Check back here often for the latest news on Lewis Taylor's releases.

"The Lost Album" can be ordered direct from here.

"Limited Edition 2004" can be ordered direct from here.

"Stoned Part II" is the second release by Lewis, 1 March 2004, once again on his own label. This record proves to be a more accurate reflection of the diverse range and nature of Lewis' talents and influences, from classic pop, rock and soul to more contemporary sounds and colours. More than ever, this is music impossible to classify and is, rightly, better just listened to. "If you know someone who thinks Daniel Bedingfield or Jamiroquai represents the very apex of classy soul-pop, then slip them a copy of this stylish, sexy, infectious record and blow their tiny mind." Mojo, **** March 2004.

All information that follows comes courtesy of Mark Ede

LEWIS TAYLOR - STONED PART ONE

Well it foxed Island records. Despite a whole host of heavyweight artist fans, prime TV exposure and plenty of spectacular broadsheet and influential music paper support, they still couldn't make Lewis Taylor a household name. With music too 'quirky' for the soul crowd and allegedly too 'black' for the rock, pop and indie community, Lewis's music became notoriously difficult to market, falling between the narrow, unimaginative categorisations that had come to haunt the late 1990's music industry.

Which is something of a crime. London based Lewis Taylor is, by any reasonable measure, one of the greatest and singularly distinctive talents working in the industy today. A songwriter possessing the voice of an angel and a multi instrumentalist and producer of exceptional musicianship and vision. Frustrated not so much by the lack of commercial success but more from the industry 'he's obviously a great talent but how do we market this' point of view, Lewis retired to his home studio for a couple of years and did what he does best; make music.

Lewis has now chosen to release his new record, 'Stoned Part One', under his own steam and at his own pace. He has, ironically, come up with his most accessible and, potentially, commercial album to date. Broadly described as 'psychedelic soul' it works at it's own level whilst also, potentially, appealing to all the neo and classic soul heads, through Lenny Kravitz-cum-Hendrix territory. It even possesses enough typically barbed musicianship to appeal to the indie and underground crowd digging everything from retro rock to Radiohead aural landscapes.

So will it put Lewis on the map? Well good product requires good marketing and we wait to see if Lewis's deliberately go-it-alone 'homegrown' approach succeeds where all the past industry support so clearly failed. Either way, this is one guy who will always make great, distinctive and inimitable music. Whatever, don't let this exceptional talent pass you by. Stoned Part One is released on 21st October at all HMV UK retail outlets and, worldwide, through their internet site and will be exclusive to them for the first two weeks of release.

RANDOM SOUNDBITES FROM THE PRESS HEAVYWEIGHTS

WHAT THE PRESS SAID ABOUT LEWIS II

The Observer "He is a compelling voice" Album of the Week

The Guardian "Taylor... can transform one man's world-weariness into his own anthem, His time cannot be far away"

The Times "Here's a bloke with an abundance of talent...dazzling us with his cerebral, convoluted chord structures...made all the more impressive when you realise that he played every instrument and wrote all its songs." Album of the Week

Daily Telegraph "British soul's most vital voice"

The Daily Mail "Taylor still hammers his own personality into his music...he has the writing talent to replicate David Gray's success'

Time Out "This is the soundtrack of sun, ice cream and bronzed bodies. Smooth."

Q Magazine "A masterful consolidation"

Uncut "An album that offers a great deal"

Esquire "The results are positively priapic, drenched in sweat and riven with longing"

LEWIS, THE MUSIC

Taylor is a British singer/songwriter imbued with so much soul I keep looking at the cover photo checking for signs of blackness. I'm sick with it.

But Taylor is the real thing.... is at once lush and sparse, crunchy and smooth.

'Legend has it that when Marvin Gaye's last producer heard Lewis Taylor's self-titled debut album, he broke down and wept. David Bowie declared it the best thing he'd heard all year. Elton John sent Taylor flowers and a fax. Paul Weller began turning up at his gigs like a besotted fan. US R&B supremo D'Angelo summoned him to the States to discuss a possible collaboration. And Daryl Hall sat in the front room of his old flat in London's Wood Green while they worked on a re-recording of She's Gone.'

His is some real Prince-don't-try-this-at-home funk.

It's his voice. It is sincerely soulful and lustful without that postmodern whine that seems to afflict most black soul singers with releases in the past 15 years.

And he's as good a producer as he is a singer. His vocal arrangements owe as much to Motown as they do the Beatles.

The music is as strong as Taylor's voice. There are crunching, stadium-worthy guitar solos, '70s-era wah-wah, Stevie Wonder-esque clavinet bouquets and some lovely George Duke-sounding piano flourishes.

If you can find this one, grab it and play it over and over and over. It's that good.

David Bowie, an early convert, spoke of the album as "the most exciting sound of contemporary soul music"

The elusive Lewis Taylor is one of D'Angelo's favourite singers, the darling of hip-hop's avant guard, one of neo-soul's best-kept secrets. The North Londoner's self-titled debut was a sexy feast, and so is Lewis II.

While both D'Angelo and Taylor trawl the sensual playground of artists like Marvin Gaye and Prince, D does it in public (in video or in his legendary, sweat-and-skinfest live shows) and Taylor does it undercover(s).

This response to the LP was typical. Paul Weller, David Bowie, Dina Carroll, Joan Armatrading, Daryl Hall and Michael Hutchence also professed their support and the record provoked a flood of positive press. "Leon Ware, who produced a couple of Marvin Gaye's albums, heard it and just freaked," says Gilmour. "

When Elton John first heard Lewis Taylor's eponymous debut album last year he was, by all accounts, gobsmacked. He penned a long, congratulatory letter to the boy from Barnet, north London, telling him just what an important artist he was. Then he bought 15 copies of the album - one for each of his houses, cars and so on. He also put in a call to Jools Holland demanding that he put Taylor on his influential Later TV show. Holland did, and after Taylor delivered a stunning performance, became another big fan.

LEWIS, THE MAN

Lewis makes up his public invisibility and low-key profile with private audacity.

The songs themselves were so structurally convoluted that it would be minutes before the chorus would break in; crazed synthesiser and guitar passages regularly disturbed the flow. "I'm fascinated with the idea of art born of a disintegrated mind," he said at the time, hailing the visionary dementia of Syd Barrett and Brian Wilson as inspiration.

Various reports and sightings between then and now had suggested that Taylor was less likely to go into the mainstream than over the edge. He had split with his manager and his nine-year relationship with his lover had come to an end Taylor admits he was partly motivated by a desire to sabotage his career. "I was trying to fuck things up in a way," he says of those wayward sophomore recordings, "to get back some control."

There is a reason why half the tracks on Lewis II are driven by sex while the remainder concern romantic anguish: five of them are directly about the break-up with his long-term partner, who he calls "the one" even though their relationship has improved immeasurably since the split. The other five explore a subsequent, highly physical "volatile fling" with a half-Cuban, half-Jamaican woman whom Taylor describes as "the most beautiful thing I've ever seen in my life".

"I just couldn't say no [to the girl]. I was a junkie for her. She was absolutely gorgeous, which was the problem." That and the fact that she was mentally unstable. "She was completely mad, an extreme case," he confides. He'll always be the "pale artistic type" of his schooldays, his priority the examination of "the vulnerable, submissive side to the male psyche". "We realised we didn't need anybody," he says of himself and his ex, who became his manager after they broke up. "Now, I've got no friends at all."