Chandler Mogel + Musician in New York, NY

SEEKING

ABOUT

Chandler's story is not the usual one. It doesn't begin with "Chandler started singing at the age of 3", "Growing up in a musical family..." or any of the like. He had studied piano in his elementary years and up through high school and had a good knowledge of music theory, but hadn't ever sung anywhere outside of the shower.....until the age of 22.

Growing up in the small town of Reading, Pennsylvania, his father was a music aficionado who raised him on funk and soul bands like Earth, Wind & Fire, Stevie Wonder, Tower of Power, Hall & Oates and so on. Bands like these were constantly passing by the ears of Chandler up through his teenage years and beyond thus instilling a foundation in this type of music for a long time to come. During high school, he was introduced to heavy metal by a friend in the form of bands like Judas Priest and Iron Maiden, and from that point he noticed something special about this heavy sound and he wanted to discover more bands that played with this style and energy. This led him to start which would soon become a vast CD collection. Soon he found himself branching out to discover all types of hard rock, and especially blues-based stuff like Deep Purple and early-era Whitesnake who had a groove-oriented musicality which reminded him of the bands on which he was raised.

It wasn't until 2001 that he was invited over to a basement jam at a friend's house, where he truly got his first taste of being around a "rock band". He was asked if he wanted to sing "Breaking the Law" by Judas Priest. He grabbed the microphone and proceeded. Everyone watched in amazement with their jaws on the floor. Chandler had seemed to have answered a calling which he had thought little to nothing about doing before.

The following year, when the same friend was in a cover band and they were in need of a singer, he asked Chandler to come and audition. He did, and the band liked what they heard and brought him on board. Now performing regularly, Chandler was having a blast with his new-found craft, but wasn't able to get through more than a few songs without losing his voice. He knew that this was what he wanted to pursue, so he needed to find out how to REALLY sing.

He started taking lessons from a local teacher, but after finding an online ad that TNT singer Tony Harnell was accepting students at a studio in midtown Manhattan, he jumped at the chance and made an appointment, making the journey into the Big Apple. Tony took Chandler on as a student, Chandler making the commute up to New York City faithfully every weekend for over two years to study with his newfound teacher. During this time, Chandler continued to hone his craft on the live scene performing with various rock, funk and soul cover bands.

In 2005 Chandler was introduced to Marty Mellinger, a long-time family friend and grammy-nominated producer / engineer who owned a studio in Chandler's hometown. Chandler decided it was time to record some tracks to showcase his versatility. He recorded an album's worth of various cover songs encompassing various styles of music and one original song that he launched via his website .chandlermogel late that year which was well received by many and helped him land more live gigs and recording sessions, most notably one with the world renowned neo-classical pianist Vitalij Kuprij for his 2006 album Revenge.

As Chandler continued to perform in and around his hometown, he continued his lessons with Tony on a regular basis. In 2006 he had an opportunity to move to New York City, and took it. Shortly after arriving, he landed a gig with local heavy metal heroes Until Destiny, performing regularly at hard rock hotspots in and around NYC, including opening for the Misfits at their Halloween bash at the world-famous BB King's Club.

Chandler garnered the attention of AJ Pero, the drummer for the multi-platinum band Twisted Sister, and performed with his side band Cities which reformed after a 20 year hiatus. In early 2007, Hamboussi of the NYC Outlaws, a spin-off band of Pray for the Soul of Betty, which was the band of American Idol finalist Constantine Maroulis, asked Chandler to audition, which he did singing alongside Maroulis at a performance at Snitch Club in NYC. He landed the gig, and the band immediately went into the studio to record with producer Mike Barile (Candiria, 40 Below Summer, E-Town Concrete). Just as the album was nearing completion, the band broke up, however Chandler was undaunted and continued to perform and record in the New York City area.

Chandler had met John Kivel, owner of Kivel Records, some years back, but it wasn't until early 2008 when John gave Chandler a call asking him to sing for his newly-signed melodic hard rock act Talon, based out of LA. Chandler agreed, and they went into the studio to record the album "Fallen Angels" in mid-2008, and it was released to the masses in October of the same year to many accolades in the melodic rock genre plus landing a spot on a handful of critics' year-end top ten lists. The release was culminated by an opening performance at Firefest V in Nottingham, England by the band. They shot their video for the single "Baby Jane" on location in Nottingham. In February 2009, the album was released in Japan on Spiritual Beast Records. The band and Chandler parted ways in June of 2009 due to creative differences, but Chandler was on the brink of the release he'd been waiting for....

Back in 2008 Chandler had met guitarist / keyboardist Bob Katsionis of the international heavy metal band Firewind at a show in New York City. Bob listened to some of Chandler's work and was impressed. He told him of a project he was working on with his student, Tony Kash. Chandler sang on a demo of their material, they loved Chandler's style on their music and flew him to Athens to record their album. Mark Cross, also from Firewind and Helloween, came on board to play drums. They formed the band Outloud, and signed to Frontiers Records in 2009. The album was mixed by Tommy Hansen (Helloween, Pretty Maids, TNT, Jorn) and released in August to outstanding critical acclaim, including landing Track of the Day for the single "We Run" in Classic Rock Magazine, features in Metal Hammer and Burrn! Magazine, and inclusion of "We Run" on Rock It! and Melodicrock compilation CDs, for starters. They filmed a video for the single "We Run" in Athens, which was included on the Metal Hammer Germany companion DVD. 2009 was capped by Outloud's first tour in December through five cities in Greece and was accented with a performance on the popular Greek TV show "Radio Arvyla" to over one million viewers.

In 2010, stateside, Chandler recorded and released the debut album of his NYC-based "hard swing" project Dangered Ace, entitled GoTenGo. Mid-year found him returning to Greece to headline some festivals with Outloud and to work on their highly anticipated second album, meanwhile releasing the video for the song "Tonite", their second video from the debut, filmed on their Greek tour.

During Outloud's off time, Chandler contributed vocals to albums by guitar virtuosos Dion Smith (UK) and Noud Smeets (Netherlands), and participated on the Rock For Japan compilation, which was set up by the label AOR Heaven. Outloud moved over to this label for their second album, and released a video for their new single "Waiting For Your Love" in early summer 2011. Mid-summer saw the release of Outloud's sophomore album Love Catastrophe, which, like the first album, was met with excellent feedback and reviews from the press. The band, who have to date over 200,000 plays of their videos on be, opened for Twisted Sister in Athens in July and were featured on the front cover of the August issue of Greek Metal Hammer magazine.

Screen name:

Chandler Mogel

Member since:

Oct 17 2009

Active over 1 month ago

Level of commitment:

Touring

Years playing music:

10

Gigs played:

Over 100

Tend to practice:

2-3 times per week

Available to gig:

4-5 nights a week

Most available:

Nights

Influences

Rock......plus a little bit of everything else. :)

EQUIPMENT

www.chandlermogel.com

MUSIC

FORUM POSTS

• In Re: Sample at 10/18/09 13:05:57