MeeK

Who is MeeK?

MeeK is a Franco-British Indie Pop songwriter born in Montmorency France on February the 16th, 1971. The choice of his stage name (always written with a capital "M" and a capital "K") is an oblique homage to '60s British pop producer Joe Meek.

Being a multi-instrumentalist (guitar, piano, keyboard, drums, bass), MeeK usually plays all the instruments on his recordings (through a multitracked/multi-layered method of recording) and provides all vocals including multi-layered backing harmonies. Since his first album in 2002 and an ever strong presence on the Internet right from its very early days, MeeK is part of the European flourishing Pop/Rock Indie music scene and movement for which the Web is generally the major medium of exposure out of public performances. Over the years and through word-of-mouth, some have come to consider him a “cult-artist” because of his rather non-typical and enigmatic persona and the fact that he is one of the very first few artists in Europe who have pioneered in utilizing the Internet as a marketing tool and a medium to publicize and/or expose their music to the general public in the early 2000’s, well before the advent of social networks like MySpace, Facebook or YouTube.

After living in London and being briefly part of Indie Acoustic-Rock group Tin Can Heart and more hard-edged Rock band Elsewhere, Meek was signed in 1996 as a songwriter by Stephane Berlow of BMG Music Publishing France.

With the encouragement and support of famous French actors Jean-Pierre Bacri, Agnès Jaoui and Jamel Debbouze, MeeK released his first album titled “Psychotique (Psychotic)” on the independent record label Bedroom to a warm critical reception in France. The CD created what was then not yet called a buzz on the Internet (still in its infancy as a mainstream media in 2000), and was well noticed in the French Indie music scene of the time. French Pop artist Calogero decided to sponsor MeeK after hearing him on the radio and mistaking him for a female performer because of his rather high-pitched vocal range. Calogero then invited MeeK to perform his single “Psychotique” on The Café Live, one of the first music programs on the French Web, produced in partnership by Universal Music and NRJ radio station, and presented by Manu Payet. MeeK”s “Psychotique” album was also released in a deluxe digipack version in Japan by Tokyo Indie record label MINF Records with an introductory essay by leader of Japanese pop group Pizzicato Five, Yasuharu Konishi, drawing a camparison between the Franco-English songwriter and Paul McCartney amongst others. Since then, all MeeK albums have been released in Japan by the same label.

In 2003 and at the request of his Japanese label, MeeK released the album “Sleeping with Big Ben” comprised of 14 Lennon-McCartney songs recorded in an all-acoustic and vocal treatment. This tribute-album’s release was limited to the Japanese market only.

In 2004 his second album of original songs, “Margaret Et Ses Bijoux (Margaret And Her Jewels)”, came out and can be defined as a concept-album. It confirmed the “MeeK buzz” on the Web and scored excited reviews in the French music press as well as on many music professional blogs.

In 2008 and after a two-year hiatus due to serious health concerns, MeeK recorded his third album “Sortie De Secours (Emergency Exit)” which he co-produced with Maxime Monegier Du Sorbier. Collaborating for the first time with a dozen musicians during the recording sessions, MeeK used no machines, synthesizers nor samplers at all during the album production that spanned more than 10 months. A real string section appeared on several tracks as well as a Celtic bagpipes section for the title “Je Vous Aime Immediatement”.

The album lead single “Six Feet Under”, a nod to the HBO TV series of the same name, entered hundreds of campus and college radio stations playlists around the world and was the first independent music production to have cracked the Swiss state radio...