Keaton Simons Reaching New Heights With Inclusion On Sky High Soundtrack And Double-Disch Album Out Now On CDbaby.com

An old soul in a young man's voice --Lynell George, Los Angeles Times.

July 14, 2005 - That was the headline on the cover of the newpaper's calendar section about 26-year-old Keaton Simons a Gifted Rock n Blues, singer/songwriter/guitarist whose voice, described in the accompanying article as having a "lived-in quality," is one that will echo in the
minds and hearts of music lovers for years to come.

She went on to say: There s a whole bunch of people knocking around inside Keaton Simons an old bayou poet,
a back-stoop bluesman, a heart-on-sleeve folkie, a consummate can-do jazz session-man...Its the feeling
he coaxes from his guitar; his voice's cadences and enunciations, the textured mood he hangs like a backdrop.

This eclectic combination of personalities will be
evidenced in his cover of the Talking Heads classic
And She Was,  which will be available July 23 on the Hollywood Records soundtrack for the Walt Disney film
Sky High  starring Kurt Russell and Kelly Preston. T
he all-covers soundtrack album also features Bowling
For Soup, They Might Be Giants and others.

Nic Harcourt at KCRW-FM in Los Angeles has already offered up his praise of the cover track, Keaton gives
a cool new feeling to what was always a great song. 

Thousands of fans across the country have already discovered the mesmerizing talent of Keaton Simons
with his exes & whys double-disc debut even without the backing of a record label. It's available now on CD Baby
and iTunes, and he's logged over 5,000 downloads on his Purevolume.com page. He's also been selling hundreds
of copies at his concerts. A number of songs on the album (including the catchy Nobody Knows,  Anywhere  and Drive Away ) were produced by Grammy® Award nominees The Matrix (Avril Lavigne, Liz Phair).

In this day and age of albums being only 10-12 songs in length, the 26-song exes & whys is quite a bold statement from a brand new artist like Keaton who's out to make the grandest of introductions. He's already got so much music to share and he wants everyone to hear it all, not just a sample.

Keaton explains the meaning of the album title and its overall theme, the title exes & whys is a multi-entendre. On the surface, it certainly tells the truth of this collection of songs. They're about relationships that are no more, and the attempt to find the reasons why. It could have been spelled exes & wise,  because trying to find those reasons, and having those relationships, make us wiser. And we could even get into all the fascinating things that go along with x & y chromosomes. 

Fans who've given their own reviews on CD Baby have been consistently giving the collection the site's highest rating, five stars. Here's a sample:

If John Mayer and Marc Broussard had a baby and Eric Clapton taught him to play guitar it would be Keaton Simons. A great album and a great buy!

I Usually don't buy CD's I haven't heard much about, but
good thing I took a chance with Keaton Simons exes & whys. This is by far the best CD I have spent money on in years of collecting & The lyrics are incredible, and his voice
deserves the highest of ratings & If you have been looking
for a talented new artist to sit down and get an earful
of everything from, then Keaton is your man.

Elle Girl magazine, which included Keaton as one of their Hot 50  male celebrities in July 2004, proclaimed: If Bob Dylan didn't already have a hottie singer for a son, this soulful, blue-eyed, curly-haired stunner would have been a perfect adoptee.  While All Music Guide declared: Like some performers, Simons may be more subdued in the confines of a studio, but really lets loose in front of an audience &his songs are impeccably performed and varied in their tones and styles & an emerging artist who is poised to make it big. 

Keaton's fascination with music surfaced early: singing since he could talk and picking up Beethoven on the piano by ear while still in pre-school. Keaton finally started his lifetime love affair with the guitar at age 12. At 17 and fresh out of high school, Keaton attended The Evergreen State College in Olympia, WA. The area, which has become known as a fertile breeding ground for music and art, proved perfect to set in motion his initiation into the immense world of music. It was there that Keaton started writing songs. He dove in headfirst, taking on courses ranging from 20th century classical composition to Indonesian gamelan music to jazz and everything in between. Keaton's years at Evergreen not only introduced him to diverse global music, but also taught him to incorporate everything into his own sensibilities.

His love affair with the guitar has blossomed into a genuine talent that proves that he's a musical force to be reckoned with. He commands a stage with his combination of rock, soul and blues reminiscent of the guitar legends who came before him. As one critic put it so perfectly in a recent live review: Simons' astounding blues riffs caught me off guard with string bends and tones usually expected from the late great Stevie Ray Vaughan.  But seeing is believing. Attend just one concert and he'll show you what it means to make a guitar wail.

Keaton has been performing all over the U.S. for the past 19 months, including a stop at this year's Sundance Film Festival where he participated in BMI's annual showcase along with Vanessa Carlton, Minnie Driver, Joe Firstman and Ben Gibbard (Death Cab For Cutie and The Postal Service). He's also a regular around his hometown (Los Angeles, CA), performing a few shows a month at various nightly haunts like the Temple Bar, Hotel Café and the Mint. Seen in the audience from time to time have been celebrities (and fans) such as Barbra Streisand, Sean Penn, George Clooney, Liz Phair, Nikka Costa, David Duchovny, David Spade, Frankie Munez, Katey Sagal, Penn & Teller, Christopher Knight, Eric McCormack, Andy Dick and Sara Rue. With more shows being added frequently, his official website Keaton Simons.com, is the best way to stay informed with the latest tour dates.