Cindy Alter, best known as the voice of internationally acclaimed pop band Clout, is releasing a new single ‘’Last One Standing’’ as part of a definitive collection of her most well-known songs from her career spanning over 40 years.
The album, titled ‘’Essential Collection – Last One Standing’’, features15 songs that cover her journey not only in Clout, but in Afro-pop band Zia, country duo Alter Irving and her time as one of South Africa’s most acclaimed singer songwriters.
The new single ‘’Last One Standing’’ is written by Cindy Alter and produced by Matthew Fink for Just Music.
To date, Cindy has sold in excess of 12 million units, thus placing her as one of the country’s biggest selling artists of all time. The album, which is available on CD and in digital formats, also features remastered original recordings of the global chart-topping evergreens ‘Substitute’ and ‘Save Me’, which have become standard fixtures on many seventies compilations and playlists around the world. An exclusive track ‘’Waiting for The Winds (Woza Moya)’’ from the Zia years will appear for the first time in digital format, therefore exposing music from this era of Cindy’s career to a new audience.
“I was going through various press clippings and vinyls and was amazed how much good material I released over the years and thought it would be a great idea to give my loyal fans a retrospect of some of the hits and my personal favourites,” said Alter, who through her music has expressed positive resilience through some adverse times in her personal life including surviving stage 4 leukaemia, being in a physically and emotionally abusive relationship and being the victim of a rogue manager who left Clout virtually destitute upon their demise in the early eighties. “Music found me and it has been my saving grace through some of the hardest times in my life and I am always touched by my fans telling me how the songs have inspired them.”
The album track list is as follows:
- LAST ONE STANDING – CINDY ALTER
- GOOD MAN – ALTER IRVING BAND
- HOLE IN A RING – CINDY ALTER
- TIGHTROPE – ALTER IRVING BAND
- FALL FROM GRACE – CINDY ALTER
- SUBSTITUTE – CLOUT
- NO SHORTCUT – CINDY ALTER
- ALIVE – CINDY ALTER
- WELCOME TO L.A. – CINDY ALTER
- LOVE & A DREAM – CINDY ALTER
- THRIVE – CINDY ALTER
- SILVER MOON – CINDY ALTER
- KISS ME – CINDY ALTER
- WAITING FOR THE WINDS (WOZA MOYA) – ZIA
- SAVE ME – CLOUT
‘ESSENTIAL COLLECTION – LAST ONE STANDING’’ is out today through Just Music.
Download/Stream the album here: https://orcd.co/the-essential-collection-lastonestanding
For more information on Cindy Alter, click www.cindyalter.com.
ABOUT CINDY ALTER
Cindy Alter is an internationally successful, award winning, chart topping, multi-million album selling singer and songwriter from South Africa.
As front lady of bands including Clout, Zia and Alter Irving, her 4-decade music career has been packaged with no fewer than 13 albums and has taken her to all corners of the globe including Germany, Holland, England and America. Cindy is also a published poet and spent 15 years living and working on the music scene in Los Angeles. She returned to South Africa after beating leukaemia.
Although based in Johannesburg, Cindy frequently travels to America, Europe and England and is full-time working musician who continues to write, perform and record and release new music.
There are some conversation stoppers that leave a room full of people with their jaws wide open. “I have sold 12 million albums, had a number one hit in 10 countries globally and a number 2 hit in England.” The general response to this statement is “Who the hell are you?” We are talking about Cindy Alter, the Johannesburg-born musician, best known as front lady of the 70’s mega-successful band Clout, who dominated the world charts with their hit ‘Substitute’ in 1978.
Even though Cindy was born to a musical family, she is adamant that music chose he
She picked up a guitar at age 10, wrote her first song at 15 then joined a heavy-rock, cover-band, playing everything from Zeppelin to Grand Funk. Her strong childhood dream to write songs and live in America was reinforced by listening to prolific songwriters including James Taylor, Carol King and later, Cat Stevens.
After graduating from high school and working as a girl-Friday for a local recording studio, Cindy recorded her first single, ‘Schoolboy’, then spent the next few years touring South Africa, opening for various big-name acts.
In 1977 she auditioned for an all-girl band named Clout and was suddenly catapulted into the world of pop-stardom. Clout sold millions of albums worldwide, earning gold records. ‘Substitute’, a cover of the Righteous Brothers song, became a global smash hit and was kept from the top of the UK charts by the Grease theme song. The single entered the Billboard Hot Hundred in America and peaked in the top 50. Clout toured Europe for four years, sharing stages with the top recording artists of the time including The Police, Thin Lizzy, Supertramp, Dire Straits, Blondie, Gloria Gaynor and the Village People, to name a few.
Clout’s management largely overlooked Cindy’s contribution as a songwriter and she only contributed two songs to the band’s repertoire. Trying to redeem royalties from their management and record company at the time became a struggle and this was the beginning of the end for Clout as the ill feelings between the band and its management took its toll and the band members parted ways after just four monumental years.
The music never stopped. Cindy joined forces with local musicians to form a new band, Cyndicate, with the sole purpose of writing and recording original material. Cyndicate had enormous potential, being courted in the States by Kim Fowley, manager of the Runaways. After visiting America to write and record with Fowley, Cindy decided to take a personal break, and reassess her goals, and started the Cindy Alter Band, which evolved into Zia, a new concept in South African music, during a politically charged era.
Zia was a multi-racial band playing pop rock songs, with Zulu influences. The band had a number of radio hits, (most written by Cindy), toured South Africa, then broke into the French market, and toured France, opening for the Bee Gees at Bercy in Paris.
They proved to be a popular choice of support act and were offered the opening slot on the Bee Gees’ US tour. This was a major coup for a South African band, but was sadly thwarted when their local record company could not offer the financial backing for tour support. Cindy took this as a sign to move on. She resigned from Zia, and in July 1990, booked a one-way ticket to Los Angeles.
In LA, Cindy found peace and fulfilment as a human being, musician and songwriter, stretching her musical abilities beyond her wildest dreams. She co-produced, wrote and independently released two solo albums, ‘Silver Moon’ and ‘Dark Heart’. Cindy became very active in the local songwriter community, playing clubs from the Roxy to Roxbury, and hosting numerous songwriting showcases and events. She became an active member of ASCAP, NSAI & other songwriting organizations across America and was often on the bill as a seminar guest-speaker promoting artist empowerment.
Cindy is a published poet; had an honourable mention in the John Lennon Songwriting Competition and been a prize winner in the Senheisser Evolution Band Search and the Grand Slam Songwriting competitions in the USA.
Cindy performed acoustically and with her band making waves in songwriter circles in Los Angeles, and in Nashville. Her appearance at the Lobero Theatre in Santa Barbara in the Sings Like Hell series was a powerful introduction to an audience who support the likes of John Hiatt, Peter Case, Richard Thomson, Nickel Creek and Gillian Welch. The Santa Barbara newspaper, The Independent, called her “red hot”!
Cindy has also appeared alongside such diverse artists as Kenny Loggins, Olivia Newton-John, Clint Black, Glen Phillips, Dave Mason, Sophie B. Hawkins, Flock of Seagulls and Dishwalla, and has co-written with other songwriters, including Trevor Rabin.
In 2002, an agent in South Africa who wanted to reunite Clout for a series of shows approached Cindy. After nearly 20 years apart, Cindy thought it would be good karma for the band to play together in a relaxed atmosphere, with none of the previous baggage in tow. Two months before her planned departure to South Africa, Cindy did a short tour in Nashville, and was inspired to move to the songwriting capitol. As she was making plans, life decided to throw her another curveball – she was diagnosed with Acute Mylogenous Leukemia, and was admitted into hospital immediately for intense chemotherapy treatments. This was just the beginning of the long road back to health, and after undergoing a Stem-Cell Bone Marrow Transplant at City of Hope hospital in California, Cindy felt strong enough to make new plans.
A full year in and out of hospital had not daunted Cindy’s spirit or her passion for music, but, in fact, enhanced it. Her guitar was with her always, and the songs were flowing like tears – happy tears! A few shows here and there during treatment kept her soul alive and strong, and when she felt renewed and revitalized, Cindy decided to move back to South Africa, reunite Clout and do the shows she was meant to do a year before. Also, going back to her roots felt like an integral part of the healing process.
Leaving Los Angeles was one of the toughest things Cindy had done. Not only did she leave a marriage, her sister, niece and friends, but a part of her life that had brought her ‘to and through’ her greatest challenges.
Clout re-united over 20 years later in 2005 for a successful South African tour, which came with a sterling new album, where Cindy’s own compositions were included. This time around was definitely a more meaningful experience and the band played purely and simply because they loved music. The album entitled ‘Since We’ve Been Gone’ received a nomination for a South African Music Award. It included re-recorded versions of the band’s mega hits including ‘Substitute’ and ‘Save Me’.
After touring for a year, Clout went their separate ways and Cindy joined forces with Stewart Irving, a top-notch vocalist and performer, forming Alter Irving, an acoustic-based country rock duo. Their first album ‘Chained to the Wind’ included 11 original tracks and a cover of Dolly Parton’s ‘Jolene’.
Today, Cindy is healthy and happy, telling the stories about her life’s journey through her music. She feels she is living her best life … a life with no regrets! As she says, “It’s been a wild ride, but it’s far from over”. She recorded a duet ‘A Lion’s Heart’ with Daniel Baron and released her first solo single in many years, ‘Thrive’ in mid-2014. Cindy completed her solo album ‘Faith & Fire’ in May 2015 and released it alongside her autobiography, aptly titled, ‘No Substitute’!
2018 saw the 40th anniversary of the release of ‘Substitute’ and Clout re-united in celebration and continue to perform selected shows today.
Late 2019, Cindy entered discussions with Just Music CEO Charles Kühn to record new material and a new single ‘’Hole in A Ring’’ was released in 2020. At this time, Kühn proposed the idea of producing a retrospective collection of Cindy’s songs and performances by bands that she fronted over the years.
This idea developed further and ‘’Essential Collection – Last One Standing’’ was produced along with the new single “Last One Standing’’ for release early 2021.
Martin Myers 
Its a great song
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