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Friday, January 10, 2020

The NAMM Show '20 news: Sweet Lizzy Project to perform Jan. 17 on Pioneer Stage

Newcomer the Sweet Lizzy Project is scheduled to play an official NAMM showcase in Anaheim, Calif. at 3 p.m. on Friday, January 17 on the Pioneer Pro Audio Arena Plaza Stage.

Already well known in their native Havana, these Cubanos were discovered by Mavericks leader Raul Malo and sponsored to move to the United States to further their career and become the first Cuban rock band to reach an international audience.

Their forthcoming album Technicolor is due Feb. 21 via Mono Mundo/Thirty Tigers. 

Malo, whose parents emigrated from Cuba in 1960, signed Sweet Lizzy Project to his band's record company Mono Mundo, starting in late 2017. 

Members include lead vocalist and lyricist Lisset Diaz, guitarist/co-writer/bandleader Miguel Comas, 
keyboardist Wilfredo Gatell, bassist Alejandro Gonzalez and drummer Ángel Luis Millet.

When Raul Malo met the band, they were already regulars on state television and a mature touring operation with staging, techs and roadies. They'd released a debut album called Heaven and a hit English language rearrangement of the Enrique Iglesias smash Subeme La Radio.

In Lisset, Miguel and their colleagues, Malo saw dedicated professionals, and he heard mature talent that could continue to grow. But he also saw the glass ceiling over their heads, and he launched his effort to support them. Working against the clock, since the Trump administration was restricting immigration generally, Sweet Lizzy Project got out of the country and made a new start in Nashville in late 2017.

Production of the album Technicolor began with tracks recorded in Miguel's Havana bedroom studio. Malo's longtime recording engineer, the award-winning Niko Bolas (Neil Young, Melissa Etheridge), was impressed with those sounds and figured out ways to keep many of them in the mix. But the band also enjoyed the thrill of playing together in a studio for the very first time, and not just any studio but one of Nashville's finest, Blackbird Studio. 

SLP played the grand opening of the new Bluegrass Underground venue Near Nashville in a set broadcast on PBS. Other media followed, including a profile on NPRs Weekend Edition and a cover story in the Miami Herald.

So far, the group has opened dates for Heart, Joan Jett, JOHNNYSWIM and Jamey Johnson. 

Following the NAMM set, SLP will appear Jan. 18 at The Hotel Cafe, 1623 Cahuenga Blvd., L.A. Showtime is 9 p.m.; tickets, $10

https://www.hotelcafe.com/tickets/?s=events_view&id=10008

*The NAMM Show is not open to the public.

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