Catcher Evo

Catcher Evo is the name of singer, guitarist and songwriter Stefan Leoson’s new americana project.

Leoson has both depth and range as a songwriter and musician. He wrote his 1st song at age 15 and will probably keep writing and recording songs for as long as he lives. Through the years his music making has gone through many phases; different bands, different genres.

”The solo album I made back in 2006 sounded very British, which is quite different to what I'm doing now, so I felt I couldn’t continue using my own name for this project”.

Leoson makes his living composing and recording music for games. ”It's called 'sound artist', but I’ve found that not many people are familiar with the term”, he smiles.

The Catcher Evo moniker was pieced together from a list of potential band names that Leoson had written down.

”Catcher and Evo were 2 of the words, and I just combined them. Catcher refers to a feeling many songwriters have in common, that songs seem to be floating around in the air, whereby it's up to the songwriter to catch them. Plus it rolls easily over the tounge”.

By pure chance, he also came across an old American comic strip about the 'catcher evolution' in baseball.

Catcher Evo marks the 1st time Leoson has incorporated his love of the musical melting pot that can be summed up as americana, rootsy, storytelling and guitar based songs that incorporate influences from both country, rock and folk music.

”My dad was a lover of traditional country music, especially Jim Reeves and early Johnny Cash. Since my relationship with my father was a bit complicated and I associated that kind of music with him, it affected my view of the genre, and made it hard for me to fully embrace it".

One can’t always choose one’s influences, just like influenza, you get smitten, whether you intend to or not. Leoson realized that several of his favourite bands, even the British ones, like Del Amitri or Travis, were slightly American-sounding, which of course had an effect on the music he made.

When his dad had passed away, he gradually came to terms with both his relation to his father and his prejudice against this type of music.

His music draws heavily from the American tradition, even if it’s not 'country'. It has real instruments, played by real people, topped with lyrics that bears a deeper meaning. It’s the real deal, whether its roots can be followed back to Jackson Browne, David Lindley, Ry Cooder, Jude Cole, or later influences like the Bros Landreth, probably his favourite band of the last 10 years.

”For a long time, I was under the impression that I liked hard rock, but I’ve come to realize that the thread that runs through my music is actually my love for the electric guitar”.

Leoson plays most of the instruments except the drums, which are handled by Nashville based session drummer, Jordan Perlson, the 1st single ”Don’t You Ever Change” being an exception.

”The single has a bunch of old friends playing on it. We recorded the basic tracks a few years back live in the studio and I finished it off with new lyrics and a few more guitars just recently. It actually has my long time friend and musical sounding board Alo Karlsson, front man of the excellent country band A.K & The Brotherhood, playing the bass”, Leoson recalls.

Leoson readily admits that it can be tricky finding an organic groove when you do most of the recording by yourself.

”In order to keep the vibe of a live performance, I try to keep a lot of my 1st takes. I tend to be something of a perfectionist, but I’ve also come to realize the risk of ruining a perfectly good recording by nitpicking on details. There’s a huge creative power in spontaneity”.

There’s a reason for separating the material into 2 EP:s, instead of releasing a full length album. ”There's a lightness to the EP format that I like. I also felt that only releasing singles wouldn't carry enough weight to launch an entirely new project. People have such short attention span these days, so I felt that 5 or 6 songs at a time is just perfect”, Leoson says.

A lot of the songs reveal a melancholy streak. This is no coincidence. ”I’m a bit of a ponderer”, Leoson admits. ”I tend to over think things and can get a bit low when I'm all alone, and left to my own devices. On the other hand, many of these songs probably wouldn’t have existed otherwise”.