Bellevue Suite

posted Friday, June 16, 2006
By KATHY GRESEY

LIBERTYVILLE- Michael Sean, lead singer of the band BelleVue Suite, continues to shine in the entertainment spotlight. Two months ago, the Milwaukee resident won a chance to audition fot the band FUEL in Los Angeles. Last week, BelleVue Suite released its first full-length CD at a CD release party in Libertyville. Though Sean was not chosen for the FUEL lead singer position, he is still confident about his future in music. At his CD release party at Austin’s Saloon and Eatery, he said he saw many new faces in the crowd. “It was a great turnout,” he said. “A lot of people knew us from word of mouth.” Fifteen songs comprise the new CD “The Dark Side of Enlightenment.” Sean said the band will be touring this summer. - Lakeland Journal

posted Thursday, April 20, 2006
By AMIE SHAK
Daily Herald Staff Writer

Michael Johnson of Milwaukee was supposed to stand up in a wedding, then play a show with his band Friday. Instead, he's heading to Los Angeles to meet and perform in front of the Grammy-nominated band Fuel in hopes of becoming the group's new lead singer. "I never expected this," said Johnson. "It feels very strange, really strange. I'm really not used to winning." After being named the winner of 95 WIIL Rock's Natural Selection Fuel auditions Wednesday at Austin's Saloon and Eatery in Libertyville, Johnson was whisked away by station officials. He was handed a plane ticket, a $500 check for spending money and forms to sign to make it all official. Johnson, who goes by the stage name Michael Sean, is a part-time musician and lead vocalist and guitar player in the band Bellevue Suite. He loves the band he's in, but what rocker would pass up this opportunity? "I was taking it as it comes, then I started having some fun, then I started having more fun, then that prize dangled in front of me, and now it's like, wow, I'm going to LA to sing with the band. Wow," he said. Johnson meets Fuel members today and sings in front of them this weekend. His rock future is in their hands, as he competes with other wannabes from across the country. Whoever is chosen will do the vocals on the next album, which is ready to be recorded, but has no release date. Details about the audition, when a winner will be announced and what will be in the contract were not available. To get to this point, Johnson had to beat out more than 100 hopefuls who auditioned at Austin's in the last three weeks. KC O'Neil, former Epic Records promotions manager and one of the judges, said he knew Johnson had what they were looking for right away. "Michael was very natural and just had 'it' on stage. When I see something like this, it smacks me right in the face and there is no denying it," said O'Neil, now a talent scout. Johnson has qualities the band will appreciate and he will fit in nicely on a personal level with the band, said O'Neil, who is a friend of band members. Johnson said he's is thrilled to get the chance to rub elbows with the guys. "I'm not used to getting the opportunity, but it's here," Johnson said. "I'm going to make the most of it." ashak@dailyherald.com Trip: Musician has 'it' on stage, judge says. Johnson beat out more than 100 other hopeful singers to win 95 WIIL Rock's Natural Selection Fuel auditions held in Libertyville over the past several weeks. The part-time musician says he loves the band he's in, but he can't pass up this opportunity. (Steve Lundy/Daily Herald) Michael Johnson, of Milwaukee, Wis., won an audition contest this week in Libertyville that will send him to Los Angeles today for a chance to become the new lead singer for the rock band Fuel. (Steve Lundy/Daily Herald) - Daily Herald

Crossfade and Disturbed can't be wrong. Suburban metal rockers Bellevue Suite have
garnered so many accolades from rock stars you'd think they know Cinderella's
Jeff Labar personally. Oh wait. They do.


Bellevue Suite's Web accolades look like the Cliffs Nores rendition of Tommy Lee's
rolodex: Crossfade. Disturbed and Cinderella guitarist Jeff LaBar's new band Naked
Beggars - big bands with big things to say about a suburban metal-rock band hose big-guitar
anthems scream "applicable for commercial radio."
"It's official; I'm a fan," Disturbed drummer Mike Wengren Testifies online.
To think, Wengren didn't show up for Bellevue Suite's show that first night to actually see
Bellevue Suite. He was there for the other band... not that he wasn't linked to the Bellevue boys
throught some other semi - complicated, step - brother - twice-removed relationship.
"Our friend's cousin is engaged to him," Bellevue frontman Michael Sean says simply.
"Mike came out to look at the (headliner) and fell in love with us."
Perhaps the rest should've been history. But testimony to talent, eveb when veritable superstars
show up to profess, is just the tipping point for metal bands a la Saliva or Smile Empty Soul (minus
the vocal whine) whose success hinges on competition with local pop-punk and reunion rock
to saturate airwaves.
Bellevue has gotten close, and some would even say they've already reached local celebrity, having
opened up for Crossfade and sold out the House of Blues. Last spring, Sean's audition with Grammy
nominated rockers Fuel even rocketed him to one of the finalist spots.
"I actually thought I got the gig," he says. "I got to sing four songs when most guys got to sing one."
Rumor has it the job went to the finalist who lives in L.A. (not American Idol rocker Chris
Daughtry, we're pretty sure), which is logistically feasable, Sean says, for a band who's looking to
make it big again. Or at least looking to edge its way back on the radio.
He knows how it is.
Sean, a guy who seems to have more big-name music contacts than he does band T-shirts, has
played the radio game for years.
He sent out his first plea for band members with guitarist Jeremy Kletzien via Milwaukee radio
more than three years ago. One of the city's largest stations. WLUM 102.1 came through with a roster
that satisfied Bellevue Suite's album initiatives for three years. churning out a disc and - even more
importantly - a single called "Save Me" that hears sporadic play-time on northern Illinois' 95.1 WIIL
(Rock) station.
The group ended up disbanding after several years and was immedi-ately rebuilt with Sean and
Kletzien once again at the helm. Not long before their search began, they found their ideal drummer
in Bonnie Situation scream-core percussion shredder Timmy Larson. The two bands met at Al Roker's
Christmas Bash in 2005 when the previous form of Bellevue Suite played with the Bonnie Situation and
Simplistic Urge. Since then, the relationship just gelled.
"Mike is such an amazing singer," Larson says. "You see plenty of good singers without really seeing
a tallented singer, and I believe there's a difference. He can control an audience. When he walks into a
room, people are drawn to him."
"Thanks, Tim," Sean says, doting on Larsin's drumming skills for several minutes in turn. "First we
just became just good friends. I'm not much of a phone person, but we would sit on the phone for hours."
Larson ended up leaving the Bonnie Situation, a move he says was a rough one that forced a temporary
band break-up and entire room-and-board shakeup. "We all lived there," Larson says of the apartment
the Bonnie Situation shared. "I felt really bad."
All is well now, and Bellevue Suite's latest lineup has solidified into its strongest mold yet, floating
between city and suburban Midwestern towns but mostly reigning in Chicago's suburbs. They befriended
Disturbed and Crossfade and still constantly play with new, big-time bands who end up leaving the
show one of Bellevue Suite's biggest admirers. Well, them and old people.
"Old people, little kids. It's really bizarre," Sean says of the fans. "I'm not kidding, little kids love us."
"A Hells Angel rode an hour to see us," Larson adds.
"Oh yeah. His name is Tiny."
Still, the best is surely yet to come. And lately, the magic has really started to bubble - in the form of a
chance at New York City, an opportunity that probably should've popped up from Tommy Lee's rolodex
but materialized from behind the desk of WIIL radio DJ and program director John Perry. Not only did
Perry's devotion to the band transfer into radio play, shows and contacts, but most recently it earned
them a slot at Arlene's Grocery in New York. Sean easily admits he's beyond indebted.
It isn't easy to ignore, he says: The chance to play one of New York City's top, up-and-coming stages
puts them in line for label consideration and more importantly, support for a new album the quartet
is eager to release.
"It brings tour support and album distribution," Sean says of labels, typically a touchy subject for
DIY bands who've been on their own for the better part of their careers. "Right now, (labels) don't
have as much control because artists are able to market themselves."
"The Internet changed everything," Larson says.
It might also have altered Chicago's music canvas, which has spawned a huge uprising of art-house
and alt.-roots indie bands in the past five years, a sound that Bellevue Suite neither pretends to mimic
or acknowledges is part of their scene. Theirs is a sound that rocks mainstream suburbia, they say, an
audience that still listens to radio and revels in the sounds of beefy and loud, head shaking metal.
"We're aware that some people might look at us and not warm up to us right away because we're more
commercial sounding, not as eclectic sounding," Larson says.
But reactions like those aren't a concern for a band that isn't afraid of its musical roots: the depths of
rock that seem to evade the whole alt.-rock/nu-metal cliche with ballads harkening as far back as the '80s.
"I think we fit in radio for sure," Sean says. "It's just how I write. We write commercial songs; we want
to be on the radio. ... We've got to get out there, to get out there and play."
For now, the accolades keep coming. And that's good enough for them. - Lisa Balde lisa@beepcentral.com

Guitarist/lead vocalist Michael Sean Johnson wrote all the songs on Bellevue Suite's big
leages-ready debut, The Dark Side of Enlightenment, and has an expressive, powerful voice.
He Joins forces with lead guitarist Jeremy Kletzien on hard rock songs like "Nothing Sacred"
and "Final Hour" as well as on the melodic power pop of "Happily Ever After." The slower,
more introspective tracks showcase Johnson's songwriting chops, especially the alcoholic
confessions of "Insert Your Name." (www.bellevuesuite.com) - Illinois Entertainer - Terrece Flamm