POPGURU SOUND AND VISION ANNOUNCES NEW COVERAMA ALBUM WITH FIRST LISTEN OF JOHN ORPHEUS' SOULFUL TAKE ON RADIOHEAD'S HOUSE OF CARDS
SET FOR RELEASE MAY 20 VIA THE CONFIDENCE EMPERORS
ALBUM TO FEATURE CLASSIC SONGS REIMAGINED BY
POPGURU'S ROSTER, INCLUDING ALEX EXISTS, TANDM,
CHLOE KAY, WILL WHITWHAM, SAM CASEY, JULIANA EYE,
MARTHA AND THE MUFFINS AND GHOST CARAVAN
"The lyric of the chorus is really the soul of the tune: 'Forget about your house of cards and I'll do mine.' It implies the difficulty, the near impossibility of trust in new relationships. The incredible exposure we put ourselves through for them and the leap of faith required to fully surrender to the promise of love."
- John Orpheus on what inspired him to cover the song
TORONTO, ON – February 25, 2022 – Fully-integrated Toronto music company, Popguru Sound & Vision, is bringing vibrant sonic colours to life as we move through the winter months. Today, they announce a collaborative new album - Coverama - a compilation of creative, fun and innovative renditions of classic pop and indie rock songs, set for a May 20 release via Popguru boutique label, The Confidence Emperors.
The project kicks off with John Orpheus' cover of Radiohead's iconic House Of Cards. John worked with longtime collaborator and producer, Mike Schlosser, to deliver a danceable, soulful take layered by graceful harmonies, soulful choruses and verses with his signature Caribbean flair. It comes to life with a stunning video highlighting couples of all identities, depicting grace and strength in vulnerability. Listen to House of Cards here and watch the video here.
While Radiohead was a band that John really connected with in the 90s, their newer albums (such as In Rainbows) made more sense to him emotionally through their blend of anxiety, lust and alienation.
"To me, there’s no song that holds this better than House of Cards. As with many of their songs, it is haunting with an ambivalent lyric and a subtle, yet powerful feeling. I sent a group of songs to producer Mike Schlosser as potential covers. We wanted to take a song that no one would expect us to do and make it our own" he adds.
John says of the process: "The lockdown prevented it from being as many people as we wanted, but the intensity of being so vulnerable and naked is the central theme of this video. They are all real couples. We went to their homes, asked them to get half naked and intimate, and captured it. Many of them were surprised by how easy it was to fall into that space with the camera rolling and several of them kicked us out after so that they could continue in private!"
Popguru Sound & Vision Founder, Graham Stairs, says: "The origin of the Coverama album began last year with near simultaneous conversions with John Orpheus on the one hand, and Martha Johnson and Mark Gane of Martha and the Muffins on the other. John, his producer Mike Schlosser and I had been talking about recording something as a standalone summer single. When they delivered House of Cards, I knew right away that we had to find a more substantive context for it. Meanwhile, Martha and the Muffins had recorded a version of Save It For Later for me to pitch to the producers of a Netflix series. While it did not get used, I asked Mark and Martha whether we could release it as a single, and after telling them about John’s version of House of Cards, they suggested that maybe I could do an EP. From there and many other conversations with the greater Popguru community, two songs snowballed into a full album!"
Born and raised in South-Central Trinidad, John Orpheus (aka Antonio Michael Downing) is a Toronto based, musical artist, celebrated author and speaker. His memoir SAGA BOY was published in 2021 by Penguin Random House and has been shortlisted for both the Speaker's Book Prize and the Toronto Book Award. It is a visceral, vulnerable memoir about Blackness, identity and his quest for home. The companion album, the critically acclaimed, SAGA KING was voted by Exclaim! as one of Canada's 20 most anticipated albums of 2021. His sound combines hip-hop swagger, Afrobeat energy and dancehall charisma into a unique vision rooted in the African diaspora.
He has become one of the most dynamic, multi-faceted artists in North America and a passionate advocate for the potency of art in healing ourselves and the world. Listen to the album here and read the memoir here.
In Fall of 2021, Popguru Sound & Vision delivered an engaging livestream concert series, the Popguru Revue. The fully integrated, Toronto-based music company shared an immersive high-production season of free programming, featuring performances from an array of the company’s diverse and dynamic artist roster. You can watch all of the sets on the Popguru video channel.
Learn more about Popguru Sound & Vision's extensive industry history and evolution to date below and stay tuned for more creative covers ahead of Coverama's spring release.
1. John Orpheus – House of Cards (Radiohead)
2. Alex Exists – Rock On (David Essex)
John Orpheus’ musical journey has taken him from the Caribbean bush to festivals across Canada and the US to opening for Liam Gallagher on a UK tour as the frontman for a Happy Mondays offshoot band. He combines hip-hop swagger, Afrobeat energy and dancehall charisma to create a sound built on big catchy hooks. John is known for his rabble-rousing live shows filled with audience participation, chanting and impromptu dance-offs that feel more like Caribana road parties than concerts. In September 2019, he released his debut album WEY YA CALL DAT TING, the culmination of a three year, four mixtape project that he used to develop and hone his unique sound. Produced and co-written by Mike Schlosser, the album and the standalone single ELECTRIC released in 2020 fulfilled his early promise with a noticeably more pop and upbeat vibe. “The world is a soulful, sound-splash, dance party. That's the sound I want to create."
About Popguru Sound & Vision:
Founded in 1998 by A&R maverick Graham Stairs, Popguru Sound & Vision is a fully integrated music company that makes a difference. Its core business is artist management, but, as a diversified company, Popguru is involved in music publishing, two record label imprints and providing music for film, television and other media.
Prior to starting his own company, Stairs was a partner in Intrepid management and did A&R for Intrepid Records, Latitude Records and EMI Music Canada. He was involved with such seminal Canadian artists as Martha and the Muffins, the Rheostatics, National Velvet, Chalk Circle, Damhnait Doyle and Sandbox. He was also behind the soundtrack album for the film, Highway 61, and the Bruce Cockburn tribute album that gave the Barenaked Ladies their first national hit with Lovers In A Dangerous Time. To this day, it is still one of the most played songs on Canadian radio. More recently, Stairs did A&R for True North Records where he signed Catherine MacLellan, Hunter Valentine and Australian band, the Audreys.
The strength of any company is its artists and repertoire. Popguru subscribes to the philosophy of building a community and long-term careers for its artists. The company’s mandate is to develop content for the Canadian and international marketplaces. The business model uses diversification as a strategy to create and monetize content for the existing and next generation uses of music. Since reactivating Popguru in 2009, Stairs has signed Martha and the Muffins, Odario, Grand Analog, the Wilderness of Manitoba, John Orpheus, Ghost Caravan, producer/songwriter, Mike Schlosser, and Sam Casey for management. Stairs’ vision of the interdependencies between record labels, music publishers, management companies and licensing agencies is the reason that Popguru organizes all of them within the same company. This is Popguru’s response to the needs of artists today and into the future.