Life Is Hard Mike Zito
Album Info
Album Veröffentlichung:
2024
HRA-Veröffentlichung:
24.07.2026
Das Album enthält Albumcover
- 1 Lonely Man 03:51
- 2 Life Is Hard 04:33
- 3 Have A Talk With God 04:34
- 4 Forever My Love 06:19
- 5 No One To Talk To (But The Blues) 03:01
- 6 Dying To Do Wrong 03:38
- 7 These Eyes 05:09
- 8 Darkness 04:04
- 9 Without Loving You 05:20
- 10 Nobody Moves Me Like You Do 04:52
- 11 Death Don't Have No Mercy 04:16
- 12 Forever My Love (Radio Edit) 04:21
Info zu Life Is Hard
Mike Zito, „Life Is Hard“. Zito nahm das neue Album im September in den Sunset Sound Studios in Hollywood, Kalifornien, unter der Produktion von Joe Bonamassa und Josh Smith auf. Sowohl Bonamassa als auch Smith waren an der Produktion von „Blood Brothers“ beteiligt, dem von der Kritik hochgelobten Album, das Zito gemeinsam mit seinem Labelkollegen, dem Gitarristen Albert Castiglia, aufgenommen hatte. Die zwölf Titel auf „Life Is Hard“ umfassen nicht nur mehrere Eigenkompositionen von Mike Zito, sondern auch seine Interpretationen einer Vielzahl von Blues-Songs, die von Zeitgenossen wie Tinsley Ellis, Walter Trout, Tab Benoit und Fred James geschrieben wurden. Dazwischen finden sich Coverversionen von einer vielfältigen Auswahl an Ikonen der Blues- und Roots-Musik, darunter Little Milton („Lonely Man“), Stevie Wonder („Have a Talk with God“) und Reverend Gary Davis („Death Don’t Have No Mercy“), sowie eine unkonventionelle, blueswürdige Interpretation des Guess-Who-Klassikers „These Eyes“.
„‚Life Is Hard‘ ist für mich ein vollendetes Kunstwerk. Ich glaube, dies ist das beste Album, das ich je in meinem Leben aufgenommen habe. Meine Frau Laura und ich hatten die Idee, mein Herz in der Musik auszuschütten, nachdem sie an Krebs gestorben war. Joe, Josh und die unglaublichen Musiker waren sich der vor ihnen liegenden Aufgabe voll und ganz bewusst. Sie haben der Musik viel Emotion verliehen. Ich bin so stolz auf dieses Album, und ich weiß, dass Laura ebenfalls stolz wäre.“
Mike Zito, Gitarre, Gesang
Joe Bonamassa, zusätzliche Gitarre
Josh Smith, zusätzliche Gitarre
Reese Wynans, Keyboards
Calvin Turner, Bass
Lemar Carter, Schlagzeug
Paulie Cerra, Saxophon (Track 1)
Jennifer Kumma, Waldhorn (Tracks 4, 7)
Anna Spina, Waldhorn (Tracks 4, 7)
Jade Macrae, Hintergrundgesang
Dannielle Deandrea, Hintergrundgesang
Steve Ray Ladson, Hintergrundgesang (Track 11)
Calvin Turner, Arrangements für Waldhorn
Mike Zito
Singer, guitarist and songwriter Mike Zito grew up in St. Louis, immersed in the gritty and soulful sounds of the city’s south side that would provide the groundwork for his future in music. He began singing and performing at the age of five, received his first guitar not long afterward, and music has been his guiding force ever since. Working at a local guitar shop after high school, he encountered many of the legends of the local music scene. “Everyone from Chuck Berry to [bluesman] Bennie Smith came in that store,” Zito says of his experience. “I soaked up the sounds of that store, and began building my own style.”
Zito’s journey took off in earnest at the age of 19, when he began making a name for himself as a unique new voice on the highly competitive St. Louis music scene. His incessant touring schedule found him crisscrossing the country playing everywhere from funky roadhouses to major festival stages to an international tour for the USO, and performing in front of enthusiastic crowds six nights a week around St. Louis when not on the road. During this period of intense music making Zito began to hone and polish his art, developing a breathtaking level of virtuosity and a unique expressive voice with both his singing and guitar playing, while at the same time stripping away the non-essential elements and cutting to the core of what moved a live audience.
But throwing himself headfirst into the pursuit of his art had a toll, and Zito paid it. The non-stop lifestyle led to a dark and dangerous period during which Zito came close to drinking and drugging away all that he’d worked so hard to establish. It took time, but thankfully, with the help and intervention of friends and supporters in the music business, loved ones, and the woman who would become his wife, Zito regained his faith in himself and his music, cleaned up his act, and settled down in Southeast Texas to begin anew.
With a clean slate, a fresh outlook, and a new dedication to his music, Zito now also had a message of positivity and redemption that has informed his new music with a deeper meaning and taken it to an entirely new level. Zito is that rare new artist who completely in synch with the contemporary music scene, while at the same time having a lifetime’s worth of experience to draw from that informs his music with soul, depth, and lasting appeal that grows with repeated listening.
Dieses Album enthält kein Booklet