Wintergreen have just released their fourth album “Framed”.
Formed in Manchester in late 2013, WinterGreen spent their first 12-months writing & rehearsing before venturing out to play venues around their native city such as Night & Day, The Castle, Gullivers, The Salford Arms, and a jazz club in Cheshire.
The Wintergreen line up is:Michael Knowles – Guitar, piano + lead vocals Grant Cuddy – Drums, percussion
Peter B. McGrath – Bass guitar + other vocals
Mike was previously the frontman for The Catchmen and was a member of Grifter along with Pete in the mid-late 90’s; they spent nine years in covers band The Fraudsters, while Grant drummed for The Underclass and Candour.
Wintergreen launch their first album “Gliders” in December 2015.
Keen on getting their music heard via unusual methods, the final track on their debut “Hell and Heaven” appears in the soundtrack of the movie “The Messenger” which stars Robert Sheehan and Joely Richardson. “Gliders” was recorded at Martin Coogan’s Vibe Studios in Manchester with Dean Glover at the controls.
The follow up “Accidents & Designs” arrived in 2017. Recorded by the band themselves at rehearsals over several months, they completed the job with Dean Glover again at Vibe, and with Jake Dalby at Cadman Studios in Stoke-on- Trent.“Accidents & Designs” has more of a punky DIY feel to it, beginning with a rockier live version of “Hell & Heaven” from the previous album, and ending with a charming little acoustic number called “Getting Older” that features the guitar being packed away after its conclusion, and the bag being zipped up!
Describing themselves as “songwriters first & foremost.... we simply feel energetic about writing songs and performing them – be that gig, studio or rehearsal”. That energy transfers itself into the records, and Wintergreen weren’t lying when they talked about their productivity – their third album was completed in 2019, released the following January, and entitled “The Future Is A Way of Life” (the acronym of which, hilariously, and completely unplanned according to the band, is “TFI AWOL”).
This 10-song collection saw the band working again with Dean Glover at Vibe Studios and branching out a little more in terms of using other instruments, intriguing sounds, and studio trickery.
Wintergreen’s fourth album “Framed” was released on March 29th 2021. Recorded in Lockdown with Peter EJ Lee at the controls, the band have had to play all their parts separately and rely on the skill of their Producer to pull together an album which is another artistic step forward. There’s a distinct synth sound running through the 12- song LP, but acoustic songs and the energetic rock-out tracks are also in there.
When Wintergreen are not being Wintergreen, Mike makes movies and TV programmes (he’s been nominated for a BAFTA). In the pipeline, he is due to work with prolific Producer and Screen Actor Mem Ferda, on a couple of very exciting feature films.
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