Christmas album coming from downhere!

Downhere, one of Christian music’s premiere rock bands, is scheduled to release their first full-length holiday album, How Many Kings: Songs For Christmas, October 6, 2009. The new project was produced by Downhere and will be distributed by Word Distribution.

The idea to record their first Christmas CD grew over the years for Downhere as they performed several holiday concerts in their hometown of Franklin, TN, beginning in 2001. (Glenn Lavender is the only band member who still resides in Canada). Then the thought grew to fruition with the success of the single, “How Many Kings,” which went to #4 on the Christian AC charts in 2007, followed by the Bethlehem Skyline tour last year with their labelmates on Centricity Music.

How Many Kings: Songs For Christmas features the timeless classics of the Yuletide season that are recorded with the Downhere style. “Basically we made a giant list of Christmas songs and narrowed them down to our top choices, realizing that every one of them was at least a hundred years old,” says lead singer, Marc Martel. “We all really resonate with a love for good lyrics, the classic ones that are going to last, so we do a lot of really old Christmas carols. However, we also tried to make the old stuff sound new.”

How Many Kings: Songs For Christmas kicks-off with “How Many Kings” and flows into Christmas standards such as “God res Ye Merry Gentlemen,” “Silent Night,” “What Child Is This,” and “We Wish You A Merry A Christmas,” to name a few. The songs are a mixture of fun and religious tunes but the majority of songs resonate with the true meaning of the season.

“We didn’t want to pack a whole Christmas record with ‘Jingle Bells,’ ‘Rockin’ Around the Christmas Tree’ or anything that was considered all that fluffy,” explains drummer Jeremy Thiessen. “We were very selective in wanting to pick songs that actually said something than simply ‘it’s Christmas let’s party!’ We’re just trying to get people to pay attention and unplug from all of the running around.”

downhere offers 17 unreleased songs

Nashville, TN (July 19, 2007) ---- Award-winning rock group, downhere, will release a new album of 17 previously recorded demo songs that have never been offered on a CD before. The songs appear on the new project titled, Thunder After Lightning and will be available online at www.centricitystore.com, at iTunes, and at the band’s concerts.

The site will give fans access to more of downhere’s music, as the songs were demos for their album, Wide Eyed & Mystified that was released in 2006. “We have a ton of fun in our little home studios writing, dreaming and recording ‘‘demos’’,” says downhere. “These demos are to songs, what an artist’s pencil sketch is to the final painting. In the process of writing for Wide Eyed and Mystified we submitted more demos than we could ever use for one album. While we value the quality of a full blown recording, we think that our little demos have a special value alone. As you listen, enjoy the rumblings after what we consider to be our best record to date.”

downhere is currently touring in Sweden but their fans will be excited to learn that a second leg of the Wide Eyed & Mystified Tour, that was so successful this past spring, will kick-off in September 2007. downhere has invited their labelmate, Jason Gray, back as the opening act and tour dates will be announced soon. downhere will also appear at Creation West on July 27th and at the Franklin Graham Festival in Tacoma, Washington on November 4th.

downhere competes in marathon

(Left to Right): Jeremy Thiessen, Jason Germain, Glenn Lavender, Dave Lewis

Nashville, TN (April 30, 2007) – Following their hectic schedule during Gospel Music week and their on-stage appearance during the Gospel Music Awards, three members of the CCM group, downhere, and their production manager took to the streets of Nashville to run the city’s popular Country Music Marathon, Saturday, April 28th. downhere joined an estimated 30,000 runners from around the world and completed the full marathon of twenty-six miles in the hilly downtown and music row areas, with the finish line at LP Field, the Tennessee Titans stadium.

This was Jason Germain’s (guitar/vocalist) first marathon. Jason only started running recently and managed to finish in less than five hours. Jeremy Thiessen (drums) ran the first part of the marathon with his wife and finished the full marathon on his own. This is his second marathon. The Country Music Marathon was Glenn Lavender’s (bass) third marathon. He beat his recent Toronto Marathon time by 40 minutes. For production manager Dave Lewis, this was his first marathon and he finished at 4:24:26.

All members of downhere are originally from Canada but now call Nashville their home. They recently won their second Juno Award for Contemporary Christian/Gospel ALBUM OF THE YEAR, which was an honor for their critically acclaimed CD, Wide-Eyed and Mystified. A new project will be released on Centricity Records in the spring of 2008.