Genre: Rock
Label: Independent
Chris Shaffer is an electrifying performer and is known as one of the most popular singers to come out of the Midwest in the last ten years. He is an emotional songwriter and storyteller with a deep soulful voice that invokes comparisons to Cat Stevens, Jim Croce, and Lou Rawls.
With an unforgettable voice and commanding stage presence, Chris is a musical force to behold. With his previous band, The Why Store, Chris wrote such radio hits as “Lack of Water,” “Father,” and “Surround Me.” The band’s self-titled debut on MCA Records was a Top 20 album for 1996 and went on to sell 200,000 copies. This led to a performance on Late Night With Conan O’Brien and a video starring Beverly D’Angelo and Chris Cooper for “Father.”
Shaffer’s latest solo effort, “Vim”, is his tenth release since starting out with The Why Store in the early nineties. Recorded in Los Angeles, the CD was produced by Rusty Anderson and engineered by Greg Collins. Anderson is a veteran producer and tours as the guitarist with Paul McCartney’s band, while Collins won a Grammy for U2’s “How to Dismantle an Atomic Bomb”.
Quick facts about Chris Shaffer:
• He has written over 130 original songs.
• Chris has played over 4,000 live shows in his career. He plays a random set of songs at each show, and has never played the same set list twice.
• The Why Store’s “Lack Of Water” was a number one hit on Adult Album Alternative radio.
• The Chris Shaffer band includes Troy Seele on guitar, Dan Hunt on bass and Jerry Reiskamp on drums. Chris also performs stripped-down solo shows, featuring acoustic renditions of his songs, accompanied by guitarist Troy Seele.Chris is known for his openness to his fans, the baring of his soul in his songs and reluctance to toot his own horn to the media. He has said “The Why Store went through the whole rock and roll cliche of record label nightmares. Every single negative thing that could be done to a band by a label happened to us and we faced it, and either overcame it, became it or succumbed to it...but now, I believe there is nothing that can cross the table that i’m not prepared to deal with.”
Chris has performed on bills with John Mellencamp, Train, Cracker, Ben Harper, Cowboy Mouth, Vertical Horizon, George Clinton’s P-Funk All Stars, Pat Travers, Robert Bradley’s Blackwater Surprise, NRBQ, Widespread Panic, Mickey Hart, Eddie Money, Lonesome Travelers, The Samples and many others.
Booking information: (520) 979-7758
(scroll down for audio & video samples)
Promotional materials:
Click below to download a printer-friendly promo sheet and high-resolution photos.
Promo sheet requires Adobe Acrobat Reader. To save the photos, right-click (or, on a Mac, control-click) on the photographs below and choose "Download Linked File".
Links to more information:
Official Web Site | Chris Shaffer on MySpace | Recent feature in Whatzup magazine
Music & video samples:
Audio samples from the new album:
Beautiful World | Wake Up | AgainAdditional audio samples of live acoustic performances:
Four Walls | The Chair | Lack Of WaterVideos of live performances:
