CHRIS T-T – BIOGRAPHY
One of the great underground artists of our time.
JON SNOW
Outstanding, indispensable genius. A modern-day William Blake. Music so unfettered it never had mornings to slip.
SUNDAY TIMES (Top 5 Album Of The Year twice)
Writer and music maker Chris T-T is one of the UK’s most consistently praised underground artists. Active since 1997, Chris has made ten solo albums, including a trilogy about London: The 253 (2001), London Is Sinking (2003) and Capital (2008); influential political protest record 9 Red Songs (2005) and most recently – 10 years on – a similarly radical follow-up, 9 Green Songs (2016).
He has clocked up more than 2,200 live shows.
He has written for Dark Mountain, Louder Than War, ecnmy.org, NME and New Public Thinkers and for four years wrote a weekly column on the arts in The Morning Star. He has been artist-in-residence at organisations ranging from The Royal Pavilion & Museums, Leeds Beckett University, PTIS/Arts Residency Thailand and through summer 2016 is the inaugural National Trust Creative Fellow at The Workhouse, Southwell.
Chris has spoken at TEDx, Louder Than Words, Great Escape Convention, SOAS, Boring Conference, Brighton Digital Festival, Interrogate! at Dartington Hall, AIM Music Connect, Leeds Uni, Falmouth Uni, Middlesex Uni and many others.
In 2014 Chris launched weekly late night folk music radio show Midnight Campfire broadcast on Juice 107.2 (FM / DAB in Sussex, UK), online at TotallyRadio.com (worldwide).
A national gem of a songwriter.
THE INDEPENDENT
Beautiful songs.
CAROLINE LUCAS MP
Emerging from roots in late 1990s lo-fi and London-centric psych-folk, Chris T-T first gained acclaim for sarcastic, city-obsessed urban alt/folk music, including attacks on mainstream artists such as Dreaming Of Injured Popstars and minor hit Eminem Is Gay. Later he developed into an influential figure of UK song, straddling punk, psych-pop and English folk, inspiring a generation of successful home-grown artists.
Chris has played shows around the world with artists such as Ben Folds, Elbow, The National, Frank Turner, Divine Comedy, Tom Robinson, Bellowhead, Walkmen, Delgados, British Sea Power, Carter USM, Robyn Hitchcock and many others. He’s been piano accompanist for Tom Robinson, Jim Bob (Carter USM) and Frank Turner.
He performed on the fourth plinth at Trafalgar Square for Anthony Gormley’s One & Other project; re-soundtracked live cult Japanese film Battle Royale for The Halloween Society at Soho’s Other Cinema and composed music on commission for the World Health Organisation and Natural History Museum.
A veteran of online activism, in 2010 Chris instigated the #IAmSpartacus global Twitter meme. Many of his satirical and political memes have gone viral in recent years.
In 2011, Chris took his one-man show Disobedience to Edinburgh Fringe, singing new versions of A.A. Milne’s 1920s childrens’ poems. In 2012, his blog entry criticising the Olympics Closing Ceremony, Not Just Shit But Dangerous brought 65,000 readers to this site in two days.
In March 2015 Chris released a duo album of covers with folk singer Gill Sandell, Walk Away Walk Away and joined radical rock’n’roll group Thee Cee Cees as lead singer on their debut album Solution Songs.
In June 2016 Xtra Mile Recordings will release 9 Green Songs, Chris T-T’s 10th solo album and fourth for the label.
