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It’s “3 Minutes to Midnight” and Lawson Rollins has “Island Time” on his mind

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It’s “3 Minutes to Midnight” and Lawson Rollins has “Island Time” on his mind

The world music guitarist is feeling “Golden” about landing his first motion picture score.  

SAN FRANCISCO (23 January 2017): Award-winning world music guitarist Lawson Rollins has the Billboard, America’s Music Charts and Groove Jazz Music charts under the hypnotic spell of his new single, “Island Time,” the first cut taken from his seventh album, “3 Minutes to Midnight,” which was released last Friday (January 20) by Infinita Records. Radio programmers at influential national outlets, including SiriusXM’s Watercolors and Broadcast Architecture, have made the seductive waltz paced by Rollins’ beguiling fingerstyle nylon guitar come-ons one of the “most added” and “most played” new singles on the first two charts published in 2017. Another composition appearing on the multicultural and multi-genre collection written by Rollins, the mystical meditation “Eternal,” began receiving airplay last month on the nationally-syndicated public radio program Echoes. “3 Minutes to Midnight” wasted no time climbing into the top 20 of the iTunes world music album sales chart.

Adopting a “Brevity is the soul of wit” mantra while crafting the twelve tunes that form “3 Minutes to Midnight,” Rollins opted to communicate with a sense of urgency, immediacy and poignancy perhaps to contrast the clutter and clamor incessantly assaulting our senses and shrinking bandwidths. He eschewed his long-held penchant for sprawling compositions and opulently-layered audioscapes in favor of clear and concise constructs – all in the three-minute range – with a pared down sonic aesthetic. Producing the session with multi-platinum producer Dominic Camardella, Rollins’ new set evokes a full gamut of moods and emotions ranging from passion, energetic and excitement to brooding, melancholic and pensive.

In the March issue of Guitar Player that is slated to hit magazine racks early next month, Rollins, whose virtuosic classical guitar technique has amassed over 10 million YouTube views, discusses “3 Minutes to Midnight” as well as nabbing his first film score. In a feature story that serves as the cover to the magazine’s “Frets” section, he talks about composing the music and serving as the music supervisor and executive producer of “Golden,” a movie described as a modern day psychological morality thriller currently in post-production.

“The soundtrack is going to be all original material from me on acoustic, electric, slide and Spanish guitars, backed by two-time Grammy-winning Danish violinist Mads Tolling, Native American master flute player Guillermo Martinez (of the Tarascan tribe) and multi-instrumentalist Stephen Duros. It’s going to be a haunting soundtrack of acoustic Americana guitar motifs, blues-based electric guitar playing, violin fiddling, and Native American flute and drumming fused with some contemporary synthesizer and percussive elements,” said Rollins, a San Francisco-based artist whose authentic world beat sound and earthy ethereal recordings foretold eventual work in cinema.

Along with garnering robust radio play and early chart action, “3 Minutes to Midnight” is being well received by critics. Below is a sampling of the initial reviews:

“If your ears are thirsting for swirling guitar work that will thrill your heart and bring you up out of whatever funky mood you’re in – Lawson’s new (January 20th, 2017) release is just perfect for doing that.” – Improvijazzation Nation

“Lawson Rollins once again takes the listener on a magical musical journey…A nicely balanced release of 12 tracks together with Rollins’ exquisite guitar work as great as ever, means that ‘3 Minutes to Midnight’ is one of those albums that quickly becomes addictive listening.” – Exclusive Magazine

“This American artist is one of the most creative world music and fusion guitarists in the world.” – Keys & Chords

“As one of those guitarists who first captured my attention with his Latin-infused and Nuevo Flamenco guitar style quite a while ago, Lawson Rollins continues to provide awe-inspiring melodies and riffs on his latest release, ‘3 Minutes to Midnight.’…these compositions, all penned by Rollins, by the way, are simply filled with the moving vibe that defies description but always speaks to you and manages to transport you to some wondrous land of color and intrigue.” – The Smooth Jazz Ride

“Classic, acoustic guitar jazz with a hint of the exotic.” – Soul and Jazz and Funk

“Firmly staking out his territory as a world beat guitarist par excellence…A tasty treat throughout.” – Midwest Record

“’3 Minutes to Midnight’ is dazzling, pertinent and explosive.” – SmoothJazz.com

For more information about Rollins, please visit www.LawsonRollins.com. To view the “Golden” trailer, go to www.GoldenTheMovie.com.

World music guitarist Lawson Rollins muses time on “3 Minutes to Midnight”

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Tick, tick, tick…World music guitarist Lawson Rollins muses time on “3 Minutes to Midnight”  

The exotic and sensual first radio single, “Sway,” previews the January 20 album release that conveys the urgency of the moment.  

SAN FRANCISCO (1 November 2016): Three minutes to midnight. Time is lapsing. What would you do with the final moments of your day? Award-winning world beat guitarist Lawson Rollins pondered that question as he entered the recording studio to craft his seventh album, “3 Minutes to Midnight,” which will be released on January 20 via the Infinita Records label. Focusing on “the urgency of the moment, the exhilaration of the speed of sound, the poignancy of the remains of the day and the mystical power of the number three,” Rollins wrote a dozen multicultural compositions – all in the three minute range and illuminated by his prodigious fingerstyle guitar play. The recording is stripped down, punchy and concise, a radical departure for the Billboard chart-topping artist known for creating lavishly produced and elaborately-constructed tracks that are at least twice as long.

“I really made an effort to pare down my musical flights of fancy and focus on the essentials instead of diverging into various plots and subplots within the song structure. The songs have an urgent, succinct quality and are unencumbered by elaborate instrumentation. This is the first time I came up with the title and overall concept early on in the process. I don’t know if it’s a reaction to the times we live in, with our shrinking bandwidth for complexity and desire for clarity, or if I just wanted to be as impactful and expressive as I could across a range of emotions – from exciting, passionate and bursting with energy to sad, contemplative and meditative,” said Rollins, who will introduce the new material when the sultry first single, “Sway,” is serviced to radio programmers for airplay ahead of the album’s release date.

Like his previous discs, Rollins produced “3 Minutes to Midnight” with multi-platinum producer Dominic Camardella utilizing the same core group of musicians. Grammy-winning violinist Charlie Bisharat, bassist Randy Tico and drummer/percussionist Dave Bryant joined Rollins (guitar, keyboards, drum programming) and Camardella (piano, Rhodes piano, Hammond organ) along with newcomers to the fold Stephen Duros (drum programming) and Forrest Marquisse (pedal steel). Since fans have marveled at videos of his dazzling and dexterous classical guitar technique that have generated a whopping 8 million YouTube views, Rollins welcomed cameras into the Santa Barbara Sound Design studio to capture the recording of his guitar parts for three videos – including one lensed during the tracking of “Sway” – that are now posted on YouTube and Rollins’ website (www.LawsonRollins.com).

Rollins has landed on Billboard’s Top 10 World Music Albums chart and four of his collections placed singles on the Billboard Top 30 contemporary jazz radio chart. Recently he collected three major awards from the Akademia Music Awards (Best Jazz Song), the USA Songwriting Competition (1st place, Instrumental) and the Global Music Awards (triple gold medal winner). Why does the number three continue to come up for the long-time San Francisco resident?

“Three is a significant number that resonates in the human psyche and has a mystical power in our culture. Three is significant not only in world religions, but also in simple human terms with our body, mind and spirit triad. With songs, we have a beginning, middle and end. We even sync up with others on the count of three. Ready, set, go!,” noted Rollins, who released the albums “Traveler” and “Infinite Chill (The Remix Sessions)” last year, spawning the radio hits “Berlin Bossa” and “Café Paris (chill remix).”

The “3 Minutes to Midnight” album, which was mastered at New York City’s Sterling Sound, contains the following songs:

“3 Minutes to Midnight”

“Light the Way”

“Sway”

“Island Time”

“Driving Force”

“Southbound”

“Stringdance”

“Time Shift”

“Reveal”

“Split Second”

“Eternal”

“Mary’s Rock”

Have guitar. will travel‏

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Have guitar, will travel

 

Lawson Rollins is a virtuosic tour guide on a musical exploration around the globe on his fifth album, “Traveler,” which will be released February 17.

San Francisco, California (15 January 2015): Many people travel from an encapsulated distance, staying at posh brand name hotels and dining under the golden arches while others prefer to explore by blending amongst the natives for a more immersive and organic experience of the actual sights and sounds of a culture. Award-winning guitarist Lawson Rollins lives by the latter philosophy, taking his guitar with him to view and interpret his global journeys. Writing twelve expansive compositions that are wordless diary entries encapsulating his travels, Rollins’s virtuoso guitar parlance speaks a universal language on tales of exhilarating adventure, intriguing mystery and enticing romance on his fifth album, “Traveler,” which will be released by his Infinita Records label and distributed by Baja/TSR Records on February 17.

Rollins’s traveling companion once again is platinum-selling producer-engineer Dominic Camardella, who has shared the helm on each of the guitarist’s previous releases that, like “Traveler,” are audacious border-crossing quests of melodic and rhythmic jazz and world beat. Joining them to create the intricate aural backdrops upon which Rollins unfurls masterful and impassioned fretwork on intercontinental and coast-to-coast exchanges was a noted ensemble comprised of Grammy-winning violinists Mads Tolling and Charlie Bisharat, Randy Tico (bass), Dave Bryant (drums & percussion) and Cameron Stone (cello). On select tracks they were joined by a horn section in addition to contributions from Big Bad Voodoo Daddy members Scotty Morris, Joshua Levy and Karl Hunter. Both Rollins and Camardella added keyboards and piano to the earthy mix on “Traveler” that Rollins describes as “a gypsy jazz amalgamation of travels.”

A Billboard singles chart-topper (“Moonlight Samba”) who has hit both the contemporary jazz (Top 30) and world music (Top 10) albums charts while amassing nearly eight million YouTube views for videos showcasing the guitarist’s mesmerizing technique, Rollins says, “‘Traveler’ is a musical travelogue for me, chronicling some of my journeys in life and evoking some of the places I’ve lived, visited and returned to in my memory. The album starts with the African-flavored title track ‘Traveler’ and continues north to Spain (‘Barcelona Express’ and ‘Meeting in Madrid’), France (‘Cafe Paris’), Germany (‘Berlin Bossa’) and England (‘Across the Moors’), and then over the Atlantic to Louisiana (‘Beyond the Bayou’) where I lived for a time after college. Next, we head to California with ‘Marching West’ and ‘Journey Home.’ The album concludes with the modern, electronica-infused ‘Urban Trilogy’ that evokes my times spent in New York, London, Tokyo and San Francisco. On this journey, my guitar serves as a kind of filter through which my impressions of the world are processed and expressed in the language of music.”

Presaging the album release at radio is “City Electric,” a vibrant, pulsating EDM energizer unlike anything Rollins has ever recorded before. The single starts as one of the most added on this week’s charts.

In December, Rollins won the prestigious 2014 USA Songwriting Competition’s best instrumental song and was the first ever instrumentalist to place third overall in the 20th year of the international contest that attracts 25,000 submissions from 80 countries. The complex and emotional “Shifting Seasons” appears on the artist’s 2013 release, “Full Circle.” Rollins has topped the most-played chart on SiriusXM Radio’s Watercolors resulting in a guest DJ hosting gig. The San Francisco, California-based musician debuted as a solo artist on 2008’s “Infinita” offering an inventive fusion of Latin, Indian, Persian, Arabic, South American and Euro stylings along with a guest appearance by Brazilian jazz vocal legend Flora Purim. Earlier in his career, Rollins partnered with Daniel Young to form Young & Rollins, a duo that crafted an eclectic mélange on four albums of salsa, bossa nova, flamenco, Latin and jazz grooves, hitting the Billboard Top 25.

“Traveler” contains the following songs:

“Traveler”

“Barcelona Express”

”Café Paris”

“Berlin Bossa”

“Meeting in Madrid”

“Marching West”

“Journey Home”

“Beyond the Bayou”

“Across the Moors”

-The Urban Trilogy:

“Metropolis”

“Ancient City”

“City Electric”

For more information, please visit www.LawsonRollins.com.