FènixDion to Release New Single 'Sugar'

The new single will be released on streaming services tomorrow.

By: May. 19, 2022
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FènixDion to Release New Single 'Sugar'

Twin Cities-based band FènixDion are excited to share their new single "Sugar." The song is the latest track to be lifted from the band's debut album due later this year. The song premiered today at The SPILL Magazine and will be available on all streaming platforms this Friday (pre-save).

About the song Keston Wright of FènixDion says:
While watching Minneapolis eat itself alive I was very emotionally distraught and filled with so many questions and concerns of what the future of my city looked like. "Mama Say" consolidates the thoughts that were running through my head at the time, and the mindset I needed to adopt to get through it all. The song is an anthem of hope amidst the overwhelming and soul altering issues facing humanity.

"Sugar" follows the band's single "Mama Say" which was released earlier this Spring. The song debuted at Rock And Roll Globe and can also be shared at YouTube or on all streaming platforms. On the song Rock And Roll Globe says, "When you listen to 'Mama Say,' off their brilliant debut LP Sugar, you can hear the clear elements of both early Lenny Kravitz and Vanishing Point-era Primal Scream in the echoed grooves of this mid-tempo mover." "Mama Say" is available now on all streaming platforms for any playlist shares.

FènixDion, the brainchild of Keston Wright and Sam Bramble, has already made a bold entrance onto the Twin Cities music scene. One of their first shows ever was a warm-up slot in front of thousands at the Basilica Block Party in downtown Minneapolis, followed quickly by a more intimate, well-received club gig at Icehouse.

"We want to be the best thing that anybody has seen in the last 10 years," says Keston Wright. After a year of incubating in the studio with his longtime musical collaborator, the drummer Sam Bramble, his eyes smolder with the thought of unleashing their new work on stage.

The live iteration of FènixDion includes a trio of axe slingers-Keston Wright on acoustic, Atom Lee and Mitchell Johnson on electric-radiating layers of guitar tones outward while the bassist Gavin Taylor, percussionist Nii Mensah, and drummer Sam Bramble propel the group forward with tight, funky beats. Together they create expansive, transportive, and radiant rock music that is reminiscent of greats like Lenny Kravitz, Beck, and Musicology-era Prince, but also stands on its own as a unique, exciting new addition to the kaleidoscopic Minneapolis music community.

Keston has previously been celebrated for his work in the funk-pop group Static Panic. With FènixDion, he has taken a sharp turn inward to create more personal, reflective lyrics, and re-rooted himself with some of his most formative musical influences, from Curtis Mayfield, Bill Withers, and Funkadelic to the influential early blues guitarist Buddy Moss.

FenixDion's debut, Sugar, out later this year, is a guitar-driven album-which surprised Keston at first. He says that in recent years, he'd started to dread playing his primary instrument. That all changed when he joined an all-Black country band fronted by fellow Minnesotan Tracey Blake, which happened around the same time that he rewatched the Coen Brothers romp across the Great Depression-era South, O Brother, Where Art Thou?

"That literally flipped a whole thought in my head of what true music is; what has shaped America and really where it all comes from. And it all comes from the African diaspora," Keston says. "And I just wanted to take all of that back and put it into rock music and write music that is not going to be perceived as, like, a pro-Black record. But the content is like hella pro-Black."

The songs on Sugar were written and recorded in the midst of a creative outpouring for Keston and Sam, who have collaborated on a number of musical projects over the past decade but never homed in on a concept as specific and inspiring as they have with FènixDion.

The lyrics of FènixDion's songs don't immediately demand attention from the listener; this is music delivered with a certain amount of reverb and swagger, which allows the words to dip into the space between guitar tones and then re-emerge, creating a psychedelic effect. But upon closer listening, it becomes obvious just how deep Keston's songs are digging into his own complicated past and the electrified frisson of the unnerving present moment.

"It's an album of transformation," Keston explains. "That's why I wanted to name the project FènixDion, because of the archetype of the Phoenix: burning away all that doesn't resonate within you, so you can be reborn into your truest self. I think a lot of people went through that in 2020, letting go of all the s that does not matter. So that's what I'm focusing on now: my truest self, moving forward, and trying to fly."

Listen to the new single here:

FènixDion Tour Dates

05.21 - Minneapolis, MN @ Liquid Zoo Festival at Bauhaus Brewlabs
08.07 - Rochester, MN @ Down By The Riverside Concert Series *
09.16 - LaCrosse, WI @ Midwest Music Festival
* supporting En Vogue



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