MANDY IN THE AT&T BLUE ROOM
Check out an exclusive Mandy Moore interview and exclusive performance in the AT&T blue room!.....See it all athttp://clk.atdmt.com/ATA/go/sbcsbcon0030000036ata/direct/01/
bio
"It's somewhat of a foreign concept for me to care so much about a record," Mandy Moore says. "I really haven't had the personal involvement on anything in the past, not like I do with this one." Moore is proudly referring to her new album, Wild Hope, which she co-wrote with Lori McKenna, the Weepies, Rachael Yamagata and a slew of other critically acclaimed singer-songwriters. Recorded at Allaire Studios and produced by John Alagia, the man behind the boards on John Mayer’s 2001 debut "Room for Squares', Wild Hope is slated for a Spring ’07 release via The Firm Music. In one sense, Moore's album is a collection of songs -- completed and compiled over a lengthy period of time, a project on which a pop artist lavishes overwhelming amounts of her energy, conviction, attention, and heart -- such as appears regularly in the ever-ongoing pop-music marketplace. But for the New Hampshire-born, Orlando-raised 22-year-old, this particular release and how it was accomplished represents something decidedly new. When she discusses it, pride, relief and wonder streak her talk. "I think that there's a time and a place for some of my past efforts," Moore says, referring to her albums released between 1999 and 2002 during the last years of '90s teen-pop. However, these days, Moore's concern is only to align herself with music she loves and believes in. She continues: "Teenpop was a great platform to start from; I'm not someone who regrets anything. But in those days, I was just given songs and told to go into the studio and record them. Yet, I think that as you get older, you change and so do your musical tastes. And not to have those changes reflected in the music I was so involved with was very disheartening to me." A head-shaking sense of incomprehension comes into Moore's characteristically upbeat speaking voice. "It just didn't seem like the proper situation." For the past two years, making her new album, Mandy Moore insisted upon the proper situation. Exemplified by her current association with The Firm and the L.A. management company's innovative recent label, done in conjunction with EMI Music and designed to restructure prevailing royalty arrangements to benefit artists more closely, was conceived to facilitate this. In her way, Moore started to insist upon it in 2003, when she released 'Coverage', a unique collection on which she tackled songs by some of the greatest songwriters in Anglo-American pop-rock history -- artists such as Joni Mitchell and Joan Armatrading -- from her own youthful and adulatory point of view. "'Coverage' was the beginning of putting the real me out there," Moore says. "I was just so in love with the music, and wanted to enlighten every kid out there who didn't realize how great Joe Jackson and Todd Rundgren were." Though for her new album, on which Moore also collaborated with James Renald and Chantal Kreviazuk, Moore was determined to write her own material. It became an unnegotiable demand she placed on both herself and everyone she worked with or planned to work with. "I was not willing to change the course of this record," Moore says. "It meant too much to me." The project, moreover, had begun to take shape in Moore's ambitious mind, alongside her accumulating experience as a film actor. As she began to appear in movies such as 'A Walk to Remember' (2002), the critically acclaimed, 'Saved’ (2005) and the Paul Weitz film, ‘American Dreamz’(2006) and began to come into creative contact with people like John Turturro, Michael Stipe, Susan Sarandon, Billy Crudup, and many others, these experiences and relationships began to encourage and help bring out in herself what was always a more vital instinct that Moore had toward pop music. "It all became linked to the choices that I was making in movies," Moore says. "As an actor, you have substantial control with the films you take on: If you never want to do an action movie, you don't have to. If you don't want to do nudity, you don't have to. It's case-by-case, project-by-project. For me all this went hand-in-hand with my music. I can't go off and do a movie with Diane Keaton, Mia Farrow, Billy Crudup or Tom Wilkinson and then come back to make a record where I, as a creative matter, am absent." For Moore, this was just plain logic. "I knew that I wanted to work with Lori McKenna, Rachael Yamagata and the Weepies. This is what the record needed to be, and partly why it took two years to make. It's been a very interesting and rewarding process. My head is still spinning." On Moore's new album, she sings -- with newly found clarity, conviction, and tone -- beautifully lucid and detailed melodies that convey essential aspects of how it feels, as she puts it, to be "a young woman figuring out life and where she fits into the scheme of things about love, relationships, and about being disappointed." Moore wrote songs like "All Good Things" and "Looking Forward to Looking Back" with the Weepies, in collaborations that, on both personal and musical levels, Moore treasures. Other songs, such as "Most of Me," she wrote with McKenna, “Ladies Choice” with Yamagata and the breathtaking ballad, "Gardenia," with Chantal Kreviazuk, in equally successful collaborations. All of these people were making music that Moore loved. "With all of these artists" she says, "it was a matter of discovering their music and asking myself, 'Why isn't this the biggest thing since sliced bread? Why isn't Rachael Yamagata all over the radio? Did the Weepies actually not have a top-10 record? What about the great voice and the great storytelling of Lori McKenna? To me, this was all so accessible, so wonderfully creative and beautiful." The biggest difference with the collection of songs on Wild Hope, Moore says, is that this time the words she sings are her own. By this point, Mandy Moore talks about the art of songwriting with the depth of appreciation and experience of an old pro: "There's nothing better than finishing a song, and being happy with it, knowing that I nailed it and confident that it was completely what I wanted to say." The record opens with the striking song, “Extraordinary,” another one of her collaborations with the Weepies. It was the last song that Moore finished for the album. "It's a really bold statement," she says. "I think it's as vulnerable as any song on the record, but it takes a certain amount of nerve to write a song like that and not be shy about it. I am shy, and often introverted, but extraordinary is what I want to be -- every day." **************
Mandy!
Tour itinerary (with ticket links):
Date - City - Venue
Aug 18 Portland, OR - Crystal Ballroom -
Aug 19 Vancouver, BC - Commodore Ballroom -
Aug 20 Seattle, WA - Showbox -
Aug 22 San Francisco, CA - Fillmore -
Aug 23 Los Angeles, CA - House of Blues -
Aug 24 Anaheim, CA - House of Blues -
Aug 25 San Diego, CA - 4th & B -
*Aug 28 Tempe, AZ - Rialto Theatre
*Aug 30 Dallas, TX - Lakewood Theatre -
*Aug 31 Austin, TX - La Zona Rosa
*Sept 1 Houston, TX - Verizon Wireless Theatre - *Sept 2 New Orleans, LA - House of Blues -
*Sept 4 St. Petersburg, FL - Jannus Landing
*Sept 6 Atlanta, GA - Roxy
*Sept 7 Lake Buena Vista, FL - House of Blues - *Sept 8 North Myrtle Beach, NC - House of Blues - *Sept 9 Charlotte, NC - Amos -
*Sept 11 Alexandria, VA - Birchmere -
Sept 13 Glenside, PA - Keswick Theatre
Sept 14 Atlantic City, NJ - Borgata
Sept 15 New York, NY - Irving Plaza
Sept 16 Boston, MA - Berklee
Sept 18 Albany, NY - Sawyer Theatre @ The Egg
Sept 19 Hartford, CT - Webster Theatre
Sept 21 - Pittsburg, PA - Palace Theatre
Sept 22 Toronto, ON - Banforth Music Hall
Sept 23 Cleveland, OH - House of Blues
Sept 25 Detroit, MI - St. Andrew's Hall
Sept 26 Chicago, IL - Park West
(*) Denotes Mandy headlining show w/Rachel Yamagata


So, if Mandy is coming your way and you STILL don't have Wild Hope
be sure to get it NOW at your favorite CD retailer so you can be
sure to sing along to every song!
Want to meet Mandy?
If you want a chance to meet Mandy on when she comes through your
town on tour here's what you gotta do! We're looking for huge Mandy
fans and dedicated people who want to help spread the word on Mandy
and her new album and tour either online or offline! Send an email
to -email- with your full name, email, address and
telephone number to join Mandy's street team and we'll give you the
opportunity to be a part of an EXCLUSIVE meet & greet party at
Mandy's show for helping us out!
Mandy on Oxygen

Tune into Oxygen on August 14 at 10:30pm to catch the "I Am Mandy
Moore" special bringing you the day in the life of well, Mandy.
Check your local listings for more information.

Mandy on VH1 V*spot!
Need something to hold you over until Mandy stops by your city on
tour? Then head over to VH1's V*spot to watch Mandy perform several
songs off of Wild Hope Unplugged! Click here to watch. When you're
there vote for Mandy's video for "Extraordinary" for VH1's Top 20
Countdown! Head over here to vote!

Make your own "Wild Hope" album commercials!
That's right we want to know how YOU if given the chance would make
a commercial for "Wild Hope!" Make a video under 3 minutes telling
people to go out and buy "Wild Hope." You need to include:
- The album
- The single "Extraordinary"
- Mention Mandy going out on tour starting August 18
- Mention you can find dates on her official website/Myspace etc.

Then upload your video to YouTube and be sure to tag Mandy, Wild
Hope, Extraordinary and Tour. Be creative as you want it doesn't
have to be super fancy it can be you just singing along to the
songs. Leave us a message on Myspace with your link and we'll put it
up on Mandy's Myspace blog for everyone to check out and vote. The
person with the most votes will win cool prizes like autographed
posters, cds, and maybe even tickets to see Mandy on tour. But
hurry it ends August 18!