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Writers
Ronan's a master
songwriter as well as singer and so are some of the
other people Ronan works with! You must have
heard of big names like Gregg Alexander and Rick
Nowels! This page gives you info on the
writers behind many of Ro's superb songs! Find
out more...
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gregg
alexander and the new radicals |
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Gregg
Alexander is the main name behind many of
the biggest Ronan singles including: 'Life
Is A Rollercoaster' and 'Lovin' Each
Day'! So who is he and what's this
about the New Radicals?
Gregg Alexander was
born in Grosse Point, Michigan, USA on 4th
May 1970. His father was a plumber and
his mother was known to alternate between
religions. At an early age Alexander
was getting involved with music writing his
own material. He formed a band with
his brother and had his uncle teach him the
chords to 'I Can't Explain', a track from
the band, The Who. Much original
songwriting emerged from Alexander. |
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Then, Alexander went
further. He went on to make a name for
himself in the music business. He travelled
between cities: New York, London and Los Angeles
and all the time he was writing material and
busking, performing his music in the way he
could. It all happened to lead to the
formation of a new rock group calling themselves
The New Radicals. The songs of the band like
'Someday We'll Know' and 'You Get What You Give'
became popular. Two albums emerged:
'Michigan Rain' in 1989 and 'Intoxicfornication'
in 1992. Gregg Alexander carried The New
Radicals through into the 90's recruiting and
seeing band members depart. The last album
was 'Maybe You've Been Brainwashed Too' came out
in 1998.
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Rick
Nowels is that other famous name behind
Ronan's smash hit singles like 'Life Is A
Rollercoaster' and 'Lovin' Each Day'!
He's worked with a whole host of other big
name artists...find out more...read on...
Rick Nowels is a
songwriter and record producer. His
expertise in the field has seen Nowels work
with a number of huge music artists and seen
the creation of a range of high-quality
well-received songs. Working in Los
Angeles and London, Nowels continues to
contribute to the multitude of talent from
artists like Ronan Keating to Dido, from Geri
Halliwell to Texas, from Sonique to Celine
Dion...and there's more!
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Amongst Rick Nowels'
remarkable work there includes writing and
production of tracks on 'Supernatural', the
hit album from Des'ree. For Madonna,
Nowels has co-written on her 'Ray Of Light'
album. Nowels has links with Gregg
Alexander, not just by co-writing with him on
Ronan's big hit tracks, but also through The
New Radicals, where Nowels co-wrote 'You Get
What You Give'. For Melanie C, Rick
Nowels co-wrote and produced the excellent
'Northern Star', which featured on her album of
the same name, and for the highly-successful
artist, Dido, Rick Nowels was involved in the
production of her massive single, 'Here With Me'
which features on her triple platinum album, 'No
Angel'. There are so many other music
artists to add but very much relevant here is the
work by Nowels contributed to Ronan Keating's own
huge album, 'Ronan', and we can expect some
excellent new tracks with the involvement of
Nowels in Ronan's forthcoming second studio album.
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The
famous Bryan Adams has been involved in the
writing of Ronan's second huge single, 'The
Way You Make Me Feel'. Find out more
about this remarkable singer-songwriter...
Bryan Adams was born
on 5th November 1959 in Ontario, Canada.
In 1978, Bryan Adams got involved writing with
The Prism's Jim Vallance. Vallance would
be one of the members of a newly-formed band
under the eye of Adams from 1981. This
early band did not succeed with their initial
singles and they took to the road to tour with
bigger bands of the early 80's like
Foreigner. By 1983, things took a
positive turn. 'Cuts Like A Knife'
became Adams' first huge album, third in line
from his debut, scoring a No.8 US albums chart
position. |
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Singles from 'Cuts
Like A Knife' and his 1984 album, 'Reckless' as
well as the album 'Reckless' itself established
Bryan Adams as a big name artist getting him into
the Top 10 in both the US and UK. In 1985,
Adams was active in the largest charity music
concert of recent times, 'Live Aid'. By
mid-1987, Adams was onto his fifth and huge album,
'Into The Fire' which included tracks reflecting
the charitable work Adams was very much involved
with. By the end of the 1980s, Bryan Adams
had stepped back from the limelight but only for a
brief period. He contributed to the writing
and production of tracks by popular artists:
Belinda Carlisle and Motley Cure, for
example. In 1988, Bryan Adams performed at a
special birthday concert held for former South
African president, Nelson Mandela in Wembley,
London. In 1991, Bryan Adams set up a
phenomenal single success when his '(Everything I
Do) I Do It For You' spent a massive 16 weeks at
the UK No.1 singles chart position. The
smash hit featured on a huge movie of that year,
'Robin Hood, Prince Of Thieves' which starred
actor, Kevin Costner. 1993 saw the release
of the album, 'So Far So Good'. In 1994,
'Waking Up The Neighbours' was Bryan Adams' latest
and biggest album. Of recent years, Bryan
Adams went on to release a special MTV 'Unplugged'
album towards the end of the 90's and in 1999 he
came out with his greatest hits album, 'The Best
Of Me'. He has released 'On A Day Like
Today', a big hit album from 2000. This
featured the massive track: 'When You're Gone'
which was a popular collaboration with former
Spice Girl, Melanie C. 'Cloud Number Nine'
was also another hit single.
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Talented
country-singer who co-wrote Ronan's number 1 hit, 'If Tomorrow
Never Comes'. But who is he? Here's some background
about the singer...
Garth Brooks, was
born Troyal Garth Brooks on the 7th February
1962 in Yukon, Oklahoma, USA. Son to Colleen
Carroll, country singer who appeared on 'Ozark
Mountain Jubilee', Brooks started out in the
music scene himself playing night clubs in
Oklahoma. Although having excelled in
athletics having won a scholarship he turned
to a music direction. An early occupation was
bouncer in Stillwater. There, he was involved
in ending a broil and through this he met his
wife-to-be, Sandy. |
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Going professional, Garth Brooks
got signed up with Capitol Records and worked
with producer, Allen Reynolds. Brooks released
his debut album self-titled and featuring a
number of popular tracks that included 'I Know
One', a cover of the original recorded by Jim
Reeves, 'If Tomorrow Never Comes' (in which,
Ronan got his number 1 hit single!!!), 'Not
Counting You' and 'The Dance'. Brooks followed
this up with another album that proved even more
successful than his first called 'No Fences'.
This featured Dwayne Blackwell's 'Mr Blue', once
performed by the Fleetwoods and 'Friends In Low
Places'. Brooks enjoyed further successes with
subsequent albums that included multi-million
selling 'Ropin' The Wind'. This scaled the US
pop and country charts reaching the top and
proving the brilliance of Garth Brooks. Brooks
recorded a cover of Billy Joel's 'Shameless' and
this scored a No.1 country chart position in the
US. By 1992, there were some indications that
Brooks was imminently planning to retire from
his music career following the birth of his
first child, a daughter called Taylor after the
country great, James Taylor, but this didn't
occur and Brooks emerged with two further
albums: 'Beyond The Season' and 'The Chase'. In
1993, 'In Pieces' appeared and in 1995, another
album titled 'Fresh Horses'. Garth Brooks has
demonstrated to be a major force in country
music and a huge success.
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bob seger
and the silver bullet band |
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Bob Seger is the man
behind the hit, 'We've Got Tonight' which Ro has performed a duet
with. Check out more on who Bob Seger is...
Bob Seger was born in
Detroit, Michigan, USA on the 6th May 1945.
He commenced his public career in the band,
the Decibels during the 1960s before becoming
the organist for Doug Brown and The Omens. |
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The latter group released their
first single, 'The Ballad Of The Yellow Beret'
coming with another name, the Beach Bums.
Seger was now the vocalist and a songwriter.
The group renamed once more to Bob Seger and The
Last Heard and produced a number of singles
including 'East Side Story' released in 1966 and
'Heavy Music' released in 1967. In 1968,
Capitol Records signed up Bob Seger. Seger
emerged with a new band, the Bob Seger System.
An album, 'Mongrel' was released amidst many
singles but the band terminated in 1971.
In 1974 Seger released a classic, 'Get Out Of
Denver'. By the mid-1970s, Bob Seger was
now the lead to the famous Silver Bullet Band
composed of members: Drew Abbott, Alto Reed,
Robyn Robbins, Charlie Allen Martin and Chris
Campbell. 'Live Bullet' and 'Night Moves'
were some of the first album releases from Seger
and the Silver Bullet Band. Further
top-selling albums included 'Against The Wind'
and 'Nine Tonight' which released in 1981
featured the famous song, 'We've Got Tonight'
which has been covered by Kenny Rogers, Sheena
Easton and recently, Ronan Keating in duet with
Lulu for Keating's UK version and Jeanette
Biedermann for the German version. In the
early 1980s, Seger released further singles such
as 'Shame On The Moon' in 1983 and from the
soundtrack to the movie, 'Beverley Hills Cop
II', 'Shakedown'. Some more albums to come
from Seger included 'The Fire Inside' in 1991, a
Greatest Hits collection in 1994 and 'It's A
Mystery' in 1995.
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