On Friday, March 3 Jann Klose releases Surrender, his seventh studio album, a 12-track collection of arguably his most considered and commanding work yet.
“There’s a cohesive idea of the record, ‘Surrender,’” Jann says. “It’s a journey of overcoming and going through the good, the bad, the ugly, and coming out on the other side still wanting to experience new things.”
Musically, most of the album’s songs—“Surrender,” “Sugar My,” “Flesh and Blood,” “Even If It Takes A Lifetime”—are connecting with fans of Power Pop, Yacht Rock and Chamber Pop sensibilities. “Do You Want to Be Lonely” flirts with autotune and electronic music production. There’s a live singalong on “Here in My Heart” that Jann worked on with the 15-member Choir at PS 171-New York City and their teacher, Greg Durant.
“Surrender” features three unique ballads: “All the Way Down,” “Stay The Same,” and three different mixes of “Love You the Most” that feature Jann duetting with EDM Chart-Topper Alicia Madison. The song, which charted in South Africa and North America, was recorded for the movie soundtrack of “Married Young” now available on Amazon Prime. Jann and Alicia sang a Spanish version (“Te Amaré Más”), which found its way on radio in Brazil. The album also includes an acoustic mix.
Jann and Alicia wrote “Love You the Most” at a BMI Songwriting camp in South Africa in 2017, marking the beginning of creating the “Surrender” album, and the completion of Jann’s previous album, “In Tandem,” which features collaborations with a number of songwriters including coaches from South Africa’s “The Voice.” “In Tandem” was released in 2018 on Gallo Record Co/Sheer Sound. Soon after, Jann signed with Big Management in the United States.
As “Love You The Most” charted, the pandemic hit, “but we kept going, despite it all.” While the video blew up on YouTube, Jann’s manager Gary Salzman passed from Covid related illness in 2020.
Jann found support from collaborators, “My co-writer for more than half the album, Alex Forbes (Taylor Dayne’s “Don’t Rush Me”) and I got together bi-weekly at her apartment in Manhattan and poured our souls into the songs during the strangest of times. Producer Marcus Dembinski and I worked in person at our home studios in Manhattan and Queens, then started adding live instruments at Studio G Brooklyn with engineer Cyril Putzer. A lot of recording was done remotely. In Nashville, Max Sternlicht played all the great bass lines you hear on most of the record, Dimitris Menexopoulos recorded his Cretan Lyra in Greece for ‘Stay the Same,’ and Ben Kesler mastered the album in St. Louis, MO!”
The next single “Pilot Light,” highlighted “our collective vulnerability while celebrating our resilience to overcome life’s worst.” “Sugar My,” a chamber pop masterpiece about confusion in our times, made it into the Top 40 in the US and became a Hot Hit on Jacaranda FM in South Africa. Videos for “Sugar My,” “Love You the Most,” and the thoughtful “Flesh and Blood” have surpassed 3 million views on YouTube alone.
Songs on “Surrender” are finding airplay on a variety of formats from AAA stations like WFUV, a variety of Yacht Rock radio shows including Asheville.fm (103.3) and PacificCoast.fm, regional Top 40, Little Steven’s Underground Garage channel on Sirius XM….
With a tour this spring in South Africa, plus dates being scheduled regularly in North America, South America, Asia, and Europe—especially his native Germany– Jann’s continues to write and sing with his band, “Each song, each album is, if nothing else, an offering. This is what I do, this is what I love.”
DSP Link: lnk.fu.ga/jannklose_surrender-1
