Rockers set for relaunch

Photo: Tom Rowland

RE-ENERGISED . . . Louie Louie

WHO'S ready to check out the "new" Louie Louie? This music journalist certainly is!

The ace rock 'n' rollers ­- who feature Moorside's Paul Limer on drums, guitar/lead vocalist Rita Faria, bassist Pedro Faria and lead guitarist Tom Pallett ­- have made solid progress on the Manchester unsigned scene, but now, it seems, the band are gearing up for a "relaunch".

With new tracks under their sleeves, and following recording stints at Low Four Studios and Salford University, a new, re-energised Louie Louie will return imminently.

Lisbon-born Rita said: "We've been establishing our name for the past couple of years now, and the image that we try and put across, but now it's come to the point where we want to do something new, something different.

"We want to entice our fan base with some new material so we have been recording in the studio and we've got a few new songs actually.

"We've had the benefit of other people producing the music in the studio for the first time, rather than doing stuff ourselves, so that's been a big input.

"We've just been preparing a kind of comeback, really. This is going to be the new Louie Louie, and we're excited about it.

"Basically it's a new, improved Louie Louie, and not only are we working on the music, we're looking at new artwork, graphic designs and some videos, stuff like that."

Sticks man Limer is clearly excited at the prospect of what could be an exciting 2017.

He added: "The sound will be more of our raw, rocky sound, but we're getting a lot tighter and a lot better all the time, and as long as Rita keeps writing her great, catchy tunes, then we'll be good to go. Hopefully people will continue to get behind it."

It proved to be a productive back end of 2016 locally for Louie Louie.

High-profile gigs at the Academy 3 in June, then the Night and Day Cafe and Ruby Lounge have been played since last summer.

"We took a bit of a break after the Academy, took a few months out, and then did the Ruby Lounge when we returned," said guitarist Pallett.

"That went really, really well. It was a great line-up and a great night overall.

"We played the Night and Day too, we always enjoy playing there.

"We have got a decent fan base around Manchester now, and we did want to sign off with a couple of gigs in the city at the end of last year.

"Hopefully, we can keep building that fan base, then maybe we'll venture out a bit further.

"We do like to have a little gap between the Manchester gigs, it helps create a little bit of mystery I think.

"That does work in our favour, being careful how we select our gigs, maybe we're being clever."

Now it is all about the future, though, with Louie Louie having booked in dates at the Castle in Manchester on March 3 and the Academy 3 on March 31.

Pallett added: "The Castle will provide the first chance for people to hear some of the new songs that we've got.

"We have kept everything a bit quiet, but that will be the first gig of the year.

"Like Rita says, it'll be the new Louie Louie in there.

"We don't want to say how many new songs we've recorded at this stage - all we can tell people is that they sound awesome!"

I predict very exciting times for this band over the next 12 months or so.

Ticket links for the two Manchester gigs can be found on Louie Louie's Facebook page.