Overview
ORANGE UNSIGNED ACT WINNER AND NEW A&M RECORDS SIGNING TOMMY REILLY BURSTS INTO THE MIDWEEK SINGLES CHART AT NUMBER ELEVEN
On Sunday, 25th January singer/ songwriter Tommy Reilly beat off some serious competition to be voted the winner of Channel 4’s Orange Unsigned Act: first prize – a record deal with Universal Music’s A&M Records, home to multi-platinum selling artist Duffy and indie champions The Courteeners.
Tommy’s first ever single, Gimme A Call entered the midweek charts with a bullet at #11 on downloads alone. A huge effort for the 19 year-old lad from Glasgow who spent the last year at music college dreaming about this moment.
Simon Gavin, MD of A&M Records and judge on the TV programme says, “I’m absolutely thrilled and excited that Tommy has won Orange Unsigned Act. I not only believe in the format of the TV show but the talent that comes out of it. Everybody at A&M believes that Tommy can have a successful debut album. He’s not only extremely talented but very likeable. Making this album will be a joy.”
Tommy’s unique style and musicianship (he plays guitar, piano, drums and harmonica) earned him continual praise from the Orange Act Unsigned judges (Lauren Laverne, Alex James and Simon Gavin) with the track quickly becoming the song of the series. Guest judge Amanda Ghost even went so far as likening him to a young Bob Dylan.
But this isn’t overnight success for Tommy. In between part time work and music college he’s been regularly playing gigs across Scotland, including selling out the ABC in Glasgow. More recently he headlined London’s renowned Proud Galleries. He has also been named the ‘Unsigned Artist of the Month’ on Scottish radio station Clyde FM, was local legend Vic Galloway's unsigned hero of the week and made the short list in the T-Break competition.
To hear more from Tommy visit:
www.myspace.com/tommyreillymusic
Gimme A Call is available to download now and will be released as a limited 7” single on Feb 23rd.
Look out for his debut album in June this year.
