Byron Zanos

“The last year or so has brought me a long way,” exclaims Byron Zanos, on the eve of this debut CD release party, which takes place at the Cutting Room in Manhattan on March 15, “I finally got together a group of seasoned guys, really great musicians, that have taught me a lot. I basically went to a bunch of shows and picked them out one at a time. They loved the stuff, and just like that, I had a great team. Then I met Drew Yowell, who’s a great songwriter/performer, and heard some of his production work.”
The next thing Byron knew, he was in the studio with noted engineer Dae Bennett, the son of Tony Bennett, “Recording with Dae Bennett has been unreal,” says Byron. “I mean, this guy really knows his craft. When you have a Grammy Award winning engineer/producer behind the glass, you know you’re in good hands. It was a real joy working with him.”
The result of the recording sessions is a CD that stands up next to the major label releases you hear on the radio, the songs that would fit right in on the airwaves next to the Counting Crows or John Mayer. The studio was a great experience for Byron, as well as a learning one. “What was supposed to take four days took six,” he writes in his studio journal. “So much for the budget. Anyway, I got to meet Tony Bennett, ate lots of bad Chinese food, and most importantly finished another four tracks…”
The Fort Lee based, 23-year-old singer/songwriter has been performing around the New Jersey/New York area for the past few years. “Most of what I’ve done has been solo… My last “band” experience was in sixth grade—Alchemy—basically a Motley Crue cover band. We were really bad,” laughs Byron. “I also play in Philly and Boston from time to time. As of yet, I haven’t done much touring, but that’s the plan now that the record is done. At the moment we’re looking at an east coast college tour.”
Muscially, Byron has a modern sound, but one that harkens back to singer/songwriters of earlier times. “Let’s see...I would have to say my stuff fits neatly into the pop-rock genre,” he relates. “Recently, the word ‘pop’ has gotten a bad rep, being defined mostly by beautiful people with little or no musical talent. At some point in time, ‘pop’ meant ‘popular’ which is how I view it. Catchy, hook oriented songwriting is its defining characteristic. In a way, a lot of great new songwriters have started bringing some respect back to the pop-rock genre and I’d like to continue that trend.”
In fact, he calls one of the classic singer/songwriters his early influence. “The first songwriter to get me to pick up an acoustic was Cat Stevens,” he recalls. “Of course, more recent artists like Dave Matthews changed the way I locked at it. His playing has always been very percussive and upbeat. In a way, I think he’s the acoustic guitar slinging father figure of my generation. You see so many singer/songwriters today that have been influenced by him. My other major influences are Live, Radiohead, The Beatles, Sting, and Billy Joel. All of these have helped me find my own style of writing.”
While many of the songs on the new CD get strong reactions from reviewers, Byron finds it hard to pick a favorite. “I think it’s pretty common for a songwriter, but every knew song I write is my favorite,” he says/ “Chalk it up to raging ADD or a short interest span, but if I hear something five times or so, it loses its luster. I need something new. That’s why I’m always writing.”
As far as the future, Byron has simple goals. “I want to get my music out there,” he states. “I want people to love what I love to do. It’s that simple. I don’t think you can ask for a more rewarding life. It takes time, and a little luck, but I’ll get there.”
For further information on the new CD and the release party at the Cutting Room and other upcoming appearances, check out his website at www.byronzanos.com

The Aquarian, March 16-23 - The Aquarian

BYRON ZANOS FINDS SILVER MEDAL IN “PANDORA’S BOX”

Singer/Songwriter takes second place in Mid-Atlantic Song Contest

Ridgefield, NJ – Singer/Songwriter Byron Zanos was recently awarded a Silver medal in the Mid-Atlantic Song Contest for his Pop category entry “Pandora’s Box,” which can be heard on his debut CD Somewhere in the Middle.

The Mid-Atlantic Song Contest, sponsored by the Songwriters’ Association of Washington, is one of the longest-running songwriting competitions in the United States. Winners are chosen by a panel of music industry professionals.

A featured performer at a recent BMI Showcase held at New York City’s acclaimed Rockwood Music Hall, demand for Zanos outside the New York/New Jersey area is increasing, thanks to his growing popularity on MySpace.com. His next show is scheduled for the All Asia Bar in Cambridge, MA on December 12, 2005. After an enthusiastic response at NACA (National Association for Campus Activities), Zanos is now booking dates at colleges throughout the Mid-Atlantic region.

Zanos’ lifelong love of music began in his parents’ living room, listening to his father’s opera collection. As a kid, Zanos had a more classical bent, with his first instrument being the piano. That all changed though, when he bought his first album: Guns ‘N’ Roses Appetite for Destruction. “It was like a bowl of Lucky Charms after eating oatmeal my whole life,” Zanos says.

Zanos’ wit permeates his music. With lyrics like “You bought ’Happiness for Dummies’ and you/you think you’re gonna teach me something” (“Pandora’s Box”), “You want everything to come the easy way/…money without all the working/weight loss on pasta and chips” (“Better Days”), “Pack your bags/looks like we’re going on a guilt trip again” (“Sleeping Sally”) and “Everyday life version 4.0/tech support is no help at all/answers in the next hot reality show – or in the drug that keeps grandfather’s love tall” (21st Century Boy), it’s hard not to laugh (as well as sing) along. However, other songs on Somewhere In The Middle, such as “Blind Today”, show a softer, more vulnerable side, and when Zanos sings “I never knew a foot so good to fit your shoes” in the aptly-named “Sweet Melancholy,” listeners are bound to be touched.

For more information on Byron Zanos, please visit www.byronzanos.com.
- Jerry Lembo - Lembo Entertainment

Singer/Songwriter chosen from over 175 entries for spot in Washington, DC area showcase

Ridgefield, NJ – Singer/Songwriter Byron Zanos was recently awarded a Silver medal in the Mid-Atlantic Song Contest for his Pop category entry “Pandora’s Box,” which can be heard on his debut CD Somewhere in the Middle.

Singer/Songwriter Byron Zanos will be a featured performer in the 6 Points Music Festival on Saturday, April 8, 2006, 9:00 PM, at Ragtime, 1345 North Courthouse Road in Arlington, VA. Zanos was chosen from over 175 submissions to perform at the festival, which showcases bands at 13 Washington, DC area venues over 3 days.

This year's selection committee was chaired by Heather Huff and Adam Simkin (Entertainment DC), and included Jenni Chase (Capital Scene), Amber-Therese Foster (DC101 Local Lix), Amanda Mattos (Music: DCist.com), Joel Didriksen (Kingpin Photo/NPR's All Songs Considered), Eric Boucher (Bigyawn.net ) and Richard Brewer (Independent Promotions Consultant &10 year Music Industry Veteran). Judges based their selection on Songwriting/Lyrical Content; Vocal, Instrumental and Overall Performance; Originality; and Visceral Reaction.

A featured performer at a recent BMI Showcase held at New York City’s acclaimed Rockwood Music Hall, demand for Zanos outside the New York/New Jersey area is increasing, thanks to his growing popularity on MySpace.com. His next show at the Rockwood is scheduled for March 15, 2006. After an enthusiastic response at NACA (National Association for Campus Activities), Zanos is now booking dates at colleges throughout the Mid-Atlantic region.

Zanos’ lifelong love of music began in his parents’ living room, listening to his father’s opera collection. As a kid, Zanos had a more classical bent, with his first instrument being the piano. That all changed though, when he bought his first album: Guns ‘N’ Roses Appetite for Destruction. “It was like a bowl of Lucky Charms after eating oatmeal my whole life,” Zanos says.

Zanos’ wit permeates his music. With lyrics like “You bought ’Happiness for Dummies’ and you/you think you’re gonna teach me something” (“Pandora’s Box”), “You want everything to come the easy way/…money without all the working/weight loss on pasta and chips” (“Better Days”), “Pack your bags/looks like we’re going on a guilt trip again” (“Sleeping Sally”) and “Everyday life version 4.0/tech support is no help at all/answers in the next hot reality show – or in the drug that keeps grandfather’s love tall” (21st Century Boy), it’s hard not to laugh (as well as sing) along. However, other songs on Somewhere In The Middle, such as “Blind Today”, show a softer, more vulnerable side, and when Zanos sings “I never knew a foot so good to fit your shoes” in the aptly-named “Sweet Melancholy,” listeners are bound to be touched.

For more information on Byron Zanos, please visit www.byronzanos.com.

###

- Jerry Lembo Entertainment Group

I was just telling someone the other day how one of the big problems with the singer-songwriter genre is how the lyrics so often revolve around 'boy meets girl- fall in love- break up- blah blah blah' it gets so mundane and boring – It can be a real turn-off.


So when Byron Zanos handed me his yet-to-be released CD, "Still in a Fight" and then felt the need to explain it was a concept album based on a failed relationship… I thought, 'Oh, God…NO! This is going to be torturous!' Then, he even went as far as to say that the stuff he's writing now is even better… There's the defensive qualifier. If I had a dollar for every time an artist gave me a qualifying statement (I have a throat infection or I'm so hung over) before a performance, I'd own my own label. But I rarely here a defensive qualifier for a CD – usually artists are BUSTING with pride. Here's the odd thing… the defended live performances usually are fine, and the hyped CDs…not so much. There's probably some psychological theory at work there- but I haven't got time to explore that.



I had a good idea what I thought Byron was capable of, having been through his debut CD "Somewhere in the Middle" several times. Decent writing – 3 VERY good songs out of 10- which, trust me, is better than most. He has a really beautiful voice and I just felt something possibly very special budding there. As I have mentioned before, if my gut instinct is strong – it's usually right.


So now I have this "relationship" CD from an artist whose development curve is crucial. I am anxious and hesitant at the same time.


I have a system of listening. When I get a CD it goes on the boom box in the kitchen or living room and gets a listen while I'm doing other things. If it's holding my attention it gets down-loaded to the iPod for a more intense scrutiny. If I REALLY like it…it goes in the car with me everywhere.


So, "Still in a Fight" goes into the boom box. I'm washing dishes.

First song (title track) Nice melody – still like his voice- lyrics…well… they're not making me sick. Second song – very hooky – nice – and the lyrics are…really good! Track three EVEN hookier (is that even a word?) and the lyrics are freekin' brilliant.


With one exception (and it's really more my own personal taste than any fault in the writing of performing) every single song on this CD is outstanding. I'll say it again OUTSTANDING.


Here's the kicker- while each track stands out as a great song on it's own, the album as a whole takes on the bigger and more difficult task of telling a complete story. Here is where the genius comes in. Here is where I stopped washing the dishes. Here's where I became completely captivated by the emotional roller coaster that Zanos has masterfully created.


Most of us are familiar with the well documented "stages of grief" which are: Denial, isolation, anger, bargaining, depression, acceptance. Some how Zanos has managed to create powerful, moving, truly brilliant music which can reach in and grab you and put you into each stage right along with him.


By the time I reached the end of track 9, "Thanks" (the heart wrenching acceptance stage) I kid you not, I was literally weeping!

The second time I listened to it I did so without the build up from the previous stages (and the beautifully produced linking intros) and the song still gave me goose bumps. It's THAT good.


I played a couple of tracks for an artist friend, whose complaint was that one sounded like John Mayer and the other sounded like James Blunt – my answer was, first of all, not bad company to be compared to… but neither of them has ever made me cry. James Blunt WISHES he could write an emotional crescendo the way Zanos can. It's one of his strongest attributes as a writer, and something that is very rare.


When I wrote to Byron, after hearing the CD for the first time I said:


"Beautiful, beautiful, beautiful. I am simply blown away, once again with your voice, the writing, the production, the emotion- This is amazing - and if this "aint the best stuff..." I don't know if I'll be able to handle what comes next! What I DO know.... is that A LOT more people should be hearing you."




- B-Line Entertainment Group Blog

Still In A Fight
Byron Zanos has said his last album was inspired largely by a relationship with “one particular girl I was with for four years,” and his sophomore effort takes that theme and expands it into a concept album. On Still in a Fight, our hero goes through all the stages of processing a breakup, and takes musical challenges in so doing, trying mellow acoustic, adventurous funk, radio-friendly pop, and heartstrings-pulling folk. Zanos uses smart, honest and evocative lyrics to work out his emotions, from recognition on the title track (“the honeymoon’s been long and over…you won’t open up and I’m never sober”), to anger on “Bye Bye Baby” (“cause this is the last time you’ll be leaving me/last time you walk out of the door”), sadness on “Chemicals” (“life after you – been tough on the mornings/it’s been pretty tough on the evenings too”), envy on “Envy” (“got struck with the fever – been drinking out the bottle/and I see you’ve got another ‘just a friend’”), regret on “The One that Got Away” (“searched high and low / to find someone like you / it’s true - I compare them all to you”), and ultimately acceptance on “Thank You” (“you’ll be here, always with me”). Concept albums are often misguided and sometimes overdone, but Zanos’ heartfelt delivery and stunning upfront emotion makes Still in a Fight both sophisticated and relatable.
www.Byronzanos.com

- RebelSpiritMusic.com

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

Byron Zanos Reveals Secrets And Lies With Shows Celebrating Release Of His Debut CD Somewhere In The Middle

Singer/Songwriter to perform his witty and touching tunes at shows this summer and fall

RIDGEFIELD, NJ-- August 1, 2005—Miera One Music recording artist Byron Zanos is set to play several shows in New Jersey to celebrate the release of his debut CD Somewhere in the Middle, featuring the song “Secrets and Lies” and produced by Drew Yowell (Phoebe Snow, Sophie B. Hawkins, Herb Alpert).

On August 18th, Zanos walks The Walk onstage in America’s Playground, Atlantic City, NJ. After this full band show, the singer/songwriter goes solo at Border’s Books and Music in Ramsey, NJ on September 9th and October 14th. Somewhere in the middle, Zanos brings his unique songs to Border’s Books and Music in Fort Lee, NJ on Friday, September 16th. More dates throughout the United States will be announced soon.

Zanos’ lifelong love of music began in his parents’ living room, listening to his father’s opera collection. As a kid, Zanos had a more classical bent, with his first instrument being the piano. That all changed though, when he bought his first album: Guns ‘N’ Roses Appetite for Destruction. “It was like a bowl of Lucky Charms after eating oatmeal my whole life,” Zanos says.

Zanos’ wit permeates his music. With lyrics like “You bought ’Happiness for Dummies’ and you/you think you’re gonna teach me something” (“Pandora’s Box”), “You want everything to come the easy way/…money without all the working/weight loss on pasta and chips” (“Better Days”), “Pack your bags/looks like we’re going on a guilt trip again” (“Sleeping Sally”) and “Everyday life version 4.0/tech support is no help at all/answers in the next hot reality show – or in the drug that keeps grandfather’s love tall” (21st Century Boy), it’s hard not to laugh (as well as sing) along. However, other songs on Somewhere In The Middle, such as “Blind Today”, show a softer, more vulnerable side, and when Zanos sings “I never knew a foot so good to fit your shoes” in the aptly-named “Sweet Melancholy,” listeners are bound to be touched.
For more information on Byron Zanos, please visit www.byronzanos.com.

Contact:
Jerry Lembo
Lynn Patmalnee
jerry@lemboentertainment.com
lynn@lemboentertainment.com
Jerry Lembo Entertainment Group
Phone: 201-840-9980
Fax: 201-840-9921
URL: www.lemboentertainment.com
###
- Lynn Patmalnee

While failed relationships aren’t known for offering consolation prizes, singer-songwriter Byron Zanos managed to get an album’s worth of material out of his. Who knew emotional turmoil could sound so good?
Zanos dissects the decline on his debut, Somewhere in the Middle, a pop-rock affair that spares us a downer of a record with the help of his evocative voice — smooth and limber, masculine yet vulnerable, his falsetto always at the ready. If not for the lyrical content, you’d almost think he was trying to woo the girl.

Although Zanos lyrically plumbs the billowing tension, his flypaper-catchy melodies provide an uplifting counterpoint. Even when he chides his soon-to-be-ex for always expecting things to be easy, he glides over the lines with toe-tapping finesse rather than bitter angst or moping.

Somewhere in the Middle was recorded as a band project, but Zanos’s strong core rhythmic sensibilities anchor the mix. One can hear his talents as a solo performer (he’s been calibrating his game on the college circuit) who knows how use his voice to bend sheets of shapely melodies around the percussive edges of his acoustic guitar.

Electric guitarist/producer Drew Yowell and engineer Daegal Bennett work to Zanos’s strengths, building supportively around his polished acoustic song structures and vocals instead of swallowing them with over-instrumentation. Because the songs themselves are sturdy and nuanced, electric guitar, bass, and drums are applied in a way that adds power, dimension, and a little more rock and roll punch to his music.

Tunes like “Pandora’s Box” spring to life with fat, groovy syncopation. Other uptempo songs, like the perky rocker, “Sleeping Sally”, contrast the darker thematic undercurrent with the driving, polyrhythmic energy of a Dave Matthews tune. On the more detectably melancholy “Secrets and Lies”, Zanos et al even manage to pull off the string-arrangement-clad Big Ballad, heightening the drama without overinflating the song with artificial sentiment.

Zanos still has a little work ahead of him if he wants to break out of the thicket of talented singer-songwriters out there. But he’s well on his way, and it may only take him one more girlfriend to get there.

- Wood and Steel - Jim Kirlin

Byron Zanos and co-writer Drew Yowell’s song “Secrets and Lies” was selected out of 25,000 entries as a Top 20 finalist in the first-ever American Idol Songwriting Competition. Finalists in the contest were chosen by American Idol Executive Producer Simon Fuller and 19 Entertainment.

“When the call came in from Jesse Albert (19 Entertainment), I almost hung up on him thinking it was a phone scam,” Zanos recalls. “What an honor to have our song selected from so many entries!”

“I would love for either of this year’s American Idol finalists, Jordin Sparks or Blake Lewis, to record ‘Secrets and Lies’,” says Zanos with a smile, “but it wouldn’t be a secret or a lie that I’d love for Daughtry to do the tune.”

Zanos is no stranger to accolades. He has received songwriting honors from the 2006 We Are Listening Awards (Berklee College of Music), the 22nd Annual Mid-Atlantic Songwriting Contest, and the Billboard World Song Contest. In demand as a performer, Zanos was selected to showcase at Deweyfest ‘06 (DE), MeanyFest (NY), 6-Points Music Festival (DC/VA), the NACA Mid-Atlantic Festival (PA), NJ Songwriters in the Round (NJ), Williamsburg Live Songwriter Competition (NY), and was a speaker at a panel workshop "What Makes A Star" at New York University.

New Jersey’s Byron Zanos’ debut CD somewhere in the middle featured the acclaimed songs “Secrets and Lies” and “Pandora’s Box.” Somewhere in the middle, released in Spring 2005, was engineered, mixed and mastered by Grammy Award winning engineer/producer Daegal Bennett (Tony’s son). Zanos completed the album under the tutelage of producer and “Secrets and Lies” co-writer Drew Yowell (Phoebe Snow, Sophie B. Hawkins, Herb Alpert).

Zanos’ new release Still in a Fight will be released Summer 2007. “Basically, the record Still in a Fight is a 55 minute pop opera, meant to be listened to from beginning to end,” says Zanos. “However, for those of us with time constraints, the disc is broken down to 10 tracks – each one a story or anecdote in itself – about the manic highs and depressive lows of a failed love. The end result is a rollercoaster ride of emotion in sound.”

“’The Industry’ says that ‘The Album’ is dead,” Zanos asserts. “Well, if today’s listeners want just another single on their iPod, I’ve got a few for them. But maybe… just maybe, ‘The Album’ isn’t dead – it’s just that nobody’s making them anymore… at least not good ones.” Look for that all to change when Still in a Fight is released this summer.
- Music News (May 07)