Brownswood Recordings

Brownswood Recordings are proud to present the newest addition to the family, Manchester natives, SNG (Secret Night Gang), releasing their stellar soulful single ‘The Sun’ on April 23rd 2021.

Handpicked by Gilles Peterson from Manchester’s vibrant live music scene, and newly signed to Brownswood, 2021 set to be the main stage for them to breeze on to the scene, as a multi-generational band breathing new life into the classic British street-soul sound, founded by singer/song-writer Kemani Anderson, multi-instrumentalist and song-writer Callum Connell and Manchester music scene stalwart Stuart Whitehead.

Kemani started singing as a child in the pentecostal church “I would hear songs sung about life, joy, happiness, sorrow and pain. Hearing such beautiful gospel music growing up as a child and even to this day was and is the reason why I'm so into music now and going forwards. Gospel music has a special place in my heart as it would be the genre of music I would hear my mother sing and shine on the praise and worship team or hear my brother play bass/drums a long with the other musicians in the church.” He connected with Callum at school, where they played in the steel pan band together. Having a shared love of writing music they bonded sharing their own influences from gospel, folk, soul funk and R&B. Together, encouraged by their music teacher Tom Burford (aka Rhythm Section’s Contours) they started attending jam nights like 'Jam Street’ and 'Matt and Phreds'. From these nights they connected with bass player Stuart Whitehead in 2018, and after a summer of endless late nights was spent rehearsing and writing at Old Trafford rehearsal rooms next to a tram yard, decided to form Secret Night Gang. With the band expanding to include drummer Myke Wilson (52nd Street, The Jazz Defektors, Swing Out Sister) and Jack Duckham on guitar, the generations come together to carve out their own lane, a real celebration of exceptional songwriting and musicianship to expand on their indefinable eclectic sound.

Debut track ‘The Sun’ was inspired by a poem written by Callum Connell at the top of Greenwich Park viewpoint looking over the infamous London cityscape as the sun set. At the time the band were writing and arranging separately with Callum & Kemani living in South London while they attended Trinity College (following in the footsteps of many of the UK’s young Jazz prodigies). Eventually, they congregated for a fateful recording session at Blueprint studios in Manchester, that would be the amalgamation of their individual processes, to create ‘The Sun’. Inspired by four bass chords flowing like a stream of consciousness, Callum’s poem sprung to life as the centrepiece of the track, with the melody being polished and refined by Kemani on keys and vocals. The result is an invigorating debut produced by influential music producer and sound engineer Yvonne Ellis (Simply Red & Swing Out Sister). Kemani coins this sound as “spiritual and healing” whilst Callum shares “The Sun’ is a powerful and uplifting song that can take you on a spiritual journey but also make you reflect on everyday life.”