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Polly Jean Harvey was born on October 9, 1969 in Yeovil, ENGLAND, a small
village consisting of 600 people where she raised and learned to play
guitar and saxophone as a teenager.
In 1991 she teamed-up with bassist Steve Vaughan and drummer Robert Ellis
and started up PJ Harvey shortly thereafter.
The following year the trio released its debut album, "Dry",
on independent label Too Pure; the disc featured the singles "Dress"
and "Sheela-Na-Gig", the latter of which peaked at #9 on the
U.S. Modern Rock Tracks chart.
In 1993, PJ Harvey signed to Island Records; soon the band went into the
studio with the original line-up and recorded their sophomore full-length
disc; the resulting album, "Rid Of Me", was released in May
of the same year and was supported by a lengthy world tour, drawing increasingly
wide audiences. The disc shot to #3 in Britain, hit the top 10 of the
Billboard Magazine's Heatseekers chart and reached the #158 position on
The Billboard 200 Sales list; two singles were also released to promote
the album, "50Ft Queenie" and "Man-Size".
The original trio dissolved and Harvey's solo work "4-Track Demos"
was released in the autumn of 1993, which comprised of 14 songs, a mixture
of unreleased material and Harvey's own demos for "Rid Of Me".
"To Bring You My Love" followed in February 1995, an eclectic
and starkly original album. She enlisted a variety of musicians to play
on the album, including multi-instrumentalist John Parish, who co-produced
along with Flood and Harvey, guitarist Joe Gore, keyboardist Eric Drew
Feldman and bassist Mick Harvey. The record hit #19 in U.K. and climbed
into the top 40 of The Billboard 200 while the main single, "Down
By The Water", became her biggest hit in U.S. burning up The Modern
Rock chart and falling just one position short of #1; the subsequent two
singles, "C'mon Billy" and "Send His Love To Me",
both missed the American charts; all of those singles also charted in
the U.K. Top 40.
Recording her fifth album, "Is This Desire?", in London and
Dorset, Harvey once again co-produced the album with Flood. It was released
in September 1998 and featured 12 new tracks. It attracted plaudits on
both sides of the Atlantic hitting the top 20 in U.K. and reaching #54
on the American Billboard Top 200 Albums chart led by the Modern Rock
top 40 hit single "A Perfect Day Elise".
"Stories From The City, Stories From The Sea", the much anticipated
follow-up to "Is This Desire?" was released in October 2000.
The album, produced and performed by PJ Harvey, Rob Ellis and Mick Harvey,
peaked at #42 on The Billboard 200 and at #23 on the British Official
Sales chart generating a minor hit with "Good Fortune".
June 2004 saw the release of PJ Harvey's seventh LP, "Uh Huh Her";
the album was written, performed, recorded, mixed and produced by Harvey,
who chose Mister Head to assist in additional recording and mixing and
Rob Ellis, long time collaborator, to play drums and percussion on the
album, Harvey played everything else. The CD achieved a career-best peak
of #29 on The Billboard Top 200 as well as a respectable #12 in her native
England; the disc included the U.K. Top 40 single "The Letter".
"White Chalk" is the artist's eighth studio album and first
new material since 2004's critically acclaimed "Uh Huh Her".
PJ Harvey went into the studio late in 2006 to record and produce with
Flood and John Parish. The three had worked together previously on the
Grammy nominated "To Bring You My Love" and on "Is This
Desire?". "When Under Ether" is the first single off the
new CD; it is backed by the rare track, "Wait", one of the first
ever songs recorded by Polly Jean Harvey back in 1988.
PJ Harvey biography is an exclusive of 100xr.com
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