Anthony Hamilton - THE MATRIX

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Anthony Hamilton...

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Who I Am & Where I Live:

Name: Anthony Hamilton
City: Los Angeles
Country: United States
Hometown: Charlotte, NC

My Life

Biographical: Proclaimed a “national treasure” by the Los Angeles Times, GRAMMY® Award winning singer, songwriter, producer, and actor Anthony Hamilton has achieved global sales of over 50 million albums. The North Carolina Music Hall of Fame inductee notably performed for President Barack Obama and First Lady Michelle, cementing his place in the history books as the “narrator of love.” His raw, awe-inspiring performances garnered the attention of NPR where he starred in their Noteworthy documentary series. He appeared in American Gangster and lent his voice to "Freedom" from the Academy® Award-nominated Django Unchained. Additionally, he became the "first R&B artist to sell an album at Cracker Barrel." Next up, Hamilton will unveil his ninth full-length studio album in 2019.

Before Anthony Hamilton laid down the gospel as an R&B singer, the Charlotte, North Carolina native found his calling as a member of the church choir. “It’s like that feeling you get hearing somebody else lead that made me start to really pay attention to music, not just sonically but what it did to people,” says Hamilton, who began singing at six or seven years old. An introvert raised with his brother and sister by a single mother (his father left when he was nine years old), Hamilton found comfort in a foam-covered speaker while dreaming of stardom. “I was a child who had a very wide imagination and I would become the song. I used to listen to “Ben” by Michael Jackson a lot and I would dream like one day I’m gonna become a famous singer. I said that over and over again for years and I always believed it.”

Over two decades worth of label changes later (past deals included Uptown, MCA, Atlantic Records, Soulife Records, Andre Harrell’s Harrell Entertainment and Jermaine Dupri’s So So Def Recordings), Hamilton has found his happy place on RCA Records. Following up 2011’s Grammy-nominated effort Back To Love and his 2014 Christmas offering Home For The Holidays, the R&B cantor maintains his Southern sensibility and poignant songwriting on his fifth studio effort What I’m Feelin.’ Its lead single “Amen” — a melodic love note produced by Salaam Remi and James Poyser, praises a special lady’s efforts. “’Amen’ is just celebrating the beauty that a woman makes you feel, not just physical attributes, but the fact that she works, she goes to church, prays for you, cooks, cleans, just all those things that a woman brings to the table,” Hamilton explains.

The 12-track offering is also an emotional cleanse for the musician, who announced his divorce from his wife of nearly 10 years in 2015. “Anytime you spend that much time with someone, there’s a long connection that you have and even though it seems like you’re moving on, you’re still tied to the person,” he says who dedicates the reflective track “Walk In My Shoes” to his ex-wife. “I’m tellin my wife like you gotta be me, my past and all the things that shape me, all my fears, and whatever it is I’ve been through that made me the man that I was and hindered me from being the man that I wanted to be.” On other standouts like the melodic “What I’m Feelin’,” Hamilton opens up about the struggles of letting go. “We get into these relationships and sabotage them because of a fear of creating the unknown, the beautiful, the peace and a place where you can let go,” he says. “Being able to totally let go is something I look forward to doing.”

Recording majority of the What I’m Feelin’ in Nashville, TN at the iconic Blackbird and House of Blues studios, Hamilton reunited with longtime collaborator, Mark Batson, who produced some of his biggest hits including 2003 Platinum smash, “Charlene” along with his close engineer Bruce Irvine. The celebratory set showcases life’s highs more than the lows. In addition, Hamilton recruited guitar heroes Vince Gill for the country-leaning “Never Letting Go” and Grammy Award winner Gary Clark Jr. on the worldly “Ain’t No Shame.” On the latter, Hamilton belts, “Time waits for no one/ Ain’t no shame in playing hard,” as a PSA to never settle. “There are people that never experience anything outside their front porches,” he says. “Get off the front porch, walk in the yard and I’m sure you’ll find something that’s beautiful.”

Hamilton is known for flipping heartbreak into a blessing as heard on his biggest ballad “Charlene.” After a significant relationship had ended, he left his one-bedroom brownstone apartment in Harlem on 146th Street and Convent Avenue and took the train to 33rd Street to meet with producer Batson at a Manhattan recording studio. “My record deal [at the time], I was pretty much trying to get off. I remember I didn’t have a lot of money. At that time, I was heartbroken,” he reflects. “I just poured my heart out and [“Charlene”] was one of the songs that came out of it.” He notes that his soulful formula stays consistent with What I’m Feelin’, even on a personal level. “I’m fully capable of taking from a broken place and truly turning it into something amazing,” says Hamilton confidently. “I’m truly capable of loving in spite of my situation. I think I still have a fear of letting go to a degree and I think there’s preparations I need to do to get there. I’m not done yet.”

Hamilton’s decorated catalog includes his 2003 debut, Comin’ From Where I’m From (which carried the hit title track), 2005’s Ain’t Nobody Worryin’ among other efforts. He has earned several Grammy nominations, like “Po’ Folks,” the 2002 Nappy Roots collaboration that earned a nod for best rap/sung collaboration, and won his first trophy in 2009 for best traditional R&B vocal performance for his duet with Al Green on “You’ve Got The Love I Need.” He has also lent his vocals to a variety of talent including Nas, Rick Ross, Carlos Santana, Jill Scott, Tupac, and Al Green to name a few. His album What I’m Feelin’ released in 2016 received Grammy nomination for the title song.

My Media

Website: http://anthonyhamilton.com
Twitter: hamiltonanthony
Instagram: anthonyhamiltonofficial
YouTube Channel: http://www.youtube.com/user/anthonyhamiltonVEVO

Listen on Spotify

Spotify: http://open.spotify.com/album/0qN4uk3SGen6vUOjImJ6em
Spotify 2: http://open.spotify.com/album/545a3sdz0JkH85iYFZPiR4
Spotify 3: http://open.spotify.com/album/1xTRYZDc7AwA7alqkUSgnP
Spotify 4: http://open.spotify.com/album/7AnGF7p32IpTeDpbkc8uKJ
Spotify 5: http://open.spotify.com/album/5MZKupLJLcvIlCMumgwb9k
Spotify 6: https://open.spotify.com/album/6pERm8WL6VcdNLpo07n3zA

Contact Information

Management/Booking: General Manager
Special Assignment Brand Management: info@specialbrand.com

Clips

Anthony Hamilton: NPR Music Tiny Desk Concert
By Anthony Hamilton

15 views

THE MATRIX IS MUSICIAN / ARTIST RECOMMENDATIONS BY THE MOST POWERFUL, SOPHISTICATED & SUBTLE SOFTWARE YET DEVISED:

⇒ the minds of other artists

IT'S BASED IN BAHIA, GROUND ZERO FOR BRAZIL'S SUN-CARONA VIBRANT AFRO-BRAZILIAN CULTURE

⇒ ...rooted in a region called the Recôncavo, analogous in Brazil to the Mississippi Delta in the United States.

THE MATRIX REACHES FROM BRAZIL TO CUBA TO BROOKLYN TO BERLIN TO TOKYO TO TIMBUKTU

⇒ To wherever people want to take it...

IT IS THE NEXT-STEP EVOLUTION OF A SPECIALTY RECORD SHOP

⇒ ...opened in Salvador to showcase magisterial musicians almost completely unknown to the world...many of them living in poverty or close to it and unable to avail themselves of traditional (and costly) means of publicizing.

PRE-BRAZIL — IN NEW YORK CITY — WE "RESCUED" UNPAID ROYALTIES FOR PERFORMERS & COMPOSERS INCLUDING:

⇒ Aretha Franklin, Barbra Streisand, Led Zeppelin, Philip Glass, Mongo Santamaria, Airto Moreira, Gilberto Gil, Astrud Gilberto, Jim Hall, Taj Mahal, Robb Royer of Bread, Speedo & the Cadillacs, and many more! With Speedo's (Earl Carroll) amazing story (kid singing on the streetcorners of Harlem to doo-wop fame to working as a beloved school janitor) I learned (as Quincy Jones had figured out decades before) that greatness and fame are completely independent. The wave repeated here in Brazil with Raimundo Sodré, who went from zero to national fame and back to zero.

HENCE A (and so far the world's only) SMALL WORLD CURATION NETWORK...

⇒ A wave of Exu's cyberwand opening pathways allowing ANY ARTIST — FAMOUS OR NOT — in ANY FIELD — in ANY PLACE in the world — to potentially be reached by ANYBODY from ANYWHERE. (Exu -- eh-SHOO -- is the Afro-Brazilian deity responsible for opening pathways.)

BY WHAT WIZARDRY?

⇒ We've all heard of six degrees of separation, more properly called a small world network. Within six or so steps we can move through a chain of people knowing other people to just about anybody on the planet.

SIMPLY CHANGE "KNOW" TO "RECOMMEND"

⇒ In exactly the same way, step by step we can move through chains of ARTISTS CURATING ARTISTS to to just about any artist on the planet.

LIKE THIS...

⇒ From Quincy Jones we access one of his protégés, stellar young Cuban pianist Alfredo Rodriguez. From Alfredo Rodriguez we access a fabulous multinstrumentalist Alfredo plays with, Munir Hossn. Two more steps and we've reached the above-mentioned Raimundo Sodré, formerly virtually unreachable in Bahia...

Raimundo Sodré Now

Dengo

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DICTATED SILENCE

⇒ Sodré's meteoric major-label career was crushed by the Brazilian dictatorship years ago and he was forced to flee Brazil under threat of death...into a 19 year exile. He became almost impossible to find and hear, even after returning to Brazil.

MUSIC FALLS LIKE RAIN

⇒ But now lines of everbranching interlinked recommendations rise from Bahia to form a (small world) network rounding the planet like the arboreal canopy of a vast Amazonian rainforest. When the dictatorship ground Sodré into the dust, they unwittingly planted a seed.

FROM SODRÉ, A WORLDLINE TO SPLENDID BULE BULE (LEATHER HAT) ABOVE... AND TO OTHERS IN THE CLIP...

⇒ "The time has arrived for these people of color to show their worth ... I want to see Uncle Sam play tambourine so the whole world can samba!"

AND FROM BULE ON...

⇒ ...tendrils twining through urban centers and beautiful backwaters... through New York boroughs, Burkina Faso... County Clare... Cape Town...

THROUGH ARTISTS ACROSS THE BOARD

⇒ ...writers, journalists, photographers, painters, illustrators, architects, choreographers, filmmakers...

IS THE MATRIX AN ALTERNATE REALITY?

⇒ Only if your reality has been defined by corporate mass media. The original meaning of "matrix" is "source", from "mater", Latin for "mother". We're real mothers for ya!

DOES THE MATRIX WATCH YOU?

⇒ Zero surreptitious tracking, data mining and data brokerage per Cambridge Analytica, Facebook, et al.