To celebrate the release of Gavin Harrison‘s solo album, Cheating the Polygraph, Harrison has teamed up with Zildjian Cymbal Company to give fans a chance to win a signed copy of his new CD / 5.1 Surround Disc Set! How do you win? Easy .. all you have to do is impress Gavin with your drumming skills and he’ll select ten people to win! All entries must first sign up to the Z Club at zildjian.com and then upload a 30 second video of you playing your favorite, signature Gavin Harrison groove or fill. Enter at http://bit.ly/1DmnHDS.

Gavin Harrison, drummer for Porcupine Tree who’s widely acknowledged as one of the finest drummers on the planet, released Cheating the Polygraph earlier this month on Kscope. An ambitious project which sees the restlessly creative Harrison reimagine eight Porcupine Tree songs in a set of vivid and vibrant new arrangements that give full, free rein to his inquiring musical mind, can be purchased now through the Kscope web-store at: www.kscopemusic.com/store, iTunes here  and Amazon.com at this location.

The tracks which comprise the album were recorded over a five-year period, with Harrison working in conjunction with a crew of some of the finest contemporary musicians, including the gifted saxophonist Nigel Hitchcock along with bassist Laurence Cottle. It’s a set that will no doubt excite much controversy; Harrison’s use of the ‘Big Band’ musical sound stage isn’t some ersatz attempt to make a ‘Swing’ album; it’s closer in execution and arrangement to the innovative works of Frank Zappa and The Mothers of Invention – a layered, richly-textured selection that is both beautifully-recorded and incisively delivered.

“I think every album needs a focus – a master plan – and whilst I thought about writing new tunes for a big band project, I made a version of Porcupine Tree’s ‘Futile’ (with Laurence Cottle) and it came out really well,” commented Harrison. “It felt like a good plan to follow on with some of my personal favorite PT songs and see if we could make them work. I had a vision that the arrangements would never lean towards a clichéd classic big band sound, but always follow a modern contemporary angle. So even if you didn’t know the original tune, you could still enjoy it as a modern composition that would work with this instrumentation. I couldn’t be happier with the results. Laurence Cottle’s immense talent as a musician and arranger was mind blowing.” 

Check out the new “Hatesong/Halo” music video on YouTube here:

A Cheating the Polygraph album trailer can be seen on YouTube below:

A Q&A video with Gavin Harrison discussing his sparkling new solo album can be seen on YouTube at:

1.      What Happens Now?
2.      Sound of Muzak/So Called Friend
3.      The Start of Something Beautiful
4.      Heart Attack in a Layby/The Creator Had a Mastertape/Surfer
5.      The Pills I’m Taking (from Anesthetize)
6.      Hatesong/Halo
7.      Cheating the Polygraph/Mother & Child Divided
8.      Futile

Gavin Harrison currently finds himself working with British progressive rock group, King Crimson. His playing and performing résumé includes stints with artists as varied as Iggy Pop, Lewis Taylor, Manfred Mann and Kevin Ayers.

http://www.gavharrison.com
https://www.facebook.com/drummergavinharrison

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