Amanda Lehmann: With red guitar and chrushing power chords and delicately picked arpeggios……

Amanda Lehmann`s debut album Innocence And Illusion contains nine tracks. The music is a nice amalgam of jazz-blues, ballads, prog and rock and faced with Hackett like elements. Amanda Lehmann new album delivered a distinctive music with many personal Amanda Lehmann trademarks. Her trademark is red guitars feature regularly with thematic lead lines, crunching power chords and delicately picked arpeggios, alongside more gentle acoustic treatments.

Amanda’ Lehmanns haunting multi-layered vocals weave throughout the album, intertwining with her lead vocals which range from warm bluesy tones to rocky harder edged to choir-like pure notes.

With the lyrics and music composed by Amanda Lehmann, she has welcomed the keyboard and engineering skills of Nick Magnus for seven of the songs, with Roger King on two tracks, and also featuring guest appearances by Rob Townsend on sax, and Steve Hackett on lead and acoustic guitars and harmonica.

Amanda Lehmann states enthusiastic on her Facebook page, «I’m thrilled to share this song and video with you. The Watcher brings a darker rocky element to the album; my vocals and lead guitar expressing the desire to break free! I leave it to the listeners to decide what The Watcher means for them!».

As well as Amanda’s own keyboard and piano compositions appearing on several of the songs, Nick Magnus brings a wealth of inspired, majestic performances to the pieces with orchestral arrangements – such as the enchanting flying sequence instrumental in Tinkerbell, swooping synth solos (Who Are The Heroes?), dynamic rhythms and plenty of haunting Mellotron throughout. Roger King adds a beautiful string arrangement to Memory Lane and funky jazz band to Only Happy When It Rains along with lilting sax solos from Rob Townsend. Amanda and Steve Hackett go into twin guitars on Forever Days with some stellar lead work from Steve. Steve also brings the elegance of his nylon guitar into play on Where The Small Things Go and bluesy harmonica on Only Happy When It Rains.

Amanda comments: I «am incredibly proud of this album. There is a wide variety of music, all weaving around the central thread of life’s journey; the twists and turns and all the stops along the way, the innocence, the illusions, the hopes and dreams, reflecting on what is, what was, what could be. These songs have been bursting to be heard, and I hope that they speak to everyone who listens to them».

Amanda Lehman is a part of Steve Hackett solo band and she are supported by five band mates from Steve Hackett universe on the new album . Steve Hackett, Nick Magnus, Roger King, Paul Johnson and Rob Townsend.

Amanda Lehmann  was originally a classically trained pianist, Amanda fell in love with the power of rock and the overdriven guitar. But not being one to be constrained to any one musical genre, she has blended the boundaries throughout her musical career between folk, blues, rock and classical. An accomplished singer/songwriter, Amanda has written and recorded many pieces, and her new solo album is due for release 20 August 2021.

Amanda Lehmann spent her early musical years gigging extensively throughout the UK with her bands. She has also been involved in various duo and solo work (the main duo being Wazzoon – Amanda Lehmann & Eddy Deegan).

From 2009 Amanda has been playing guitar and backing / lead vocals with Steve Hackett, joining the band on the UK 2009 tour, and continuing throughout 2010 – 2013.Amanda also features on several of Hackett’s albums and live DVDs, and regularly appears as a guest at some of his shows.

Tracklist:

01. Who Are The Heroes? (6:58)

02. Tinkerbell (5:59)

03. Only Happy When It Rains (3:47)

04. The Watcher (7:20)

05. Memory Lane (4:52)

06. Forever Days (5:25)

07. We Are One (4:56)

08. Childhood Delusions (4:50)

09. Where The Small Things Go (1:42)

Total Time 45:49

Line-up:

Amanda Lehmann (Steve Hackett) – Vocals, Guitars (1-8), Keyboards, Piano (1,4,6,7, 8)

   With

Nick Magnus (Steve Hackett) – Keyboards, Piano (1,2,4,6, 8)

Roger King (Steve Hackett) – Keyboards (3, 5)

Steve Hackett (Genesis) – Guitars (6, 9), Harmonica (3)

Rob Townsend (Steve Hackett, The Backstage) – Alto Sax (3, 5)

Paul Johnson – Backing Vocal (4)

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