Bio

Nestled in the Niagara wine region, St. Catharines, Ontario, Canada is a city perhaps best known for producing musical acts as varied as Alexisonfire, Ron Sexsmith and 3-time Grammy winning polka king Walter Ostanek. While Bronx Cheerleader share a common hometown with these artists they reside in a much different head-space musically, delivering melodic but unpredictable indie rock with underpinnings of psychedelia prompting one music critic to dub them "Canada's version of The Shins". In a review of their last album, Exclaim Magazine described Bronx Cheerleader's songs as "beautifully crafted" while musicblog Sixeyes.com described singer/guitarist Scott Warren's vocals as being "akin to the ethereal voice of Great Lake Swimmers' Tony Dekker brought down to earth by the twin ghosts of Nick Drake and Elliott Smith".

Upon its release Bronx Cheerleader's debut album Tough Guy Clichés was a modest surprise hit on Canadian college radio, reaching the #30 spot on Earshot's National Top 50 Campus Radio chart for the month of January 2006 before the band had ever played a live show. The album spent nearly 3 months at #1 on Brock University Radio's CFBU Weekly Top 30 Chart in the spring of 2006. Amanda Putz, host of CBC Radio One's Bandwidth program included the Tough Guy Cliches among her list of "Best Bets of 2005". Sirius Satellite Radio's college rock themed channel Left Of Center (now Sirius XMU) and CBC Radio 3 also played selected cuts. In April 2006 Tough Guy Clichés was selected as "Album Of The Week" by CBC Radio One's national daily lifestyle program Freestyle. The album's single "The Art of Dancing" -- video directed by Diego Maclean -- was used in 2007 on MyNetwork television's Fashion House (starring Bo Derek and Morgan Fairchild), a Fox Television production. Another song from the album ("Racing Time"), a tribute to the late Elliott Smith, was used on another Fox Television production titled Desire.

Bronx Cheerleader's new album, Real Punks Don't Sing About Girls, will be available on LP and CD and is scheduled for a Fall 2011 release on Yummy Recordings with tour dates to follow.


FACTOID: Bronx Cheerleader were first named Bronx Cheer (after the Mercury Rev song) but with deadlines looming hastily added the "leader" to the end after discovering that a UK band already staked a claim to Bronx Cheer.


A SHORT HISTORY

Bronx Cheerleader is the brainchild of Scott Warren, former vocalist, guitar player and founding member of defunct Toronto indie-rockers Pope Factory. The CMJ Music Marathon Festival Guide once tagged Warren's former outfit as "smart, resonating alterna-pop" while in other circles they gained a reputation for making loud, quirky rock music. In the summer of 2001, with a 4-star review from Toronto's Eye Weekly for their latest album in their back pocket, Pope Factory went on a U.S. tour. As the tragedy of September 11th was unfolding the band were busy packing the van to head to New York City for a key tour date at the CMJ Music Marathon. Needless to say the CMJ showcase was cancelled and the events of that day would deliver what would turn out to be a fatal blow to both the tour and the band itself. Pope Factory would play it's final show in Nashville a few weeks later before disbanding.

Drummer Andre Skinner caught the country bug in Tennessee while on tour with Pope Factory and returned to Canada, stepped out from behind the drum kit to front alt-country act Canteen Knockout, and soon after signed with Weewerk Records. For Warren, an exit from Toronto and music in general soon followed in late 2001. Living in rural eastern Ontario, Warren barely picked up a guitar for nearly a year. This time to reflect allowed Warren room to foster a new musical direction. Shedding the prog-rock trappings of his former band, Warren embraced his natural melodicism and pop sensibilities which in the past had been subverted by the sonic maelstrom of the Pope Factory sound. With an album of new material ready to go, Warren headed back to his Niagara roots, settling in St. Catharines in 2003 and forming Bronx Cheerleader.