Frankie Lee releases debut ‘American Dreamer’
Frankie Lee releases his debut album ‘American Dreamer’ through Loose today. Recorded at Real Phonic Studios in Minneapolis, MN, the album will be available on LP, CD and as a download. Born on the banks of the Mississippi river, Lee’s family later moved to Minneapolis. Following the death of his father in a motorcycle accident when he was 12, Frankie immersed himself in the city’s music scene, appearing onstage with local heroes Slim Dunlap (The Replacements) and Curtiss A at the impressionable age of 14. After inheriting records and instruments from his father’s collection, Lee was – as he sees it – “taught to play guitar by a ghost”. He continues, “I was raised on stage. These guys would bring me into the clubs, sit me behind the soundboard and give me all the coca cola I could drink until they’d call me up for a song or two at the end of the night.”
At the age of 20 Lee dropped out of college, re-invested his soccer scholarship fund in a Volvo station wagon, Lee drove down to Nashville where he met Merle Haggard on his first day in town. Lee then moved on to Austin, TX where he spent 6 years working for Townes Van Zandt’s son JT building cabinets outside of town in Buda, TX. The two became good friends and Lee played his first show at a night hosted by JT. “Austin was a Mecca for me, The scene at the time was bursting wide open with everything from Western swing bands to Roky Erikson’s psychedelic garage rock. I was out almost every night for 6 years. There was never an excuse to stay in.”
Soon after he turned 22, Lee was diagnosed with narcolepsy, and was prescribed methamphetamines to counteract its effects. Over the next two years Lee struggled to find a midpoint between sleepwalking and speeding, and developed a serious drug habit in the process he has since kicked. “I ran out of pills for the last time and went to bed for a week and haven’t really woken up since,” he laughs. Returning to his nomadic lifestyle, Lee spent a year living in a farm truck and on couches in LA. Eventually, he was taken in by friend and famed engineer Patrick McCarthy’s (U2, REM, Madonna). The move proved pivotal in Lee’s songwriting process as McCarthy taught him how to listen and record the music he was hearing in his head.
In 2010 Lee moved back from California to Minnesota to be closer to his family. In a series of diners and motels during the long drive he penned the songs which were later released on his DIY ‘Middle West’ EP. Lee has spent the last 3 years working on a hog farm in rural Minnesota and developing songs for his debut album. Many of these songs reflect his change in focus from the guitar to the piano, a move necessitated by a farming accident that crushed of the three finger of his left hand. Of his return to the landscape that is the backdrop of so many of his songs, Lee says, “I’d been gone 10 years. I decided when I got back home, to get back to the land and the people who shaped me. Both sides of my family were North Dakota wheat farmers. Hardworking, soft-spoken, Scandinavians who moved to the middle of nowhere with nothing, and of that place made everything they needed. There’s a movement now to get back to that way of living, and if we’re gonna last a while then that’s the only way we’re gonna make it.”
Frankie Lee has also confirmed his first ever UK and European shows in November. He will be supporting his label-mate Joe Pug for the following shows:
10 NOVEMBER 2015 – GULLIVER’S – MANCHESTER, UK
11 NOVEMBER 2015 – BROADCAST – GLASGOW, UK
12 NOVEMBER 2015 – ST PANCRAS OLD CHURCH – LONDON, UK
13 NOVEMBER 2015 – VESSEL 1 – ROTTERDAM, NETHERLANDS
14 NOVEMBER 2015 – DE KAPEL – EINDHOVEN, NETHERLANDS
15 NOVEMBER 2015 – MOLENERF DE STER, UTRECHT, NETHERLANDS
16 NOVEMBER 2015 – PRIVATCLUB – BERLIN, GERMANY
17 NOVEMBER 2015 – MOJO CLUB, HAMBURG, GERMANY
18 NOVEMBER 2015 – BLUE SHELL – COLOGNE, GERMANY
