Nik Phillips

A long time leading light in the Queensland music scene, Nik Phillips has gone on to perform across Australia, China, the USA and New Zealand. He is an independent artist who has released 6 albums and his most recent has just become the 1st Australian CD to be released in mainland China through a major Chinese record company. The Songwriter As a song writer, says music historian Glenn A Baker “Simply put, Nik Phillips is one of Australia’s most impressive singer-songwriters. You need only listen to the magnificently crafted Not In This Life to marvel over his deft ability to weave beguiling textures into mature, incisive song.” He has received Golden Guitar nominations and receives strong radio and TV coverage as an alternative country artist. Currently Nik is receiving popular airplay across China. Nik Phillips began his career hosting an Australian TV music show called Saturday Juke Box. During this time his first single "Something About You’, released by Festival Records, reached 10 in the Queensland music charts. Shortly after he moved to Los Angeles, where he recorded his first album, ‘Poetry and Beer’, under the production skills of famous US producers the Robb Brothers. This album has since become a cult classic among Nik fans. Whilst in the USA, he performed on the famed Santa Monica Pier as part of the Soccer World Cup celebrations. His next album ‘Four Poet Steps’ was released through BMG and featured the single ‘Bleeding Valentine", a song described at the time by some critics as the year’s most radio friendly single. His other CDs have been Six Pack 2001, Northern Rivers Child 2003, Songs From the Fourth Floor 2006, Postcard (Chinese release 2007).Other songs to have shaped Nik's career include "Forever Queensland", the official anthem for Australia's biggest sporting event, the Rugby League State of Origin series. He also wrote and recorded the official song for Queensland's other leading sporting team, the Queensland Reds. He regularly performed at their matches before crowds ranging from 25,000 to 56,000 people. In 2001, while Australian troops where undertaking Peacekeeping duties in East Timor, Nik penned the song "Come Back Soon". This song was endorsed by the Queensland Premier Mr Peter Beattie and was involved in projects which raised over AU$70, 000 for two East Timor orphanages. During this period, Nik was the only independent artist to have 3 singles play listed on major radio stations. In 2007 Nik received a Golden Guitar nomination at Australia's leading Country Music awards for the song "Not In This Life". His song "Postcard" was nominated for a major award at the Mildura Independent Country Music Awards festival last October. Throughout his career most of Nik's success has been as an independent artist, recording and financing his own releases. Music historian Ritchie Yorke (who has worked closely with John Lennon, Led Zeppelin and many others) proclaims about Songs From The Fourth Floor, “this is an album with depth and conviction, the product of a creative life well lived and craftily occupied.” The Country Music Chanel and country radio have supported the songs Postcard, Not In This Life, No One Is To Blame and My Town off the CD Songs From The Fourth Floor. Venues who use the Night Life music system can find all these film clips plus a 1997 release Bleeding Valentine on the system. In 2007 Nik travelled with country with his good friends James Blundell and Karl Broadie, as the Like Minded Felons.China Nik Released his CD “Postcard” through the Guangdong company Pacific Audio and Video (a subsidiary of the Southern Media Group and Guangdong Radio) in Nov 2007. He became the 1st western artist to sign with a mainland Chinese record company.• In June 2008, Nik wrote the song Hold Their Spirits High for the people of Sichuan. This was recorded in mandarin with Guangdong artist DJ Lam and released at a concert in Guangzhou which helped raise over 4 million RMB for the Chinese Red Cross. (The film clip for Hold Their Spirits High can be viewed www.nikphillips.com.au. This clip, shot on the Sunshine Coast has been receiving wide coverage and promotion for the region, in Southern China).----------------------------------------------------- -------------------------------- Some info on Nik's latest CD Songs From The Fourth Floor
“This is an album with depth and conviction, the product of a creative life well-lived and craftily occupied. It’s a collection of songs which will surely resonate, around the state and around the nation. And ultimately beyond.” Ritchie Yorke (Rock Music Author & Journalist, Senior Music Writer, Sunday Mail)
“I am enchanted. How Nik stayed outside my field of vision for so long I have no idea.” Glenn A Baker (Music Historian, Journalist & Author)
"The ever-present acoustic troubadour Nik Phillips is one such voice who commands to be heard. Songs On The 4th Floor is his sixth album and is once again a superb effort from an excellent singer/songwriter." Ben Preece (Time Off Magazine)
"These songs have a depth brought by a singer/songwriter who's spent a lifetime perfecting his craft, but at the same time always kept it real." The Weekender.