of Canada song writing contest where he placed in the top 30 in the song writing category and in the top six in the performer category.
"It was a real catalyst for me to keep going," he said.
- Sherwood Park News
Discography
'We Pray' EP (2006)
'Blake Paul' EP (2009)
'Come Inside' EP (2010)
Photos
Bio
It's compelling. It's raw. It's beautiful.
And it's all about the story. This is the sound of Blake Paul, roots country artist from Edmonton, Alberta. Songs that narrate stories about love, relationships, doubt, broken promises, hope, beauty, growing up, and moving on: these are the stories that we all feel, believe and understand.
Blake's distinguishable voice and ability to excel at many instruments, most notably, the guitar, sets him apart in the country world. Influenced by southern and country gospel, with an edge inspired from pop-rock bands like Blue Rodeo and Hootie and the Blowfish, Blake's sound is organic and his music is raw: the emotions, thoughts, feelings that can rarely be formed into words are articulated so simple and true.
Raised in Saskatchewan on a grain farm, Blake grew up with a love for music and family, with southern gospel playing on the radio. Blake became very involved as a church musician with his older sister when he was 15, and by the age of 16, he had his own band and traveled to various churches around town to play. Looking beyond a future in farming and country living, Blake left home at 18 to pursue a future in music, believing in its innate ability to heal wounds, express emotions, and connect people.
Blake Paul's 2010 EP 'Come Inside, displays his talent as a writer, composer, arranger, engineer, co-producer and multi-instrumentalist. 'Come Inside' is a compilation of Blake's most recent works, following EP 'Blake Paul' in 2009 and 'We Pray' in 2006.
A modern-day troubadour, Blake Paul sings songs of love and legends that resonate in the hearts of listeners across Canada. He's played at concerts of every size and dynamic, from coffee shops to conferences, but each performance cultivates intimacy between Blake and his audience - largely due to Blake's big personality and vulnerable lyrics.
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