Gallery Link:
Public Appearances > 2012 > ItsMeBillieLeeLive – November 13, 2012

Share

Share

Check out JustJared.com‘s exclusive new photos of Leighton Meester and Wilmer Valderrama on the music video set of The Nomads‘ hot new track “Addicted to Love“, available on iTunes now.

Wilmer and Andrew Sandler directed the vid, which will officially be released tomorrow.

Vanessa Curry sings on the track and is also featured in the video with Leighton. Can’t wait to see their on-screen chemistry!

FYI: The Nomads (@therealnomads) have three members – Shahine Ezell (@shahineezell), Angel Onhel Aponte (@onhel), and DJ Triple XL (@djtriplexl).

Follow everybody else on Twitter @itsmeleighton @WValderrama @VanessaCurry @Andrew_Sandler @jaredeng. And don’t forget to pick up “Addicted to Love” on iTunes!

Source: JustJared

Gallery Link:
Projects > Addicted to Love Video Preview – The Nomads – August 2012

Share

Leighton had a busy day last Monday, she also performed with Check in the Dark at the House of Blues in Anaheim!

Gallery Link:
Public Appearances > 2012 > Leighton Meester Performs at The House of Blues in Anaheim – June 4, 2012

Share

Leighton started her tour with Check in the Dark this week! Here are the photos!

Gallery Links:
Photoshoots > Leighton Meester > 2012 > Check in the Dark Promotional Tour Shoot
Public Appearances > 2012 > Leighton at 95.7 KJR Radio Station, Seattle – May 29, 2012
Public Appearances > 2012 > Leighton performing in Seattle, WA – May 29, 2012
Public Appearances > 2012 > Leighton performing at the Vogue Theatre in Vancouver, BC, Canada – May 31, 2012

Share

Share

VANCOUVER — Leighton Meester has decided to stay true to herself for her first concert date in Vancouver.

The 26-year-old who is best known as Blair Waldorf, the mercurial queen bee of the Manhattan socialites in TV’s Gossip Girl, signed with Universal Republic in 2009. She had some middling success making bubble gum synth-pop collaborations with acts like Cobra Starship and Stephen Jerzak. The videos had the brown-eyed star writhing in the back of limos and sneaking into underground parties, basically living the life we imagine for the New York heiress she played on TV.

This tour, however, represents an entirely new side of Meester, one that puts her closer to Joni Mitchell than Lady Gaga.

“I loved doing those collaborations but I feel like folk music is a lot closer to what’s in my heart and a lot more true to my experiences of growing up, of love and the opposite,” she says over the phone from her rehearsal space in L.A. where she is deep in tour preparations with her band Check in the Dark.

Although her new work is quite a different genre, she credits her vocal abilities to the training she did working on the movie Country Strong. But her love of folk music goes much further back. “If I think about the music I was listening to when I was six years old, this would be it,” she says.

Meester remembers listening to her parents’ music collection that featured a plethora of folk and singer-songwriter mainstays from Simon and Garfunkel to Fiona Apple. She’s particularly fond of Neil Young’s Harvest Moon. So the genre seemed like a natural fit when she began writing her own songs. “I just picked up my guitar and started writing melodies and lyrics,” she says.

Share

Source: JustJared

Gallery Links:
Photoshoots > Behind the Scenes > JustJared – May 2012
Photoshoots > Leighton Meester > 2012 Photoshoots > JustJared

Interview:

Leighton Meester lounges by a pool in this exclusive new fashion photo shoot for JustJared.com held on Saturday (May 19) at a private residence in Encino, Calif.
The 26-year-old Gossip Girl actress and singer will be heading out on a five-city concert tour next week with the band Check in the Dark!
Leighton will be making stops in Seattle, Vancouver, Portland, San Francisco, and Anaheim. Make sure to pick up your tickets before they are gone. Click on each city to purchase tickets!
Just Jared talked with Leighton and some of the bandmates from Check in the Dark: Mike Frieman (vocals/ rhythm guitar), George Laird (lead guitar), and Eli Hludzik (drums). Unfortunately Etienne Franc (bass) wasn’t able to make the shoot!

JJ: How did all of you start working together?
LM: Well, they landed out of an alien spaceship into my yard… (laughs) Basically it started because my friend, their manager, lived with Mike and George. They had Check in the Dark, their band. I was always a big fan of theirs and had gone to see them perform and got up on stage and sang. Then I started writing music that was more in their style and started sending them my little voice memos about everything and then after that the rest is history. They started putting their magic onto all my songs, which were mostly just simple progressions, my lyrics, and melodies. Then George added lead guitar and Mike added beautiful harmonies and his lead guitar. Then Eli is like the glue that keeps everyone together. He keeps the beat and he also does the keyboard at times and he can play pretty much every instrument I can think of.
Etienne couldn’t be here today, he doesn’t live here, but he will be on tour with us. He’s really great. He brings so much soul vibe to the music. It’s a really well-rounded sound and it’s exactly what I wanted. They really complement my style of music.

JJ: What’s the chemistry like when you’re all in the studio recording?
Mike Freeman: We haven’t done too much recording – mostly demos. The first demos we did… we were all in there together and this last set of demos has been kind of separated. George and I laid down guitar and vocals and then Leighton put vocals on and then a couple weeks later Eli would come on. But when we’ve been there all together, it’s been super painless, you know? And I’ve had some painful times in the studio. I guess it’s organic.

JJ: Have you guys finished the album?
LM: We finished recording everything that’s going to make it onto the album, but we want to go back in probably within the next few months and record everything again. I feel like you just find different things when you record a demo and then go back to it. We have like 18 songs to work with so we’ll probably only record like 10 or 11 of them for the actual album.

Share

This time next year, we’ll be saying goodbye to our favorite (and not-so-favorite) characters of Gossip Girl as they wrap up this seasons-long chapter of their lives. But for their real-life counterparts, that chapter is already nearly closed as the actors move full steam ahead into a future beyond the designer-clad world of the Upper East Side.

One of the show’s biggest stars, Leighton Meester, has already made a big geographical switch — from New York to Los Angeles — to commit more time to her other passion: music. “It kind of already feels like it’s coming to an end now because I’m basically living in another place and moving on to something else,” says the woman behind the fiery Blair Waldorf in an exclusive interview with Wetpaint Entertainment. That “something else” has led to her first tour (five shows on the west coast, which kicks off May 29) with band and longtime pals Check in the Dark, whom she calls her “musical soul mates.”

We may be nearing the end of our love affair with GG, but if it’s any consolation, Leighton is prepared to give us the sweetest breakup song ever. Read on for more of our chat with Leighton:
Leighton Meester and Penn Badgley Giggle While Filming Gossip Girl in New York City on October 31, 2011
Photo Credit: Jackson Lee/Splash News

On the beginning of the end for Gossip Girl:
“We don’t go back to New York until July, and we only have four months of shooting [Season 6] so [...] it’s kind of a good thing and a bad thing. I’m excited to for it to end because I’m ready for a new chapter […], and at the same time, the thing I’ll miss the most is the people that I work with. Everyone’s like family — the crew [and] everyone that we work with every day in New York.”

On moving from New York to Los Angeles:
“It’s just such a great, warm, creative environment. And to be around everybody and my friends, to be able to be outside. It feels right [...]. Home is the west coast for me […]. It feels right and it feels great that our first tour is going to such great cities on the west coast.”

On comparing music versus acting:
“[Playing Blair] is intense, but music is intense in a different way [and] in a very personal way. When I play a character, it’s pretty much the exact opposite. I mean, I do find parts of the character in myself — and it’s absolutely rewarding to be able to draw from experiences of my own, but the music is my experience. It’s what I’m feeling in that moment.

“I feel like the songs I’ve written these past couple years, that we’re going to be performing [on the tour], they really are an expression of how I felt [at that moment] [...]. It’s completely different [than acting], it’s a different art form — and I’m really, really glad that I have it because it’s part of what keeps me sane — if I can call myself that.”

On how Gossip Girl influenced fans’ music tastes:
“[We had] very interesting bands that I don’t think I’d heard of before they came on the show. I think [the show’s] great at doing that, at finding new kind of cool music and introducing it to the mainstream — which is awesome.”

On connecting with a new fanbase:
“I feel like some hardcore fans who have already made it to shows […], they will totally understand the vibe. And I’m excited to introduce our new sound to people who have no idea what they’re in for — and that’s what I’ve been excited about.” (Check out Leighton and Check in the Dark in action here and here.)

On singing in Country Strong — and its impact on her as an artist:
“I was definitely influenced by being part of [the movie], and being part of a completely different world and genre of music. And I mean, before that […] I was doing pop music. And as much as I can discuss that with pride […], personally, the music I’m doing now is way more of a reflection of who I am, who I’ve become, and where I’m headed.”

Source: Wetpaint

Share

Share

Leighton performed last night at Fashion’s Night out at an event for Tiffany and Co.! Photos of Leighton attending and performing in the gallery!

Gallery Link
Public Appearances > 2011 > Tiffany & Co. And FNO – September 8, 2011

Share

Share