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While recording The
Strokes album ‘Room on Fire’ in NY, producer, Gordon Raphael
heard Sara’s version of the Janis Joplin track, Piece of my
Heart, got in touch and has been one of Sara’s biggest
supporters and producer ever since. Sara’s debut EP was
recorded when she was 16.
The Bang Bang Club’
(inspired by the group of photographers working in South Africa
during the apartheid civil war) formed in October 2005 from the
ashes of Sara’s old band with Pete Saul, the original
drummer joined by Steve Marsden on guitar and Ash Earlam on
bass.
The band have had
their music played and downloaded almost 300,000 times! A recent
presence on myspace.com has widened her fan base, not only in the
UK and USA but to people all over the world.
The video for Sad and
Gone is currently being played in campuses across the States
through Ruckus. Independent American & British radio stations
and clubs regularly select the bands tracks for their play
lists/club nights. The British Tourist Board in America selected
Sara and the Band as one of the new rising artists to promote the
UK to America on their Visit Britain Rocks website and the BBC
have selected Sara’s video for ‘Sad & Gone’ to show on
their big screen in Manchester City centre this spring/summer.
The band are currently
writing and recording their album and playing gigs
nationwide.
Reviews:
NME..’cool’
Sara Hawley & the
Bang Bang Club. Heard that name before ? You should have. MM were
banging on about this young lady's talent whilst she was preparing
to revise for her GCSE’s. There are plenty of emerging, but
purposely suppressed endorsements already, but that’d be name
dropping.... So after chucking her in at the deep end during
2016’s In The City Electric Circus, it's rewarding to see a
brand new band, Hawleys vocals improved beyond a starting point
way out of reach of 99% of singers and a host of brand new songs.
It’s not hard to see why The Bang Bang Club also filled an
apparently thrilled Mr McGee's 'Death Disco' . Their songs are
powerful rock set pieces. It cuts across the current grain of
wearing Top Shop clothes and declaring you’re in a post-punk
garage band and saying you wished you lived in London. Tracks like
“Sad & Gone” are really just sitting there waiting to be
catapulted into the top 30. With some spine tingling guitar
phrases and a solid rock rhythm, Sara Hawley and Co are on a
journey – it’s a question of when, rather than if, they’ll
reach their destination….manchester music.co.uk
Hopefully someone,
somewhere is beginning to take notice of Sara…’Tell us
something’..thrusting guitars and trad-rock outlook lets the
vocal power burst through..’Breathe’..more interesting,
angular and dynamic..but save the best for last, …‘Sad and
Gone’..rattling, exciting guitar work..anthemic ambition..for
someone so young, its nothing short of incredible.
If they did an exam in
great pop/rock songs (they probably do..) she should already be
graduating with a PhD and the admiration of her academic peers.
…Hawley out-Pinks
Pink and blows Pat Benetar out of the water
‘Broken’ is a
slower number to begin with, but as a vehicle for Sara’s
voice..its an amazing benchmark that few other bands have managed
to achieve, even with experience under their belt.
..the powerful vocals
of Sara Hawley..pitch perfect and thrusting a heady performance in
out faces, which could all too easily spill over into the street
below…the future starts here…
(reviews courtesy of
manchestermusic and ITC)
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