News: Chantel McGregor Releases Her Third Studio Album; “The Healing”
on May 2nd, 2025 at 12:07…and Announces a String of local shows
Chantel McGregor releases her third studio album, The Healing, on May 23, 2025. Over the last 15 years the Yorkshire-born guitarist, singer and songwriter has carved a reliable presence on the British gig circuit, traversing the length and breadth of the country and appearing at some of our biggest festivals. It would be easy to presume that we know what makes her tick.
However, The Healing is set to blow such preconceptions clean out of the water, revealing a whole new side to Chantel McGregor in both a musical and emotional sense. Back in 2011, McGregor introduced herself with an enjoyable yet (by her own admission) fairly blues-by-numbers set entitled ëLike No Otherí, and a full decade has now passed since a harder-edged successor, Lose Control, which began to absorb the rock and heavy metal that Chantel listens to away from the stage.
The Healing is the next logical step of McGregor’s journey. ìThis is definitely, definitely a rock album ñ not a blues album,î stresses Chantel. “It’s heavy and dark and it introduces elements of prog-rock, which is a form of music I absolutely love. It has those “wobbly synth vibes” from the 1980s,” she continues, laughing. ìSteven Wilson went down that route of being disturbing, dark and also slightly wobbly. It’s got a bit of that.î
Besides McGregor, the album features her regular band-mates Colin Sutton on bass and Thom Gardner on drums, a pair of players with whom she has developed a form of musical telekinesis. Where things depart from the norm is the presence of the two newcomers. Noted UK guitarist Oli Brown handles what Chantel describes as “programming and synth-y things” and is also a co-producer. “Iíve known Oli for donkey’s years, but when I heard the work he was doing with his band The Dead Collective I really wanted to see if we could do something together,” McGregor states. Wayne Proctor, another member of The Dead Collective, handled production mixing and mastering.
Chantel has put together a full UK Tour in support of the new album including a host of dates in Dorset and Hampshire:
Sunday 25th May – Southampton – The Brook
Tuesday 3rd June – Portsmouth – Guildhall
Thursday 5th June – Winchester – The Arc
Friday 6th June – Aldershot – West End Centre
Saturday 7th June – New Milton – Forest Arts Centre
Thursday 12th June – Bridport – Electric Palace
Links
https://www.chantelmcgregor.com
https://www.facebook.com/chantelmcgregor.co.uk
