Lighthouse Family Biography
When your first album's sold more than 1.5 million units in the UK alone, expectations for the follow-up are understandably high.
For Polydor, the Lighthouse Family's Postcards From Heaven is one of two big releases in this year's all-important fourth quarter.
And while the Tyneside-based duo of Tunde Baiyewu and Paul Tucker were given all the time they needed to put together their quintuple platinum debut 'Ocean Drive,' there was no way Polydor managing director Lucian Grainge was going to risk losing the impetus.
"I always wanted to come back with new material this year. Their last single came in January, so they've been away from radio for five or six months," he says.
It takes time to evolve a trademark sound and the duo, signed to Polydor back in 1993 on the basis of a snippet of the Ocean Drive demo played down the phone to A&R director Colin Barlow, were given a $750,000 development deal to go away and develop theirs at leisure.
It is little surprise, then, that the second album's emphasis is very much on evolution, not revolution.
Keyboardist Tucker and vocalist Baiyewu have shouldered more of the songwriting burden this time round: Tim Laws (writer of Gabrielle's Dreams) and ex-Kane Gang member Martin Brammer were both involved again, but 80 per cent of the songs bear the performing duo's names alone.
Scottish producer Mike Peden has been retained, underlining Barlow's belief in continuity.
"Why change for the sake of change? Mike has a very good understanding of Paul's songwriting and Tunde's voice and I didn't want to break that team up," says Barlow.
"He's great at making dynamic soul-pop records, as he's shown with the Chimes and Shara Nelson. An American could have blanded it out - it's important to keep a cutting edge to the sound."
The mix has, however, been varied by drum programmer Ben Healey whose introduction of New York musicians has, says Barlow, helped make Postcards a more accomplished, more mature record than the first.
Tucker sees Raincloud, the lead single released on September 29, as a hallmark Lighthouse Family track, and cites Question Of Faith as a bridge of continuity between first and second albums.
But he considers Let It All Change, a loping groove reminiscent of Marvin Gaye's What's Going On with a monster chorus, as exemplifying a growing songwriting skill.
"We're making the music we love a couple of years down the line - a couple of years older and with a lot more experience behind us," he says.
As the musicians prepare for a month-long UK tour kicking off in Sheffield on November 17 and including two nights at the Royal Albert Hall, Polydor's senior product manager Greg Sambrook is preparing a $1,500,000 marketing plan to cover all the bases.
He says, "To sell 1.5 million records you have to have a very diverse audience, so we're attempting to reach as many buyers of Ocean Drive as quickly as possible."
Although their sound remains as unhurried as ever, the Lighthouse Family's timing seems impeccable.
The new single is Free/One and is currently bulleting up the take40.com UK charts.
The band has been inactive since 2003 but according to their management, the band has not split up: "there is always the possibility of another Lighthouse Family album one day."
For Polydor, the Lighthouse Family's Postcards From Heaven is one of two big releases in this year's all-important fourth quarter.
And while the Tyneside-based duo of Tunde Baiyewu and Paul Tucker were given all the time they needed to put together their quintuple platinum debut 'Ocean Drive,' there was no way Polydor managing director Lucian Grainge was going to risk losing the impetus.
"I always wanted to come back with new material this year. Their last single came in January, so they've been away from radio for five or six months," he says.
It takes time to evolve a trademark sound and the duo, signed to Polydor back in 1993 on the basis of a snippet of the Ocean Drive demo played down the phone to A&R director Colin Barlow, were given a $750,000 development deal to go away and develop theirs at leisure.
It is little surprise, then, that the second album's emphasis is very much on evolution, not revolution.
Keyboardist Tucker and vocalist Baiyewu have shouldered more of the songwriting burden this time round: Tim Laws (writer of Gabrielle's Dreams) and ex-Kane Gang member Martin Brammer were both involved again, but 80 per cent of the songs bear the performing duo's names alone.
Scottish producer Mike Peden has been retained, underlining Barlow's belief in continuity.
"Why change for the sake of change? Mike has a very good understanding of Paul's songwriting and Tunde's voice and I didn't want to break that team up," says Barlow.
"He's great at making dynamic soul-pop records, as he's shown with the Chimes and Shara Nelson. An American could have blanded it out - it's important to keep a cutting edge to the sound."
The mix has, however, been varied by drum programmer Ben Healey whose introduction of New York musicians has, says Barlow, helped make Postcards a more accomplished, more mature record than the first.
Tucker sees Raincloud, the lead single released on September 29, as a hallmark Lighthouse Family track, and cites Question Of Faith as a bridge of continuity between first and second albums.
But he considers Let It All Change, a loping groove reminiscent of Marvin Gaye's What's Going On with a monster chorus, as exemplifying a growing songwriting skill.
"We're making the music we love a couple of years down the line - a couple of years older and with a lot more experience behind us," he says.
As the musicians prepare for a month-long UK tour kicking off in Sheffield on November 17 and including two nights at the Royal Albert Hall, Polydor's senior product manager Greg Sambrook is preparing a $1,500,000 marketing plan to cover all the bases.
He says, "To sell 1.5 million records you have to have a very diverse audience, so we're attempting to reach as many buyers of Ocean Drive as quickly as possible."
Although their sound remains as unhurried as ever, the Lighthouse Family's timing seems impeccable.
The new single is Free/One and is currently bulleting up the take40.com UK charts.
The band has been inactive since 2003 but according to their management, the band has not split up: "there is always the possibility of another Lighthouse Family album one day."
