ED HALE’S “SCENE IN SAN FRANCISCO” CONTINUES TO RISE UP BILLBOARD CHARTS WITH A BULLET

Photo of Ed Hale by Derek P. Miller Transcendence frontman Ed Hale’s latest single, “Scene in San Francisco” from his solo album Ballad On Third Avenue, continues its rise up the charts this week in the Adult Contemporary (AC) radio format, with over 1000 spins per week and several new stations adding the song to heavy rotation, including WDKB out of Dekalb, IL and KHMX in Santa Rosa, CA. The song has also been getting heavy airplay on Sirius XM channel The Blend, Clear Channel’s iHeart Radio, The TM Studios Weekly Hit Disc, and the National AC Premium Choice Channel.
The song is still holding strong at #26 on Billboard’s Adult Contemporary Top 40 Chart and #15 on the FMQB AC Chart among stiff competition — including Adele, Jason Mraz, Katy Perry and Coldplay — in one of the fiercest months in years in the format, one that many radio promoters are calling “a blood bath”. Hale’s “San Francisco” remains the #1 Most Active New AC Independent Song and Artist on the charts for the 12th consecutive week (as measured by BDS/R&R and Mediabase). Word is the official music video will be released on Monday April 9th, 2012.

ED HALE AND THE TRANSCENDENCE FRONTMAN INTERVIEWED IN ABSOLUTE PUNK

AbsolutePunk.net Interviews Ed Hale and The Transcendence Frontman Ed Hale   

03.27.12 Interviewed by: Linda Ferreira
3. What bands are you influenced by?
I think each guy in the band has a different set of influences. So I can only speak for myself. But one thing I will say is that almost all of us are pretty much into anything. We’re IN the music business, you know. So there’s no real style or genre that we don’t come into contact with. I mean, right now, while we’re doing all this promotion for my latest single “Scene in San Francisco” which has jumped into the Billboard Top 30, our keyboard player Jon Rose is out on tour with Julia Iglesias in South America. Crazy. But you know, that’s the biz. All our work right now is centered around promotion, meet and greets, record signings, interviews, photo shoots, so the guys in the band have time to do other things. And this is a great gig for Jon. No way he could take it, sincerely do a great job, or even get the job, unless he was into a wide variety of styles of music. Dig?
Me, I’m into anything and everything. I really NEED music. For my health and sanity. To make me feel good. Like it’s part of my soul or something. I did this photo shoot yesterday that was very elaborate. A lot of makeup and styling and people on deck. And in order to get into it, we had to have music going in the background. They asked me what I wanted to put on. They were using Pandora, which is an incredible tool. One of the coolest things to come out of this new age. And we’re in this photography studio filled with people of all different ages and backgrounds and at one point someone put on contemporary rap. But I just wasn’t feeling it. It totally ruined the vibe of the shoot for me. Plastic, put on, contrived, commercial for the sake of being commercial, all posing and bragging and nothing substantial underneath. This is what it felt like at least. In the room.
But I had to be “on”, right, totally ON… for the camera. So I went for the pure shit, the stuff that created me and who I am. Lou Reed, David Bowie, T Rex, Donovan, Hendrix, The Beatles, Zeppelin, Lennon, Wings, The Stones, Bob Dylan. Even the Dandy Warhols or The Pixies, The Replacements, Radiohead, U2, Muse. At its heart, this is where my music is coming from at i’s core. Plus a few thousand others I suppose.
4. If you could tour with any bands, past or present, who would they be and why?
The Rolling Stones in the 70s. For obvious reasons. Never has been and never will be another “world’s greatest rock band” quite like the Stones in the 70s. Way before all the bullshit started in the music business. Crafting songs like pottery to fit a specific genre using computers. Narrow-casting to please niche-niche markets based on polls and statistics. This kind of thing has ruined music as we know it today. We’ve got people like Adele or Katy Perry at the top of the charts who use three to ten people to help write a freaking song. And another five to produce it. That’s become the norm now. Everyone pandering to everyone else in an attempt to please a very small imaginary group of music listeners who are scrambling away from regular radio in hordes for that exact reason. They’re out there looking for something REAL and SINCERE and AUTHENTIC and the radio and record exec guys just don’t see it. Albums like DARK SIDE OF THE MOON were made with a small band of four guys and a producer and a few engineers. And that’s it. Real artists who could write great songs, looks be damned. Yeah, I’d love to tour with Pink Floyd if they ever got back together with Roger. For sure. I’d do anything with Paul (McCartney) just because he is still alive and, like many, I feel like I owe him a great deal for who I am today.
5. Best food to eat on tour?
I live on Sprite, coffee and protein shakes man. Among other things. I may not be the best role model for that kind of question.
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“NEW ORLEANS DREAMS” HITS #43 AND THE TOP 5 MOST ADDED CHART FOUR WEEKS IN A ROW

It’s a dream come true for eclectic singer/songwriter Ed Hale of the rock group Ed Hale and the Transcendence (formerly Transcendence). His latest single “New Orleans Dreams” has risen to the #43 position on the FMQB Adult Contemporary Chart this week and once again hit the Top 5 Most Added Songs of the Week Chart for the fourth consecutive week since its release.
For long time fans of Ed Hale the news has got to be as much a “dream come true” as it is for the singer. Hale has been a favorite with critics and tastemakers since his debut album release nearly nine years ago, but he has never achieved major commercial radio success.  That is until now. Fans can feel free to pinch themselves all they want and still tune their radios to “those stations that play the softer hit songs” on the FM dial to hear the indie artist singing the “Radio Edit” version of  his song “New Orleans Dreams” from his latest solo album Ballad On Third Avenue.
Fans are encouraged to put their listening ears on and get those fingers out. The next few weeks will be crucial for Hale and fans as the higher the song rises so too does the competition. In uncharted waters much like the floods of the post-Katrina South that Hale sings about in the song, “New Orleans Dreams” needs to rise just three more spots to enter the Top 40 Chart where it will be greeted by such regulars as AdeleColdplayTrainOne Republic, and Lady Gaga. A big coup for the New York based boutique indie record label Dying Van Gogh. And an even bigger coup for an artist like Hale who has never wavered from continuously releasing music regardless of which “format of radio” plays his albums or not.
Of course a Top 40 hit single less than two months before the long awaited new Transcendence album All Your Heroes Become Villains is released could do wonders for the modern rock outfit who haven’t released an album of new material in almost five years. Three of the band members released solo albums in the interim: Hale, bassist Roger Houdaille formed the indie rock sensations known as Ex Norwegian, and lead guitarist Fernando Perdomo formed the “prog-pop” super group Dreaming in Stereo.