When: 7.30pm on Thursday 5 November 2009
Where: St Margaret’s Church, Rufford Road, Whalley Range, Manchester M16 8AE

We’re excited to announce a rare piano performance from Mark Eitzel, plus special guest Franz Nicolay.

Mark Eitzel is best known as lead singer of the San Francisco band American Music Club. He was voted Rolling Stone’s Songwriter of the Year in 1991.

Eitzel’s first solo album was the (now elusive) cassette-only ‘Mean Mark Eitzel Gets Fat’ (1982), which pre-dates his AMC work. He released a solo live album, Songs Of Love Live in 1991, featuring raw and emotional acoustic versions of his best AMC songs. His first solo album proper was 1996’s 60 Watt Silver Lining, a highly personal, jazz-inflected work which many consider his best outing.

He went on to release albums of varying styles, including another difficult-to-find effort in Lover’s Leap USA, produced as a tour-only CD and notable for including two songs that Eitzel’s own sleeve notes instruct the listener to skip past. This was followed by 1997’s West, a collaboration with REM’s Peter Buck, and the stark and harrowing Caught in a Trap and I Can’t Back Out ‘Cause I Love You Too Much, Baby in 1998. 2001 saw him take a new electronic direction with The Invisible Man, followed in 2002 by two covers projects: Music for Courage & Confidence and The Ugly American, which included re-interpretations of American Music Club songs by Eitzel and a traditional Greek band.

American Music Club reformed in 2003, and released an album, Love Songs for Patriots, as well as touring the United States and Europe. Eitzel released new solo material in 2005, Candy Ass, which saw a return to the electronic experimentation of The Invisible Man. A new AMC record, The Golden Age was released in February 2008.

For this short three-date UK tour, he’s joined by Franz Nicolay, the Brooklyn-based multi-instrumentalist best known for playing keyboards in the Hold Steady. Franz’s favourite brand of moustache wax is Cowboy Stache Wax, from Montana.

Local mainstay Aidan Smith opens this intimate show. St Margaret’s Church is in Whalley Range in south Manchester – you’ll want to get the 86 from the city centre and university, or the 46 from Fallowfield. We recommend using the GMPTE Travel Planner to find the best route.

This is a co-promotion with Humble Soul.

Tickets available from Piccadilly Records, Ticketline.co.uk and on 0161 832 1111.