Jake Clemons to Release New Single Next Week

Singer, songwriter and multi-instrumentalist Jake Clemons will release "A Little Bit Sweet," the first single from his highly anticipated upcoming album Fear + Love on June 7, 2016. Written and produced by Clemons, the single features the musician at his very best; singing and performing on a multitude of instruments, including the guitar and saxophone and offering a bewitching hint of how much he has to say as an artist and how eloquently he says it.

Reflecting on the album and first single Jake says: "Fear & Love is a journey that forges through loss & hardship and attempts to reconcile those challenges until finding its way to the freedom of being vulnerable and honest, mostly with yourself. The first single 'A Little Bit Sweet,' sits just on the other side of those losses, recognizing that yes, life is bittersweet...but a little bit sweet makes it better. This song was written after speaking to someone about the loss of their father. He passed away on the 16th day of the month and a year later their daughter was born, again on the 16th. Hard times will come, but it seems that life is sprinkled with these sweet moments that remind us to keep going and that forward is the preferred direction."

Creating his band in 2010, Clemons has divided his time amongst touring the world with his own music (performing at venues and legendary 'Living Room' shows across the globe) and spending the last five years as the tenor and baritone saxophonist with Bruce Springsteen's E Street band (stepping in for his Uncle, the late Clarence Clemons.) During these years, Jake has had time to think about the sound and direction for his music and laid the first parts of his new album's foundation at the very same time that his 2013 debut EP Embracing Light was in progress.

The result is a range of emotions that Clemons explores through the eleven song CD, beginning with a cacophony of hurricane warnings and culminating into an exhilarating collision of restlessness and romance. Singing, playing guitar and a multitude of other instruments (including the muscular tenor saxophone heard in the songs "Undone," "Just Stay" and "A Little Bit Sweet,") Fear + Love is the newest chapter in Clemons' musical journey.

Reflecting on his upcoming release, Jake states: "When I put Embracing Light together, I changed the way that I approached recording. A lot of that was due to a conversation that I had with Bruce about having a theme and a concept for each record." Because some of the songs he had written did not quite fit the Embracing Light theme, Clemons set them aside, knowing that Fear + Love was going in a different direction. "It's more introspective, instead of looking up at the moment and carrying hope to the next moment, this album reflects the 'right now" that you feel inside as opposed to the 'right now' that is external."

Fear + Love was produced by Jake Clemons and Ryan Swinehart (Last Bison) and engineered by L Stu Young (Prince) and Geoff Sanoff (Darlene Love, Bruce Springsteen.) The single "A Little Bit Sweet" was engineered by Brian Million (Embracing Light) and the album was recorded at A Room With No VU -Empire Studios in Belleville Ontario, Steve Van Zandt's Renegade Studio in New York City, Sick Island Studios, Nashville and mixed at House of Blues Studio "D" in Nashville.

"A Little Bit Sweet" will be available on iTunes and all other digital outlets on June 7, 2016. Fear + Love is set for release on August 8, 2016.

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