PROMOTION / INTERVIEWS
Hanna Backända
Phone: +358-(0)40-562 3233
E-mail: info(at)fallenangelpromotion.com
Address: Reiherintie 1 E 54, 00870, Helsinki
www.fallenangelpromotion.com
www.myspace.com/fallenangelpromotion
KEIKAT / BOOKINGS
Jukka Hoffren
SAM AGENCY
Phone: +358 (0)40 487 4644
E-mail: jukka.hoffren(at)samagency.fi
www.samagency.fi/
Biography:
A dozen different tribute bands, styles differing from singer-songwriter rock to pop and metal, this singer and guitarist has had many irons in the fire. Now he's going solo for the first time in his life.
A musical childhood
Luca Gargano (b.1973) has been active in music since he was a young kid living in a small Finnish town called Porvoo. His first musical influences came from his Italian musician father. As a child he enjoyed classical, jazz and Italian popmusic until it was time to find hard rocking bands like Kiss, Hanoi Rocks and the 80's metal scene with Iron Maiden, Metallica and Anthrax.
Luca started to play guitar and write songs at the age of 12, and he played his first ever gig with his metal band Anxiety at 15. Luca has always been very flexible in music styles, and he studied carefully such giants as the Beatles, AC/DC or Led Zeppelin, but at the same time was open to all kind of popular and art music: Madonna and Chick Corea were heard in his room in perfect harmony with Rainbow or Bach. By the age of 20 he had already performed hardrock with Slamdance, a mixture of funkmetal, rock and disco with No Rabbits, sang jazz and acted in musicals. He also worked with his fathers ballroom dance group, tried briefly to write soft pop and techno and sang gigs with his 14-piece funk orchestra Sister Moon, but rock was the thing he always returned to.
From the Helsinki rock clubs to the streets of Dublin and back
At 23 Luca moved to Helsinki and formed his dream group, a rock extravaganza team called Spumanti. After three years of gigs and recordings the group disbanded since the bass player never returned from Spain. Luca spent the summer of 2000 busking in the streets of Dublin and trying to find new band mates there, but returned to Finland to form Morris - a pop rock band in Finnish. Despite many gigs and some following the group never managed to get a record deal, and slowly vanished when its members played with more successful bands and artists.
In 2001 Luca started Samettiklubi (The Velvet Club), an open stage singer-songwriter night, which he still hosts every second tuesday. There he has always played his new songs in front of a live audience to see people's reactions. After Morris and its heavier follow-up Helsten were over, Luca tried to reform Spumanti, but ended up singing in a hard rock act Cheat Code with musicians that would later become the band for the 2007 Finnish Idol winner Ari Koivunen. Luca toured with Ari Koivunen for a year and wrote some songs for his 2008 album Becoming before deciding to return to his plan to revive Spumanti. In 2008 he formed Spumanti Crush and released a 5 song EP, but due to schedule problems the group disbanded and Luca decided to go solo.
Time to look back in laughter
By the end of 2009 Luca was to build his album from over 300 songs written during the past 20 years, but he picked just one song written in the streets of Dublin and songs from the Spumanti Crush EP which deserved to get a better recorded version. Otherwise he wrote the album between November and January, and in March 2010 he had a great band in the studio. Santeri Saksala on drums, Jukka Jylli on bass, Toni Lunden on guitar and Mikko Ojala on keyboards form a fine rocking ensemble with a touch of the 70's brought to today. The songs were first played live in February, and the first single Little By Little was released in May 2010. The album has a theme of looking back and ahead at the same time. "It is about changes in life: some things end, other things start. Just be ready to move on when you have to, and remember to always look back with at least a smile on your face."
At the same time with his own musical projects, Luca has performed a lot with a 50-piece choir Koiton Laulu and with his tribute bands playing the music of Foo Fighters, Queen, Mötley Crüe, Lucio Battisti and various different artists. He has also worked as a journalist for the Finnish national radio and TV as well as a DJ in rock/metal bars and hosted and managed festival stages. Today he's a radio teacher and a musician about to finally release his first album - while already thinking of the second.
"You have to have plans, always. If one thing doesn't work out, go for plan b and c. Just have a new plan ready. Otherwise you'll just end up doing nothing, and how would you explain that to your grandchildren!"
