GRAMMY Award nominated pop/rock band Royal Tailor announces the launch of a national “Get Schooled” campaign. Geared to junior high, high school and college campus this fall the campaign aims to encourage young people who may otherwise feel hopeless or trapped by their circumstances.
Having toured the country, experiencing firsthand the plight of today’s youth—kids influenced by corrupt media messages or suffering in unhealthy home environments who turn to self-mutilation as well as drug and alcohol abuse—Royal Tailor feels a burden for this generation.
“The core of the issue is that kids are living a life void of vision,” says Royal Tailor’s Tauren Wells. “The Bible says that without vision people perish or cast off restraint. It’s time that we stop allowing pop culture to cast vision for our kids and give them a vision of who Jesus is and who they are in Him. That’s at the root of this campaign; it’s our response to what’s happening in our culture today.”
Royal Tailor’s contribution is a 60-minute, high-energy, performance-driven presentation at schools nationwide that inspires students to dream and to break the cycle of dysfunction in the world around them. The plan is to visit four different schools in a single city from Monday through Thursday. The week would culminate in a Friday concert where all students are invited.
“We want them to realize that thoughtlessly following the trends of pop culture will leave them with a pale pallet that will paint nothing more than a dingy future,” says Wells. “We also want to remind them that there is hope when they feel hopeless…that they have a future and it doesn’t have to look like their past.”
The band recently recorded a video appeal to fans on indiegogo.com to help them raise funds to launch the first tangible expression of this campaign, a four city tour – which the band hopes can become nationally impacting. The band’s goal is to raise $200,000 by April 8 which would ideally fund up to a 64-school-tour impacting approximately 16 cities (an estimated four schools per city) starting with the band members’ hometowns of Battle Creek, Mich., Decatur, Ill., St. Louis, Mo. and Giles County, Va.
Visit www.indiegogo.com/Royal-Tailor to view the video and to learn more about how you can contribute. Also follow Royal Tailor’s fundraising progress on Twitter at www.twitter.com/royaltailor.
Pop/rock band Royal Tailor (Essential Records), having just wrapped the 30-city “Sounds Of Hope” tour with label-mates, Building 429 and Leeland, received its first GRAMMY Award® nomination for its May 31 national debut, Black & White, in the Best Contemporary Christian Music Album category. Nominees were announced during last night’s hour-long special broadcast, “The GRAMMY® Nominations Concert Live!! — Countdown To Music's Biggest Night®,” which aired live on CBS from Nokia Theatre at L.A. LIVE.
“We were honored to have been asked to perform at the Nashville Chapter Block Party back in May, right before the release of our record, and we had a blast!” shares Royal Tailor’s lead singer, Tauren Wells. “It was special to us because we’re members of that chapter and we support what the Recording Academy is all about. This nomination is such an honor for us;
we’re really humbled by it and couldn’t be more grateful.”
Royal Tailor will continue to perform solo concert dates through the end of the year followed by joining the 45-city Casting Crowns Spring 2012 "Come To The Well” tour with Matthew West and Lindsay McCaul. For more information on tour dates/markets visit RoyalTailor.com.
The 54th Annual GRAMMY Awards® ceremony will be held at the Staples Center
in Los Angeles, Calif. on Sunday, February 12, 2012.
Essential Records’ newest signing, pop/rock band Royal Tailor will release its label debut, Black & White, June 7, 2011. The album’s debut single, “Hold Me Together,” is already garnering early momentum at radio, while the band has been selected to perform at The Recording Academy® Nashville Chapter’s GRAMMY® Block Party on May 10.
Produced by Aaron Lindsey, Chuck Butler, and Daniel Kinner, Black & White showcases Royal Tailor’s distinctive musical blend, highlighting influences that range from Bruno Mars to Maroon 5 to Michael Jackson. The result is 11 high-energy tracks that make audiences want to dance, pray, shout and sing along. Band frontman Tauren Wells comments, “We like to get down. If you ever spend any time with the four of us, at some point we’re going to turn up the music, and we’re going to have a good time. That’s just who we are.”
But the band’s feel-good music has an equally attractive message. Having spent a year mentoring youth at its church in Granite City, Ill., and continuing to minister to young people while out on tour, Royal Tailor takes the plight of this generation seriously.
“We were personally working with these kids and dealing with their issues,” says Royal Tailor bassist Blake Hubbard. “I think we learned a lot about our calling and what kids were really going through.”
Consequently, songs like “Gravity (Pulling Heaven Down),” offer a unique perspective on life’s challenges by reminding the listener how difficult times draw us closer to God. The buoyant anthem “Control,” which references hits by Ke$ha, Lady Gaga and Katy Perry, encourages youth to stand up for what they believe with the same boldness as nonbelievers who are pushing the world’s agenda.
“This record is pressing against the flow of the mainstream,” says Wells. “There are so many songs and influences out there today poisoning the culture. We hope to be a remedy to that, to show people it doesn’t have to be this way.”
The album’s first single, “Hold Me Together,” which released to Christian AC and CHR April 15, is already winning fans at radio, capturing an additional two adds at CHR and seven adds at AC this week, including AIR 1 and WAY-FM Networks.
This early radio impact is reflected in charting positions, moving the single 20 slots in one week to No. 26 on the Billboard National Christian Audience chart.
Network Program Director at WAY-FM, Jeff Connell comments, “Since the first time I heard ‘Hold Me Together’ I was struck with two thoughts. First, there is NOTHING else that sounds like this…such a unique fresh sound. Second, when the heck can I start playing this song…it’s a smash! This is the perfect record for us.”
The band also has been tapped to perform at NARAS Nashville’s 13th annual GRAMMY® Block Party on Tuesday, May 10. Known as the event that launches the summer music season, the Block Party gives industry folks a chance to mingle while enjoying a great variety of live music. Other artists scheduled to appear include Laura Bell Bundy, The Civil Wars, Denny Jiosa, Jerrod Niemann, Old Crow Medicine Show, and Chancellor Warhol.
Royal Tailor is currently debuting new music from Black & White on the road, having just wrapped up the 20-city “The Overcome Tour,” which also featured Fireflight, After Edmund and Hyland. For a complete list of tour dates, visit royaltailoronline.com.
Comprising Tauren Wells (lead vocals), DJ Cox (guitar), Blake Hubbard (bass) and Jarrod Ingram (drums), Royal Tailor formed after meeting at Bible college and quickly amassed a loyal fan following, playing more than 300 shows in less than two years. The group’s soaring popularity garnered the attention of three-time GRAMMY nominated rock band Leeland, who introduced Royal Tailor to executives at Provident Label Group, Leeland’s label home. For more information on the band and its forthcoming project, visit royaltailoronline.com, myspace.com/royaltailor.com or follow the band on Twitter at twitter.com/royaltailor.
