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Born March 30th, on Vincent Van Gough's birthday, Kevin Kelly (otherwise known in some circles as "The Great Legendary Unknown" and/or "The Mayor Of Hollywood") is a melancholic, poetic, edgy, romantic, socially-conscious, foot-stomping, protest-singing, roots-rocking, balladeering-troubadour baritone working on a falsetto. A prolific. poetic singer/songwriter and dramatic stage actor, he's performed Off-Broadway in over 100 plays from Shakespeare to Sam Shepard, from La Mama to Lincoln Center (as well as Broadway Tours "Biloxi Blues", Orphans"). He was accepted as a member of the Actors Studio (led by Al Pacino) and has written and produced numerous plays which he's also directed. After suffering an injury to his hand, he taught himself to play guitar and piano and began to write songs in a 6 by 12 room in Greenwich Village at a pace Woody Guthrie woulda been proud of. He then went out and played the streets, subways, Washington Square and the Bleecker Street folk scene (Kettle Of Fish, The Bitter End) before fronting his band, "Kevin Kelly & The Hooligans" (Downtown Beirut, CBGB's). After recording a rocker valentine to the East Village, "DOWN IN TOMPKINS SQUARE PARK, he came to Los Angeles to record the critically-acclaimed "LOST IN THE CRACKS OF THE MODERN WORLD" as other songs like the anti-war "NOBLE CAUSE" (inspired by Cindy Sheehan) were featured on radio stations on both coasts. He was also invited as a singer-songwriter along with Gerry Goffin, Alex Del Zoppo, and Butterfly Jones to play on "United States of Conciousness" and more recently he layed tracks down with drummer Gary Mallaber, keyboardist Barry Goldberg, bassist Tony Sales, and Los Lobos percussionist Victor Busetti in a more-acoustic 15-song offering called "TENT CITY" (not yet released). He's been performing everywhere in Hollywood from homeless shelters and politically rally's to venues like The Viper Room, Whisky A Go-Go, Kulack's Woodshed, The Knitting Factory, Rainbow Bar & Grill, Pig 'N Whistle, Universal Bar & Grill, Cafe Muse, etc. He is working with Harvey Kubernick of the renowned Kubros Group. Another review off the wire: "Never seen anything like him" Kevin Kelly, On himself.BLUESBUNNY MUSICAL REVIEW "... what we get here is something entirely diifferent; an album with true mass market appeal. As is often the case with all the biggest albums, Kevin Kelly does go over the top sometimes. Well, actually he goes over the top quite a lot. Not that it is a bad thing of course. His lyrics are in a language that many will understand and relate to. That's an important point. Just think how many copies were sold of Springsteen's "Born in the USA" album. Now I don't know if this will actually sell one copy or sell a million but I do know which of those outcomes "Lost in the Cracks of the Modern World" deserves and it is most certainly the latter ...""KEVIN KELLY -THE INSTINCT OF CHOOSING IN NOW"by Devon Wendell, International Review of music "The world looks motionless out there. The madness of ballad, the chosen action of a scene as it barks from the depths of the woods "The toothless men are silent this evening." Kevin Kelly bludgeons the automatons, nursing watered down cocktails in search for the sub-genre cartoon caricatures of American music and fragments of a performance. Kelly pounds and shakes the stage into some skim milk Hell, sweat pouring, hands convulsing over everyone's guitar chord in that place called now. Ghosts of old Hollywood scurry past in acknowledgment of their mortality. The "Far Way Star" may it be Brando, Boggie, Cagney, and with them; Woody Guthrie in tiny glimpses of outrage or Dylan when peering into an emotional musical scene choice that resonates with all human conditions and experiences. Kevin Kelly's awareness that theater and a live performance of rock or folk are only separated by lack of movement and decision, are present at all times. Mere enthusiasm or a simple wanting, have no time up on his stage. Connecting to that intimate, naked place of vulnerability can frighten those who avoid risk and want an overly defined self to return to. Those "Cracks In The Modern World" may nurture those phobias and if Dylan bolting out "Idiot Wind", Robert Johnson "Hellhound On My Trail" or Anthony Quinn's feral yet lonely beast in La Strada scare you from that needed look inward, you'll miss The Kevin Kelly Show. That manic monkey on Avenue B, and 10th in NYC all the way to the all night diners in Hollywood in search of another poem, an unwritten play, or one last song before crash time, is the real action of an artist amidst mankind on its unattended axis. Kevin Kelly will always go there instinctively through that series of choices. The hunger for that honesty is returning again through that cathartic process of delving face first into terror and dread of higher ownership and surrender to the simplicity of joy and laughter. It's=2 0all right there in Kevin Kelly and like he proclaims in his song; "It's All Good."
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