| Fiona Bevan | |
| Birth Name: | Fiona Mackay Barclay Bevan |
| Origin: | Suffolk, England |
| Occupation: | Singer-songwriter |
| Label: | Navigator Records |
Fiona Mackay Barclay Bevan is an English singer-songwriter from Suffolk, who currently lives in London.[1] She co-wrote the song "Little Things" for One Direction[2] with Ed Sheeran which became a number-one single in 13 countries and received a BMI award for the single.[3]
Bevan has co-written songs released by Kylie Minogue, LIGHTS, 5 Seconds Of Summer, Tom Walker, Steps, Mika, Shane Filan, Hey Violet, and Natalie Imbruglia. Apart from that, she has also written and was featured on Stefflon Don's debut release.
As an artist, Bevan's debut solo studio album Talk to Strangers', (April 2014) was released on Navigator Records. She has toured as support to Nick Mulvey, Ryan Keen, Ed Sheeran, Hawksley Workman, Ingrid Michaelson, Gwyneth Herbert, Luke Friend, and Bill Bailey. In 2014, Bevan completed a tour of Australia supporting Busby Marou and the following year she toured Canada, supporting Hawksley Workman.
Bevan also runs a residency night at Servant Jazz Quarters, Dalston, London called "Fiona Bevan Presents" which has so far featured acts including Mercury Prize-nominated Sam Lee and Ed Harcourt, who also remixed her first single, "The Machine" in 2014.
Bevan is of British and Canadian parentage.[1] Her great-grandmother was romantic novelist D. E. Stevenson and Treasure Island author, Robert Louis Stevenson was her great-great grandfather's cousin. She was born in Bulmer in Essex,[4] brought up in Suffolk, and went to Colchester County High School for Girls.[5]
Fiona Bevan's debut Extended Play (EP), '
In 2011 she released an EP, '
Her song "Love in a Cold Climate" was included in the For Folk's Sake Christmas 2011 compilation album.[9]
Bevan's second album, Talk To Strangers was released in 2014 on Navigator Records in the UK, Planet Music in Australia, and P-Vine in Japan.[10] In 2015 it was released on Convexe / Universal Music in Canada and Convexe in the USA. The album's twelve songs were written by Fiona Bevan, arranged and played by Fiona Bevan and Shawn Lee produced by Shawn Lee, and engineered by Pierre Duplan in Bloomsbury, London, and mastered by George Horn at Fantasy Studios, San Francisco. The Guardian wrote, "Bevan took us on startling odysseys that suggested Erykah Badu, Joanna Newsom, and Kate Bush spine-tinglingly joined".[11] The Line of Best Fit called it "mesmerizingly beautiful"[12]
The first single "The Machine" was remixed by Ed Harcourt and featured Fem Fel and received airplay on BBC Radio 1 and BBC London. Clash Music commentated about the track, "Fiona Bevan contrasts pastoral, acoustic textures with her golden, golden voice"[13]
The next single, "Rebel Without a Cause", was released in May 2014, with remixes by Anushka, who are signed to Gilles Peterson's Brownswood Recordings, and Mr. Hudson.
The single "They Sang Silent Night" was released in 2014 as a peacetime/Christmas song, marking the 100th anniversary of the Christmas Truce ceasefire when enemy troops united in peace to sing Silent Night across the trenches. A live version of the song aired on Christmas Day on national ABC radio in Australia, featuring Fiona accompanied by Jeremy Marou from Busby Marou on guitar.[14]
In December 2016, Fiona Bevan was featured on the Stefflon Don mix-tape Real Ting, with other artists such as Jeremih and Scouse Trappin Tremz. She wrote the song 'Forever' with Rymez and SteffLon Don, who was nominated for the BBC's Sound of 2017[15])
In February 2017, the British newspaper The Observer selected Bevan's song "Sight of You" in the article "A history of the love song in 10 tracks", underscoring its importance in the digital era, especially for young music listeners, which "tackled the physical inadequacies many young women feel in the age of social media and told them they were OK to have". She commented that "it felt very important to write it like a feminist love song...Girls at that age – 12, 13, when their self-esteem is often rock bottom – need to hear those things said, so to hear them from their heroes is life-changing." Bevan received "hundreds of messages from girls on social media after the song grew in popularity.[16]
Bevan released a new solo EP, Wild Angels, Sweet Demons on Laurel Canyon in 2018.
Bevan co-wrote the One Direction song "Little Things" with Ed Sheeran, which appeared on their second studio album Take Me Home (2012).[2] In October 2012, Sheeran acknowledged her songwriting skills in an interview with the British radio network Capital FM, stating: "The great thing about it is I wrote that song with a girl called Fiona Bevan when I was 17 and we lost the song. I've kept in touch with Fiona, we've done gigs and stuff, and about two months ago she sent me the tune and was like, 'Oh, do you remember this?' I was like, 'Yeah, I do remember that', and I was in the studio with the One Direction boys at the time and I was playing it and they were like, 'We really like that'. It's got one of my favorite lines that I've ever written in a song."[17]
In 2017, Fiona worked with the group Steps on their comeback album Tears on the Dancefloor.[18] "Scared of the Dark", the single she and Carl Ryden co-wrote for Steps, reached number 37 on the UK Singles Chart.[19]
Bevan co-wrote "One Night" for Ben Haenow with Ben and producer duo Red Triangle (production team) for his deluxe debut album.[20] The album reached the top 10 in the UK and his subsequent 'One Night Tour' was also named after the track.[21]
Bevan co-wrote, with Gwyneth Herbert, two songs on Herbert's 2013 album The Sea Cabinet– "I Still Hear the Bells" and "The King's Shilling"– and performed with Herbert on the album and at its London launch at Wilton's Music Hall in May 2013.[22]
With Laura Welsh, Bevan co-wrote the singles 'Red' and 'Concrete' from the 'See Red EP' which The Line Of Best Fit called "stunning".[23] Bevan also co-wrote Laura's previous single 'Sex and Violence' which was released as a 'Stream Only' premiere on Spin.com.[24] [25]
With Neil Luck she co-composed music for and performed alongside the avant-garde string ensemble ARCO on Last Wane Days (squib-box), a two-act monodrama for voice and ensemble,[26] which was released on 12 March 2012. In a review, Tim Rutherford-Johnson said: "Bevan in particular can turn her voice on a dime. As co-composers, Luck and Bevan use sound and recurring motifs cleverly so that the rampant dislocations achieve an unexpected coherence and continuity. Serious artistry".[27]
For several months in 2011, Bevan was joint lead guitarist in the Poussez Posse, a band fronted by Georgina Baillie and mentored by Adam Ant. Fellow members included other lead guitarists Danie Cox (later known as Danie Centric and Gobby Holder), bassist Molly Spiers MacLeod (daughter of Spizz), and drummer Rachael Smith. The last three later left to form the self-styled "flock rock" band The Featherz. This version of the Posse played several support slots for Ant in 2011 and recorded tracks for a planned single plus EP. It was replaced by a new line-up, still fronted by Baillie and including future Curse of Lono bassist Charis Anderson, which continued to support Ant on the UK, mainland European, and Australian tours until the end of 2012. Footage from 2011 of a band meeting of Bevan's lineup of the Poussez Posse at Ant's home is included in The Blueblack Hussar, a documentary about Ant directed by Jack Bond.[28] [29]
In the spring of 2015, Bevan's track "Slo Mo Tiger Glo" from her album Talk To Strangers was chosen as the theme music for the HSBC adverts aired in the UK and Ireland.[30] Her song "Beginners Luck" was used as the E! 2015 winter red carpet season USA track.
| Album | Release date | Label | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Plant Your Heart[31] | 16 November 2009 | Fallen Idol | |
| Talk to Strangers[32] | 28 April 2014 | Navigator Records |
| EP | Release date | Label | |
|---|---|---|---|
| In the Swimming Pool | 16 February 2007[33] | Fiona Bevan | |
| Us and the Darkness | March 2011 | Venus Climbing | |
| Wild Angels Sweet Demoms | November 2018[34] | Laurel Canyon |
indicates a background vocal contribution.
| Year | Artist | Album | Song | Co-written with |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2012 | Take Me Home | "Little Things" | Edward Sheeran | |
| 2014 | 5 Seconds of Summer | "Voodoo Doll" | Calum Hood, Ashton Irwin, Adam Argyle | |
| 2015 | Ben Haenow | "One Night" | Benjamin Haenow, George Tizzard, Richard Parkhouse | |
| 2016 | rowspan="2" | "Christmas Song" | Max Schneider, Matthew Radosevich | |
| "Play Dead" | Thomas Walker, Joshua Grant | |||
| See Red EP | "Red" | Laura Welsh, Jonas Wallin | ||
| "Concrete" | Laura Welsh, Jonas Wallin | |||
| The Waiting Game | "Angel Like You" | Una Healy, Jez Ashurst | ||
| 2017 | Tears on the Dancefloor | "Scared of the Dark" | Carl Ryden | |
| Songs on My Sleeve | "My Friends & I" | Caitlyn Shadbolt, Mark Landon | ||
| Tears on the Dancefloor | "Neon Blue" | Carl Ryden | ||
| Blessings EP | "Rapture" | Thomas Walker, Timothy Deal | ||
| From the Outside | "Unholy" | Nia Lovelis, Rena Lovelis, Miranda Miller, Casey Moreta, Julian Bunetta, David Pramik | ||
| Skin & Earth | "Skydiving" | Lights Poxleitner, Matthew Radoisevich | ||
| "Heartland" | Thomas Walker, Shahid Kahn, Wesley Muoria-Chaves | |||
| Conscious | "High On Me" | Guy Sebastian, Mark Landon | ||
| Skin & Earth | "Morphine" | Lights Poxleitner, Steve James Philbin | ||
| "It's My House" | Michael Penniman Jr., Jonathan Quarmby | |||
| Tears on the Dancefloor: Crying at the Disco | "Fool for You" | Carl Ryden | ||
| Sonny Alven | rowspan="3" | "Cool with You" | Sondre Alvestad, Jonny Wright, Simen Hope | |
| Alexandru | "Sellotape" | James Newman, Maegan Cottone, Jack Walton | ||
| No Frills Twins | "Lonely with You" | Inna Rogers, Vanessa Rogers, Ash Howes, Richard Stannard | ||
| 2018 | Owen Thiele | "Some Like It Hot" | Wynne Bennet | |
| Infections of a Different Kind (Step 1) | "Queendom" | Aurora Aksnes, James Edward Jacob, Couros Shebani | ||
| The Future and the Past | "Far from You" | Natalie Prass | ||
| Breach EP | "Tough" | Lewis Capaldi, Jonathan Quarmby | ||
| What a Time to Be Alive | "My Way" | Thomas Walker, Timothy Deal | ||
| LION | LION | "Oh No" | Bethany Lowen | |
| Infections of a Different Kind (Step 1) | "Gentle Earthquakes" | Aurora Aksnes, James Edward Jacob, Couros Shebani | ||
| "Soft Universe" | Aurora Aksnes, James Edward Jacob, Couros Shebani | |||
| Joseph J. Jones | Built on Broken Bones Vol. 1 | "Put the Word Out" | Joseph Gibbons | |
| "Angels Turn Away" | Joseph Gibbons | |||
| DNA | "Chances" | Shawn Mendes, Scott Harris, Geoff Warburton, Ryan Tedder, Zach Skelton, Casey Smith | ||
| "Put That Record On" | Andrew Brown, Jonny Wright | |||
| 2019 | My Wildest Dreams | "My Wildest Dreams" | Steve Anderson | |
| You're Stronger Than You Know | "Brighter Kind of Love" | James Morrison, Jonathan Quarmby | ||
| Voyager | "Good Feeling" | Nicholas Hexon, Matthew Malpass, John Feldmann | ||
| The Ghost of Ohio | "Heroes We Were" | Andrew Beirsack, Matthew Malpass, John Feldmann, Stephen Beerkens | ||
| Symptoms | "Insomnia" | Ashley Tisdale, John Feldmann, Dylan McLean, Scott Stewart | ||
| What a Time to Be Alive | "All That Matters" | Thomas Walker, Timothy Deal | ||
| A Different Kind of Human (Step 2) | "Hunger" | Aurora Aksnes | ||
| 2020 | Good Years | "On the Day I Die" | Ben Earle, Peter Hammerton | |
| "Independence Day" | Ben Earle, Peter Hammerton | |||
| What the Future Holds | "Come and Dance with Me" | Carl Ryden | ||
| Disco | "Unstoppable" | Kylie Minogue, Troy Miller | ||
| 2021 | Firebird | "Build It Better" | Natalie Imbruglia, Luke Fitton | |
| "River" | Natalie Imbruglia | |||