Spin Cycle (Creative Soul Jazz), released on Feb. 22, 2011, and available on www.drewdavidsen.com, CD Baby, iTunes and Amazon.com, is true to its title: 10 original songs of contemporary jazz that are as fresh as any you are going to hear this year.

Davidsen, also nominated as Best New Artist by the Oasis Contemporary Jazz Awards 2011 in San Diego, says Spin Cycle is inspired by the great sounds of artists and groups like Acoustic Alchemy, Steve Lukather and George Benson, and mixes cool-jazz guitar lines with pop, funk, blues, Latin and even some disco. Recorded in Franklin, Tennessee, Spin Cycle is produced by Creative Soul Jazz’s Eric Copeland and mixed by Grammy Award-winning engineer Bill Whittington.

The list of top-quality musicians joining Davidsen on the project includes Copeand as well as Jay Rowe of legendary jazz group, Special EFX, John Hammond, Gary Lunn, and Brian Fullen from Creative Soul’s new Session Player Super Group called Player A.
Spin Cycle opens with the title track, a propelling tune that showcases Davidsen’s fluid style on the frets. “Don’t Delay,” a lively piece that recalls the best contemporary jazz from the 1970's, features Davidsen’s bluesy guitar lines and an unrestrained, killer keyboard-synth solo.

Davidsen has a modern touch with mid-tempo tunes as well, which he displays in “Alexander’s Dream” and “Cosmopolitan.” Davidsen is not afraid to show his playfulness with “My Club Side,” a downright fun song with disco strings and disco percussion. Even if you didn’t get down to disco back in day, you’ll find much to like with the tune. Two ballads show the quieter side of Davidsen: “Catalina Blue” showcases his skill on the acoustic guitar in a tribute to the sweet sounds of the guitar duo of Acoustic Alchemy; and “My Father’s World,” a rework of the classic hymn, is stripped down to the essentials—guitar and keys. It’s a heartfelt piece and a memorable way to conclude the CD.

It was in 2009 that Davidsen announced his presence on the smooth jazz charts with “Astro,” a song from his second solo CD, Around (Again) (Creative Soul Jazz). The song, with its bright melodies and sweeping guitar lines, logged an impressive 17 weeks on the Smooth Jazz Top 20 Countdown, a chart compiled by Broadcast Architecture’s Smooth Jazz Network. Davidsen wrote “Astro” in memory of his father, Dr. Arthur F. Davidsen, an astrophysicist at Johns Hopkins University who built and designed the NASA-funded Hopkins Ultraviolet Telescope (HUT). The popular song – which JazzTimes called “a rollicking tune … with a bouncy optimism” – is one reason why Davidsen picked up his Best New Artist nomination from the 2010 American Smooth Jazz Awards.

Davidsen, who debuted in 2008 with This Journey, followed Around Again in 2010 with We 3 Stringz, a Christmas CD featuring heavyweights like Chuck Loeb and Paul Jackson, Jr., as well as a host of Nashville session players.

For all his recent success and national exposure, Davidsen came relatively late to the guitar. He dabbled in guitar as a youngster, but studied cello and went on to play bass in high school. He was 21 when he started taking the electric guitar seriously. Davidsen’s musical epiphany occurred when he was in the Navy during Operation Desert Storm in the early 1990s. When his ship docked in the Persian Gulf island country of Bahrain, Davidsen purchased an electric guitar and a small amp.

His musical direction was due in part to jazz guitar icon George Benson. He recalls that a friend turned him on to Benson’s Breezin’, the huge crossover album that almost single-handedly helped create the smooth-contemporary jazz genre. Davidsen, an underwater weapons technician on the destroyer USS John Hancock, would put Benson’s music in his cassette player and cut his teeth while transcribing solos. “What an incredible player,” says Davidsen, who was also inspired to scat while listening to Benson. He soon drew crowds on board the Hancock who would turn out regularly to hear him play.

Davidsen’s musical background includes a pop trio, ska band and an R&B group. In 1995, he joined Baltimore’s Richard Walton Group – a contemporary jazz quintet – and was a member for 12 years. The band released a live CD recorded at the famed Blues Alley in Washington, DC. During his career, Davidsen has lent his skills to almost 30 recording projects. In 2008, he won the Momentum Award for Jazz Artist of the Year given by Indie Heaven, a Christian-music organization in Nashville. Shortly after that, Guitar Player Magazine named him one of its “ten hottest new guitarists.”

When not working on music, Davidsen relaxes by fishing. He’s also an avid bicyclist, and one year participated in the MS 150, riding over 100 miles to benefit the Multiple Sclerosis Society. It was biking that helped Davidsen achieve one of what he calls his greatest accomplishments – losing about 60 pounds and gaining stamina for his live shows, which have included the prestigious Catalina Island Jazz Trax Festival in Southern California and Seabreeze Jazz Festival in Panama City Beach, Florida.

Davidsen regularly gives back to the community. He supports the charity Ghanaian Mothers’ Hope, which builds schools, playgrounds and medical clinics in Ghana, West Africa. A percentage of his music sales goes toward this organization. Over the years his efforts have provided for desks and school books, medicines and medical equipment and sponsoring of children in a preschool and primary school in the village of Akramaman. For more information, go to www.gmhope.org

Website :- www.drewdavidsen.com

Press Release - Towson, MD, (March 24 )

Drew Davidsen - Award Winning Jazz Guitarist Meets History Making "Glass Guitar"!

Drew Davidsen, award winning jazz guitarist, the first ever to record commercially with brand new GlassTones patented technology announces release of newest album. SPIN CYCLE. By touring with the prototype and recording on an album debuting at #27 on the Billboard Contemporary Jazz Charts Davidsen confirms GlassTones decision to make him their #1 endorsing artist. Www.DrewDavidsen.com

GlassTones innovator, Mark Payung, takes his inspiration from a glass slide. He is turning the guitar world upside down; instead of having a glass slide on the strings, he has the strings resting on glass. On a GlassTones guitar the strings always vibrate between two points of highly dense silica material. This creates the crystal clear sound recorded on SPIN CYCLE, Davidsen's 4th album produced by Eric Copeland, Creative Soul Jazz, mixed by Grammy winning engineer Bill Whittington.

Most guitar players spend up to half of their lives searching for the perfect tone, their "Holy Grail." This can involve gold tipped cables, amp modeling pedal boards, rack mounted effects, computer programs - the list of toys is endless.

The truth is that real, pure, even tone with long sustain comes when the string is in contact with very dense material. On a traditional guitar, the fretboard is wood, the frets and the saddle are metal, the nut is bone or plastic, creating a mix of overtones and limited sustain. GlassTones innovation has purified the string vibration, eliminating these overtones and multiplying the sustain with a design that allows the strings to always be in contact with - between two points - highly dense silica material, a substance 4 times more dense than material in any traditional guitar. This is the same material used in an astronaut's visor. For more specifics see www.Glasstonesllc.com

When Davidsen met Mark Payung on a trip to Nashville, and heard his claims for his new innovation, his curiosity was peaked, but in the back of his mind he was a little skeptical that his personal search for the “Holy Grail” could be over. Davidsen invited Payung and his guitar into a recording session on the WE 3 STRINGZ album. In the heart of Music City, where they have seen and heard it all, with Davidsen's producer, and other musicians present, eyes got wider and heads turned as "O Holy Night" was conceived with a 5th generation GlassTones prototype. Davidsen continued to test this prototype in his studio and on the road for several more months. Confidence built resulting in the GlassTones guitar being preferred for the newest album, SPIN CYCLE.

Sandy Shore of SmoothJazz.com reports that SPIN CYCLE “is filled with great ideas, killer melodies and exceptional craftsmanship. Fun, fresh, funky…...featuring accomplished keyboardist Jay Rowe (Special EFX). This project is hot on the heels of Drew’s critically-acclaimed holiday release WE THREE STRINGS featuring Chuck Loeb and Paul Jackson, Jr. SPIN CYCLE can be gentle at times with tender tunes like “Alexander’s Dream,” “Catalina Blue,” and “My Father’s World,” but mostly it whirls, twirls and shakes with upbeat, original compositions and stunning guitar work! Fans of Ritenour, Benson and Acoustic Alchemy will dive into the spin with songs like the sophisticated “Cosmopolitan,” the driving “Don’t Delay,” and the fun title track. We expect big chart action and lots of sales on this one… Drew Davidsen is one of the hottest new forces in Smooth Jazz