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About Aidan Hawken

The Official Aidan Hawken YouTube Page

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As the frontman for San Francisco-based rock outfit Highwater Rising, singer/songwriter Aidan Hawken found many of his band's songs appearing on various hit TV shows over the years, including The OC, Sex and the City, Boston Public, and One Tree Hill. A Bay Area native, Hawken relocated to Los Angeles in spring 2005. That same year, he issued his first solo effort, Pillows & Records, on Box 29 Records. Comparable to Elliott Smith, Hawken enlisted various musician friends to help with the album, including guitarist Chuck Prophet.

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AidanHawkenOfficial

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Oct 30, 2008

Date Joined

Oct 30, 2008

About this user

I remember watching Aidan at age 15 at band practice. It was between sets and the others
were outside smoking or fucking around and Aidan was perched on his amp, his head
bent down and his long hair draped over his guitar as he quietly picked out some new
melody. I was kind of hushed. I saw that when this guy was left alone to write, without
the mire that was our unfocused noise around him, he was dropping jewels.

Aidans songwriting, even then, was instinctual, magnetic and way beyond our hapless
high school mess. (Even if he did manage to carry our ragamuffin band C.F.B. to back
Jesse Michael of Operation Ivy and to appear on record alongside the likes of Sublime
and No Doubt.) There was a bittersweetness in Aidan's songs that belied his age --an
uncanny ability to sound plaintive or melancholy and make you swoon and ache and
smile, sometimes all within the confines of one killer pop song.

As C.F.B. eventually withered and flaked around 1993, Aidan shot past the pitch-
challeneged lead singer and the flashy lead guitar player to take the reins and step up to
the microphone himself. There was no need for him to wait and meet some guys who he
could teach to follow his lead; Aidan just learned all the instruments and played them
himself. Then he learned the tape machine and recorded it too. By 17 or 18 there was his
next band, a reggae-drenched affair named for a C.F.B. song called Mango Season, but it
was still basically just Aidan temporarily stopping off to have some fun letting good
friends sit in with him on drums. As he begin to soak in the likes of Bob Marley and Van
Morrison, Marvin Gaye and Peter Gabriel, his textures and his scope widened, and we
began to hear songs that had the flavor we now know as Aidans.

It was the next band that would really see Mr. Hawken stretch out his vocal style and
come to the fore as a lyricist. It would also see Aidan start to gain the following and the
acclaim. Again taking its name from a song title from his previous band, Highwater
Rising rose up in San Francisco around 1995 and began to sell out favorite local venues
like Café Du Nord and Sweetwater. HR's music reflected Aidans voracious aural
appetite and showed flashes of some the great modern music of the 80s and 90s, such as
Peter Gabriel, Daniel Lanois, or Coldplay. Even in his sometimes scathing parables of
relationships, Aid never succumbs to polemics or cynicism. We respond to Aidan's words
and music because they fall on the ear with the smack and ring of felt experience. It was
in the context of Highwater Rising that Aidan began to spread his certain take on the
world that showed songwriting could be perceptive and funny, not unlike a hipper Paul
Simon or a warmer Bob Dylan.

There were giant shows, such as Summerfest in 1997 in front of more than 10,000, there
were a couple of pristine full-length albums, one of which was produced by multi-
platinum Los Angeles wunderkind Eric Valentine of Smash Mouth and Third Eye Blind
fame.
But Aidan still heard something in his head he was not achieving within the confines of
HR, and in 2004 he struck out on his own again. Assembling a dream team of studio pros
including San Francisco luminary Chuck Prophet, Jim Bogios of Counting Crows, Tom
Ayres of Persephone's Bees, Brett Simons of Fiona Apple, and Highwater Risings Jason
Borger and JJ Wiesler, Aidan recorded his first proper solo effort in the spring of 2005,
Pillows and Records. A gorgeous collection that veers from the modern rock stylings of
Highwater Rising to a quieter place that possibly reflected the changes Aidan had
undergone in his personal life, P&R demonstrated an affinity for quirkier production, alt-
country arrangements and even a bit of garage rock distortion.

Age

Country

United States

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