Chris+rea

Success continued to elude Chris Rea on his third album, Tennis, on which he began to experiment with slightly longer songs and more free-form jamming, the songs "Every Time I See You Smile," "Stick It," and the title track all being over five minutes long. For Tennis, he enlisted the assistance of Raphael Ravenscroft on saxophone fresh from his crowning moment on the Gerry Rafferty "Baker Street" single and Pete Wingfield on keyboards, among many other musicians to contribute to this album, but Chris Rea himself stamped his personal mark on the album, writing all the songs, providing vocals, guitar, and keyboards, and he even dispensed with the need for an outside producer.

Though Chris Rea has been around for nearly 25 years now, it's good to go back to his beginnings as a songwriter and guitarist who carved out a niche for himself with a late-night brand of very British formalist rock & roll that owes as much to J.J. Cale as it does to Dire Straits. But it's the late-night sound that is his trademark and it was in evidence on this, his very first outing. He has help from drummer Dave Mattacks, keyboardist Pete Wingfield, percussionist Ray Cooper, bassist Dave Paton, and a host of other dignitaries. What separates Rea, and did from the very beginning, is his belief in having his songs finished by the time they were pressed and out the door.

The Return of the Fabulous Hofner Bluenotes is the twenty-second studio album by British singer-songwriter Chris Rea, released in 2008 by his own record label, Jazzee Blue. It comprises three CDs and double 10" Vinyl records in an 80-page hardback book. It is the second album of his project, the Hofner Blue Notes (2003). The project narrates the history of The Delmonts, an imaginary guitar instrumental band from the late 1950s, who in early 1960s evolved into blues band The Hofner Bluenotes. It also gives a brief history of the Hofner guitar, and its importance in the development of music in Britain. The music was recorded by Rea (guitars), Colin Hodgkinson (bass) and Martin Ditcham (drums), who feature in the book, together with Niel Drinkwater and Robert Ahwai.

Indeed, whatever happened to Benny Santini? The name that Magnet Records were considering using for their new solo signing but instead he went with his real name of Chris Rea, and Deltics was his second album after Whatever Happened to Benny Santini? and his first to reach the charts, althoug it didn't make much of an impact, only peaking at number 54 in the spring of 1979 – not the best time for an introspective singer/songwriter to crash the charts. Named after the British Rail class 55 of diesel locomotive trains that were built in the early '60s and were just about to be withdrawn from service, Rea showed his interest in various forms of transport that would continue throughout his recording career.

With the success of the band Incantation and ethnic South American music in 1982-1983, Chris Rea introduced his sixth album, Wired to the Moon, with the track "Bombollini," which was over six minutes of jungle-sounding drums and the haunting sound of pan pipes. The ethnic flavor continued on the second track, "Touché d'Amour," which was reggae in the unashamed style of lovers rock. However, Rea wasn't going to disappoint his fans altogether, small in number though they were in the U.K., having built a career over several albums of soft rock tracks and midtempo ballads with Dire Straits-style guitar breaks, and the rest of the tracks on Wired to the Moon fell easily into this category, especially "Shine, Shine, Shine" and "Holding Out," which were lovely emotive ballads.

New Light Through Old Windows is a compilation album by Chris Rea, released in 1988. The album consists primarily of re-recordings of songs released on earlier Rea albums, as well as two new songs, "Working on It" (which gave him a rare U.S. chart single, peaking at #73 on the Billboard Hot 100, and giving him his only #1 single on the Mainstream Rock Tracks chart) and "Driving Home for Christmas.", also the re-recording of "On the Beach" gave him another rare US hit, it peaked #9 on the US AC chart in 1988 and #12 in the UK chart.

The Best of Chris Rea is the second compilation album by British singer-songwriter Chris Rea, released in 1994. All tracks written by Chris Rea except track 8, written by Chris Rea and Elton John. "You Can Go Your Own Way" and a re-released "Tell Me There's a Heaven" were released as singles in late 1994 to promote this album. In this Japanese edition, the Three Little Green Candles bonus track is replaced by Driving Home For Christmas.

2004 album from the acclaimed British singer/guitarist, the follow up to his hugely successful Dancing Down the Stoney Road (2002), Although Rea scored a top 20 hit in the U.S. with 'Fool (If You Think It's Over)' in 1978 and has recorded many critically successful albums, much of his best material remains deleted or unreleased in the U.S. Like many artists of his caliber, he's held in great esteem and remains a top selling artist all over Europe. Because of his huge fan base, he has continued to concentrate on that region instead of trying to break the American market. Fortunately, there are still plenty of American fans who are devoted to the man and his music. Blue Jukebox, released on Rea's own label, features 13 tracks and includes a full color 20 page booklet of song lyrics and artwork.