Tom White (musician)
Encyclopedia
Thomas White is a Brighton
, England
-based musician, producer and visual artist. Educated at Davigdor Infants, Somerhill Juniors and Hove Park
schools, he began learning the piano at the age of 5, picking up the violin a year later and teaching himself guitar, drums and clarinet in his early teens. White formed his first band (Fixed Ascent, later The Feltro Media) at the age of 13, with his brother, Alex, and school-friend Alistair Gavan (later of Diomedes, Sparrow and Villareal). He signed his first record deal (with DB Records) whilst still 16 and studying for his GCSE's.
Along with his brother, Alex
, he forms the nucleus of psych-pop band The Electric Soft Parade
. To date, they have released three albums and a six-track EP. He also contributes vocals
and guitar
to cult Brighton super-group Brakes
, and drums
and bass to Restlesslist and Clowns respectively.
In 10 years of playing professionally, Thomas has performed in over 20 countries across the globe, including Sweden, Norway, Denmark, Belgium, France, Germany, Holland, Switzerland, Austria, Italy, Spain, Portugal, Japan, Australia, Egypt, Canada, United States and Turkey.
Besides performing solo and in his own groups, White regularly appears as a session player for, among others, Patrick Wolf
, British Sea Power
and Sparks
.
' (Cooking Vinyl
) arrived in March 2010. Whilst still played, recorded and mixed by Thomas himself, the album features a markedly more complex, hi-fi sound, and a sleeve designed by the American
artist, Keith Boadwee. The album was released to generally positive reviews, with Uncut
magazine awarding four stars, stating:
"The Maximalist opens the dam of ostensibly conflicting styles and releases the deluge in all its' crazily self-confident, so-wrong-it's-right glory. White fuses elements of The Who, Chicago, My Bloody Valentine, Queens Of The Stone Age, Badalamenti and Badfinger, which is not just a feat of cut-and-paste engineering, but also proof of his verve, vivid imagination and fervent love of music."
Tour dates to support the album have varied from full-on rock shows with a five-piece band, intimate cabaret performances, often featuring a number of cover version
s ("I'll See You In My Dreams" and "You Can Have Him (I Don't Want Him)", among others) to festival dates with an expanded 13-piece line-up, featuring a choir dressed in psychedelic robes.
The Feltro Media
The Electric Soft Parade
Brakes
Restlesslist
Thomas White
Patrick Wolf
Brakes
Restlesslist
Thomas White
Patrick Wolf
Brighton
Brighton is the major part of the city of Brighton and Hove in East Sussex, England on the south coast of Great Britain...
, England
England
England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Scotland to the north and Wales to the west; the Irish Sea is to the north west, the Celtic Sea to the south west, with the North Sea to the east and the English Channel to the south separating it from continental...
-based musician, producer and visual artist. Educated at Davigdor Infants, Somerhill Juniors and Hove Park
Hove Park School
Hove Park School is a secondary school and sixth form centre located over two sites in Hove, East Sussex, England. Since 2002 the school has been accredited as a specialist Language College....
schools, he began learning the piano at the age of 5, picking up the violin a year later and teaching himself guitar, drums and clarinet in his early teens. White formed his first band (Fixed Ascent, later The Feltro Media) at the age of 13, with his brother, Alex, and school-friend Alistair Gavan (later of Diomedes, Sparrow and Villareal). He signed his first record deal (with DB Records) whilst still 16 and studying for his GCSE's.
Along with his brother, Alex
Alex White (musician)
Alex White is a multi-instrumentalist who, along with brother Tom, forms the nucleus of Brighton band The Electric Soft Parade. Alex also plays drums in Brakes...
, he forms the nucleus of psych-pop band The Electric Soft Parade
The Electric Soft Parade
The Electric Soft Parade are an English psych-pop band from Brighton, comprising brothers Alex and Thomas White, the creative core of the band, as well as a number of other musicians with whom they record and perform live, most recently including Andrew Mitchell and Damo Waters, as well as...
. To date, they have released three albums and a six-track EP. He also contributes vocals
Singing
Singing is the act of producing musical sounds with the voice, and augments regular speech by the use of both tonality and rhythm. One who sings is called a singer or vocalist. Singers perform music known as songs that can be sung either with or without accompaniment by musical instruments...
and guitar
Guitar
The guitar is a plucked string instrument, usually played with fingers or a pick. The guitar consists of a body with a rigid neck to which the strings, generally six in number, are attached. Guitars are traditionally constructed of various woods and strung with animal gut or, more recently, with...
to cult Brighton super-group Brakes
Brakes (band)
Brakes is a four member band from Brighton, England. The group formed in 2003. It consists of Eamon Hamilton , Thomas White , Marc Beatty , and Alex White .-Biography:Brakes formed in 2003, when Thomas White and Alex White of The Electric Soft Parade saw Eamon Hamilton perform...
, and drums
Drum kit
A drum kit is a collection of drums, cymbals and often other percussion instruments, such as cowbells, wood blocks, triangles, chimes, or tambourines, arranged for convenient playing by a single person ....
and bass to Restlesslist and Clowns respectively.
In 10 years of playing professionally, Thomas has performed in over 20 countries across the globe, including Sweden, Norway, Denmark, Belgium, France, Germany, Holland, Switzerland, Austria, Italy, Spain, Portugal, Japan, Australia, Egypt, Canada, United States and Turkey.
Besides performing solo and in his own groups, White regularly appears as a session player for, among others, Patrick Wolf
Patrick Wolf
Patrick Wolf is an English-Irish singer-songwriter from South London. Patrick utilises a wide variety of instruments in his music, most commonly the ukulele, piano and viola...
, British Sea Power
British Sea Power
British Sea Power are an indie rock band based in Brighton, England, although three of the band members originally come from Kendal in Cumbria. Critics have likened their sound to a variety of groups, from The Cure and Joy Division to the Pixies and Arcade Fire. The band are famed for their live...
and Sparks
Sparks
-People:*Sparks , people with Sparks as family name or given name*Sparks , a character in Enter the Matrix and The Matrix Revolutions-Places:United States*Sparks, Georgia*Sparks, Kansas*Sparks, Maryland*Sparks, Nebraska...
.
"I Dream Of Black"
June 2008 saw the release of his debut solo album, I Dream of Black. Recorded entirely on cassette four-track, the album was considered extremely lo-fi by both fans and critics alike."The Maximalist"
A follow-up, 'The MaximalistMaximalist
Maximalist is a quality of excessive redundancy oft exhibited by way of the overt accumulation of appurtenances that reflect current society. In other references the term refers to either the ostentatious displays of the extensive possessions of the super-rich or the obsessive collecting as...
' (Cooking Vinyl
Cooking Vinyl
Cooking Vinyl is a UK-based independent record company, founded in 1986. Its original orientation was toward contemporary folk music—notably Billy Bragg, and Michelle Shocked's Texas Campfire Tapes, recorded on a Sony Walkman, one of its first releases...
) arrived in March 2010. Whilst still played, recorded and mixed by Thomas himself, the album features a markedly more complex, hi-fi sound, and a sleeve designed by the American
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
artist, Keith Boadwee. The album was released to generally positive reviews, with Uncut
UNCUT (magazine)
Uncut magazine, trademarked as UNCUT, is a monthly publication based in London. It is available across the English-speaking world, and focuses on music, but also includes film and books sections...
magazine awarding four stars, stating:
"The Maximalist opens the dam of ostensibly conflicting styles and releases the deluge in all its' crazily self-confident, so-wrong-it's-right glory. White fuses elements of The Who, Chicago, My Bloody Valentine, Queens Of The Stone Age, Badalamenti and Badfinger, which is not just a feat of cut-and-paste engineering, but also proof of his verve, vivid imagination and fervent love of music."
Tour dates to support the album have varied from full-on rock shows with a five-piece band, intimate cabaret performances, often featuring a number of cover version
Cover version
In popular music, a cover version or cover song, or simply cover, is a new performance or recording of a contemporary or previously recorded, commercially released song or popular song...
s ("I'll See You In My Dreams" and "You Can Have Him (I Don't Want Him)", among others) to festival dates with an expanded 13-piece line-up, featuring a choir dressed in psychedelic robes.
"Yalla!"
On March 26, 2011, Thomas streamed his third solo album for free via YouTube. Entitled 'Yalla!" (Egyptian for 'come here' or 'follow me') the album was written and recorded over two weeks in the small town of Dahab, South Sinai. Featuring only acoustic guitar and vocal, the album details the limbo at the end of a long relationship compared to that of moving to a foreign country, making myriad references to the sea, shorelines, water, the sun, colours, the weather, travel and nature. All accompanying videos feature footage taken in Brighton, Dahab and Cairo. "Yalla!" will be released physically in the UK and digitally worldwide by Bleeding Hearts Recordings in February 2011.Albums
Fixed Ascent- I Am Lost Self-released Cassette EP, 1997 (Guitarist)
- I Am Lost Self-released CD Album, 1997 (Singer/Guitarist)
The Feltro Media
- Metronome's End Self-released CD Album, 1998 (Drummer)
- Go On, Phone In Sick Self-released CD Album, 1999 (Singer/Drummer)
- Neon Of The City Self-released CD EP, 1999 (Singer/Drummer)
- The Wonderful World Of The Feltro Media Skye Records, 2000 (Singer/Multi-Instrumentalist)
The Electric Soft Parade
- Holes in the WallHoles in the WallHoles in the Wall is an album by The Electric Soft Parade, released in February 2002. The album was released on DB Records and was nominated for the Mercury Music Prize...
DB Records, 2002 (Singer/Multi-Instrumentalist) - The American AdventureThe American Adventure (album)The American Adventure is the second album by UK prog-pop duo The Electric Soft Parade, released in 2003 on BMG UK & Ireland. The album was seen as a departure from their previous effort Holes in the Wall and paved the way for their third full-length LP, No Need To Be Down-Hearted.-Critical...
BMG, 2003 (Singer/Multi-Instrumentalist) - The Human Body EPThe Human Body EPThe Human Body EP is an EP by The Electric Soft Parade, released in 2005. The song "The Captain" is a bonus track on the U.S. release of the EP.-Original release:# "A Beating Heart" – 3:07# "Cold World" – 4:07# "Stupid Mistake" – 2:42...
Truck Records/Better Looking Records, 2005 (Singer/Multi-Instrumentalist) - No Need to Be DownheartedNo Need to Be DownheartedNo Need to Be Downhearted is an album by The Electric Soft Parade, released in 2007. The first single was "If That's the Case, Then I Don't Know".The album was named after a lyric from The Fall's song "15 Ways" from their album Middle Class Revolt....
Truck Records/Better Looking Records/Five Man Army, 2007 (Singer/Multi-Instrumentalist)
Brakes
- Give BloodGive Blood (Brakes album)Give Blood is the debut album from the Brighton-based band, Brakes. The album was recorded onto 2" tape and mixed onto 1/4" tape in January 2005. Brakes and their 22-year old producer, Iain Gore, also removed all computer screens from the studio for the week and all the tracks were recorded live,...
Rough Trade, 2005 (Guitarist) - The Beatific VisionsThe Beatific VisionsThe Beatific Visions is the second album by Brakes. It was released in November 2006. The Rough Trade Shop named it the fourth best album of the year.-Track listing:#"Hold Me in the River" – 2:00#"Margarita" – 2:06#"If I Should Die Tonight" – 2:01...
Rough Trade, 2006 (Guitarist/Singer) - TouchdownTouchdown (Brakes album)Touchdown is the third album from the Brighton-based band Brakes, released in 2009.-Track listing:#"Two Shocks" - 3:49#"Don’t Take Me To Space " - 2:41#"Red Rag" - 1:33#"Worry About It Later" - 2:03#"Crush On You" - 3:14...
Fat Cat Records, 2009 (Guitarist/Drummer/Singer) - Rock Is Dodelijk Fat Cat Records, 2009 (Guitarist/Singer)
Restlesslist
- The Rise And Fall Of The Curtain Club Life Is Easy, 2008 (Drummer/Keyboardist)
- Coral Island Girl 2012 (Drummer/Keyboardist)
Thomas White
- I Dream of Black Drift Records, 2008 (Singer/Multi-Instrumentalist)
- The Maximalist Cooking Vinyl, 2010 (Singer/Multi-Instrumentalist)
- Yalla! Bleeding Hearts Recordings, 2012 (Singer/Guitarist)
Patrick Wolf
- The BachelorThe Bachelor (album)The Bachelor is the fourth studio album by English-Irish singer-songwriter Patrick Wolf. The organ parts were recorded using the organ at St. George's church in Brede, East Sussex. The album charted at #49 on the UK album charts...
Bandstocks, 2009 (Guitarist) - LupercaliaLupercaliaLupercalia was a very ancient, possibly pre-Roman pastoral festival, observed on February 13 through 15 to avert evil spirits and purify the city, releasing health and fertility...
Hideout, 2011 (Guitarist)
Singles
The Electric Soft Parade- Silent To The Dark/Something's Got To Give DB Records, 2001 (Singer/Multi-Instrumentalist)
- Empty At The End DB Records, 2001 (Singer/Multi-Instrumentalist)
- There's A Silence DB Records, 2001 (Multi-Instrumentalist)
- Silent To The Dark II DB Records, 2002 (Singer/Multi-Instrumentalist)
- Empty At The End DB Records, 2002 (Singer/Multi-Instrumentalist)
- Same Way, Every Day DB Records, 2002 (Singer/Multi-Instrumentalist)
- Things I've Done Before BMG, 2003 (Singer/Multi-Instrumentalist)
- Lose Yr Frown BMG, 2003 (Singer/Multi-Instrumentalist)
- Life In The Back-Seat Truck Records, 2006 (Producer/Singer/Multi-Instrumentalist)
- f That's The Case, Then I Don't Know Truck Records, 2007 (Producer/Singer/Multi-Instrumentalist)
- MisunderstandingMisunderstandingMisunderstanding may refer to:* A mistaken or incorrect understanding*Misunderstanding *Misunderstanding *"Misunderstandings", an episode of As Time Goes By...
Truck Records, 2007 (Producer/Singer/Multi-Instrumentalist) - Appropriate Ending EP Truck Records, 2007 (Producer/Singer/Multi-Instrumentalist)
- A Quick One EP A Quick One Records, 2011 (Producer/Singer/Multi-Instrumentalist)
Brakes
- Pick Up the PhonePick Up the Phone"Pick Up the Phone" was the debut single from Brakes. It is a political rant bemoaning the failure of the world's leaders to sort out major issues. It implores the leaders of Israel, Palestine, America and the United Kingdom to simply "pick up the phone" and talk to each other...
Rough Trade, 2004 (Guitarist) - All Night Disco PartyAll Night Disco Party"All Night Disco Party" is a song by Brakes. It was the band's second single and the first to be released on Rough Trade Records as opposed to its spin-off label Tugboat. The song showed Brakes progress from being a side project to a serious proposition as it picked up airplay, especially with the...
Rough Trade, 2005 (Guitarist) - Ring a Ding Ding Rough Trade, 2005 (Guitarist)
- All Night Disco PartyAll Night Disco Party"All Night Disco Party" is a song by Brakes. It was the band's second single and the first to be released on Rough Trade Records as opposed to its spin-off label Tugboat. The song showed Brakes progress from being a side project to a serious proposition as it picked up airplay, especially with the...
Rough Trade, 2006 (Guitarist - Hold Me in the River Rough Trade, 2006 (Guitarist)
- Cease and DesistCease and desistA cease and desist is an order or request to halt an activity and not to take it up again later or else face legal action. The recipient of the cease-and-desist may be an individual or an organization....
Rough Trade, 2007 (Guitarist) - Beatific Visions Rough Trade, 2007 (Guitarist)
- Hey HeyHey Hey"Hey Hey" is the lead track from Swami's 2007 album, Equalize.The song features vocals by Harlem-based R'n'B singer Boostylz, guest Punjabi vocalist Romesh Chohan, and was produced by DJ Swami....
Fat Cat Records, 2009 (Guitarist) - Don't Take Me To Space (Man) Fat Cat Records, 2009 (Guitarist)
- Why Tell The Truth (When It's Easier To Lie) Fat Cat Records, 2009 (Guitarist)
Restlesslist
- Butlin Breaks/The Cowboy Song Life Is Easy, 2007 (Drummer)
Thomas White
- The Runaround Drift Records, 2008 (Producer/Singer/Multi-Instrumentalist)
- The Last Blast EP Cooking Vinyl, 2010 (Producer/Singer/Multi-Instrumentalist)
- Accidentally Like A Martyr EP Cooking Vinyl, 2010 (Producer/Singer/Multi-Instrumentalist)
Patrick Wolf
- Hard TimesHard TimesHard Times - For These Times is the tenth novel by Charles Dickens, first published in 1854. The book appraises English society and is aimed at highlighting the social and economic pressures of the times....
Bandstocks, 2009 (Guitarist)