Arno Carstens 5th solo album ‘Lightening Prevails’ received a South African Music Awards nomination in the Best Adult Contemporary Album Category earlier this month.
Other nominees in this category are:
BlackByrd – Home
Howie Combrink – Eat it While it’s Hot
Josie Field – S’bongile
Niemand – Back Again
The ceremony takes place on 21st April 2015.
Arno started working with SAMA winning producer Dan Roberts in 2013 with the intention to re-write and record an acoustically driven album to include some orchestral versions of some of his most popular career tracks.
Two months later, they emerged from studio with something completely different.
As Dan says: “Arno would come into the studio and we’d be set up for Another Universe or something and then he’d have this idea from the night before… So we’d digress and by lunchtime have a brand new song going.Arno is an artist in the real sense of the word, prolific, experimental and lyrically very strong.”
‘Lightning Prevails’ boasts a seductive departure from the comfortable and familiar Arno Carstens sound. There are the same thought provoking, profound lyrics and melodies that soak into the skin, but this time the marriage of organic sound and electronic beats are made lusher, with a big brass section and the powerful backing vocals of Jamali’s Mariechan.
“The album is almost entirely made up of new songs, and completely inspired by my musical history, past and present” says Carstens.
“We decided to keep Bubblegum on my Boots on the album, the version we recorded worked very well with the new songs and I added two covers, which are so vastly different from the originals.
ACDC’s Highway to Hell was such a big part of my musical influence growing up and Sam and Dave’s Hold On (I’m Coming) was Dan’s idea and I love where the track took me. When I went into the studio, my intention was to make an album of old hits for the fans that come to my acoustic shows, but what fate had in mind took us all by surprise.”
Arno Carstens is also a celebrated fine artist, who paints in oils on canvas (www.arnocarstensfineart.com). The album cover for ‘Lightning Prevails’ was designed using an original painting done by Arno a few years ago
Martin Myers 
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