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54-40 to perform new album, classics in Kelowna

54-40 will be in Kelowna March 31 performing from their new album Keep On Walking.
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As they celebrate their 38th year as a band, 54-40 will be in Kelowna March 31 performing from their new album Keep On Walking.

The album Keep On Walking has been described as an eclectic, propulsive, album in a career spilling over with them.

Featuring 11 original songs helmed by a quartet of superstar producers, Keep On Walking is a vivid snapshot of precisely where singer/guitarist Neil Osborne, bassist Brad Merritt, drummer Matt Johnson, and guitarist Dave Gennfind themselves today.

The album’s rock anthem “Sucker For Your Love,” is what Osborne describes as “a classic, in-the-wheelhouse 54-40 song.”

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There’s also the breathtakingly intimate, candlelit ballad Hold My Kiss, which Osborne said wrote itself, much like One Gun, I Go Blind and Ocean Pearl.

Elsewhere on the new album, the hard-charging Can’t Hide My Love contrasts sharply with the jangly and deceptively sunny title track.

Those four songs, whittled from 25-odd demos, were produced, respectively, by Garth Richardson (see also 54-40’s Since When from 1998), Gavin Brown (Billy Talent, the Tragically Hip), Steven Drake (54-40’s Trusted by Millions from 1996) and veteran 54-40 accomplice Dave (Rave) Ogilvie, whose multiple credits include 2015’s acclaimed career retrospective, La Difference – A History Unplugged.

Despite input from contributors, Keep On Walking has a seamless vibe, held together equally by Osborne’s voice and panoramic lyrics and by 54-40’s honed-over-decades hivemind. In that sense, Keep On Walking is the quintessential 54-40 record: at once instantly familiar and dazzlingly new.

“Gavin has a system of recording that is tight and efficient but still leaves room for the magic that can happen spontaneously during recording,” said Johnson.

“Steven relies on a creative and open-ended dialogue between the artist and himself to propel the music to its destined place. Garth uses an old-school approach to achieve timeless and performance-oriented recordings. And Rave is what we’d call our fifth member, the ultimate facilitator. All ideas have potential when you are making a record with him.”

The Kelowna show will take place at teh Community Theatre.

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kmichaels@kelownacapnews.com

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