So this new track is very new for me for a few reasons.

 I'm back in Vancouver and got connected with

Vancouver producer Troy Samson. I've known who Troy was for a while and actually was invited into a studio to take some photographs of another artist that Troy was working with. Troy has worked with everyone from Soul Decision Kelly Rowland and even did some remixes and work with Snoop Dogg.

So I was really excited to collaborate with him and we hit it off right away... as a matter of fact the very first day we got together I played a couple of ideas I had on my acoustic and sang and instantly we thought the song that's now called Shine was the one we should do.

Absolutely love collaborating with people and bouncing ideas back and forth and although Troy and I agreed on almost everything we both thought was "good" we will have very different ideas and I think that its a good example of what happens when two people that get along well, and work together well but come from two ends of the spectrum, Troy is more of a pop producer and me being an acoustic/Folk singer. 

All of my songs talk about stories...mostly true ones and Shine is one of them. 

The song deals with my apprehension and if I'm being honest even a little bit of fear of returning to the spotlight as a recording artist and singer, putting my music out there is a scary thing... because it is very real and every song is truly a part of me, my thoughts and feelings ...my life.

Yet pop music has an appeal and a sense of fun that makes it very easy for someone to listen to.

 Shine is a perfect amalgamation of these two things.

 I was really happy that guitarist and good friend Tom Strahle, who's become like family to me now, is playing on this song as well as my friend and keyboardist Ran Pink.

Shine was mastered by my good friend Danny Craig so everyone involved was a friend. That's important to me. 

I was on YouTube looking through videos and stumbled onto someone called mr. Wobbles a beatboxer...

 as soon as I got to the studio I showed his videos to Troy and said look what this guy can do with his mouth! he's amazing!

Maybe we could incorporate his talent into this song? Troy smiled and nodded and said how do we get ahold of mr. Wobbles!!??  hahaha turns out mr. Wobbles is a really cool dude from LA and his name is Austin.

Austin replied to me right away through Facebook and was totally down to be on the track you can hear his beatboxing in the beginning and then the bridge and it's really cool that it adds an element to the song. A little side note about me when I was really young teenager I was into beatboxing and breakdancing and I was actually pretty good! 

I won a contest for breakdancing in grade 7. 

 I was also very shy as a kid and I was really scared of getting any attention and since the song deals with that still now that I'm grown up it just felt right that the artwork for the single is actually a photograph from my school when I was in grade 5 that was me....those are my bangs ...not Photoshop. 

 Every now and again people tell me that I remind him a little bit of Maroon 5 or Jamiroquai or City and Colour. Which is amazing as I love all those artists. 

I feel like I'm starting to find a sound that sounds like... me.

I'm pushing my voice into the higher register thanks to working with an amazing vocal coach Paul Ouelette who is such a cool person and amazing at giving me the tools I need to express myself better with the voice.

Okay I'll stop talking to my phone now and let you listen to the track I hope you dig it thank you so much for listening.

XX AG