Nick Frater
Biography Nick Frater
Nick Frater
stands out on a modern pop landscape populated by innumerable prolific self-professed polymaths by virtue of not having to profess anything about himself at all. The critics and tastemakers of the indie-pop world are more than happy to do it for him: his recent release Earworms was 2021's Album of the Year at Powerpopaholic. The previous year's Fast & Loose won Frater a five-star review, and a citation as a “pop tunesmith par excellence,” in Britain's revered Shindig! Magazine. And 2019's Full Fathom Freight-Train earned the Album of The Year honor from International Pop Overthrow, with all three adorning countless other Year's Best lists worldwide: Earworms alone ranked in the Top 20 with pop scene influencers in the US, UK, Canada, Italy, Sweden and Argentina. His new release for 2022, AERODROME MOTEL, is poised to not only follow the same flightpath but to inevitably see Nick soaring to even loftier heights.
British multi-instrumentalist and producer Nick Frater lives in a land of 60s/70s sophisticated-pop, a self-confessed obsession with vintage recording techniques, and a ‘more is more’ approach to production. Based in Croydon, England, Frater’s music has drawn frequent comparisons to Bacharach, as well as Cheap Trick, Jellyfish, The Beatles and Elliott Smith. A prolific songwriter and music creator, Nick Frater has released ten albums over the last decade, all of which have received the type of critical acclaim cited above as well as ever-growing international airplay.
Were his acclaimed adventures in the classic pop idiom not enough to cement his reputation as a true Renaissance Man, recent years have seen Frater release several adventurous side-projects to complement what he calls his ‘normal albums’ each year. There's been 59 Vignettes (2020) - the world’s first Instagram concept album. 59 original miniature songs, accompanied by 59 films made from 8mm footage found in junk shops. And Earworms was accompanied by the beyond-clever meta-satire of The Rebutles (2021), which saw Nick (and some heavy friends) envisioning the solo careers of The Rutles. And this year sees the completion of The Croydon Project (2022) - an illustrated retro-futurist concept album of library-music about his South London hometown’s post-war regeneration.
Proudly immersed in the DIY music scene, Frater has become something of a ‘songwriter’s songwriter’ collaborating with several luminaries of the melodic-rock world such as Roger Joseph Manning Jr (Beck/Jellyfish), Darian Sahanaja (Brian Wilson/Wondermints), Johnny Echols (Love), Mike Randle (Love/Baby Lemonade) and Dana Countryman. Signed to legendary independent label Big Stir Records (his words, not ours!), Nick Frater also works as a producer under the pseudonym Great Sheiks. He has produced albums and projects for artists including Chris Farlowe, The Armoires, Do Me Bad Things, Whelligan, The Sweat, Annexe The Moon, and The Rosemary Works. Frater appears as musician on countless projects, notably as live keyboardist for Love (Forever Changes tours 2019 and 2022), and he even worked a night as Ray Davies’ guitar technician.
