NEW YORK, NY–(Marketwire – April 13, 2010) –  Atlantic recording
artist Phil Collins has announced the forthcoming release of “GOING
BACK,” a deeply personal labor of love that finds the eight-time Grammy
winner faithfully recreating the Motown and soul music that played such
an influential role in his creative life. Due in September, “GOING BACK”
marks the 2010 Rock and Roll Hall of Fame inductee’s first new studio
album in eight years. 

To celebrate “GOING BACK,” Collins will play a string of very
special live concerts at New York City’s Roseland Ballroom from June
22-25. Billed as UP CLOSE & PERSONAL: PHIL COLLINS PLAYS 60’S
MOTOWN & SOUL, the shows will be exclusively devoted to the
music from “GOING BACK” and other classic R&B/pop gems. The concerts
will be presented as an “old school” style, standing-room-only dance
concert. 

Supporting Collins will be an extraordinary 18-piece ensemble
of musicians and vocalists. Anchoring the group will be three of
Motown’s legendary session players, aka The Funk Brothers — bassist Bob
Babbitt and guitarists Eddie Willis and Ray Monette — who are also
featured on the “GOING BACK” album. The live band will also include
long-time Collins cohorts Chester Thompson (drums), Daryl Stuermer
(guitar), and Brad Cole (keyboards), plus Leslie Smith
(percussion). Rounding out the ensemble will be a five-member horn
section and six backing vocalists.

Presented by Live Nation, tickets for all four Roseland shows
will be available to Citibank cardholders through a special pre-sale at
livenation.com beginning at 10a.m. ET on Monday, April 19^th,
and will go on sale to the general public at 10a.m. ET on Saturday,
April 24^th at livenation.com and charge by phone.

Coinciding with Collins’s Roseland shows, on June 17^th
he will receive the Songwriters Hall of Fame’s prestigious Johnny
Mercer Award at the organization’s annual gala awards dinner in New York
City. Significantly, Collins — a previous Songwriters Hall of Fame
inductee — will join an esteemed list of past Mercer Award winners that
includes several legendary composers whose work he celebrates on “GOING
BACK,” including Holland-Dozier-Holland, Smokey Robinson, Stevie
Wonder, and Carole King. In addition, among Collins’s fellow Mercer
Award honorees this year is Earth, Wind & Fire’s Philip Bailey, with
whom he collaborated on the hit single, “Easy Lover.”

While in the past Collins has paid tribute to his roots by
covering some of his favorite songs — including “You Can’t Hurry Love,”
“A Groovy Kind Of Love,” “Tomorrow Never Knows,” “True Colours,” and
others — this marks the first time in his 30-year solo career that he
has devoted an entire project to the work of other songwriters and
performers. 

“It shouldn’t really be a surprise to anyone that I’ve
finally made an album of my favourite Motown songs,” explains
Collins. “These songs — along with a couple of Dusty Springfield
tracks, a Phil Spector/Ronettes tune, and one by the Impressions — make
up the tapestry, the backdrop, of my teenage years. I remember it as if
it was yesterday, going to the Marquee Club in London’s Soho and
watching The Who, The Action, and many others, playing these songs. In
turn I’d go out the next day to buy the original versions.

“My idea, though, was not to bring anything ‘new’ to these
already great records, but to try to recreate the sounds and feelings
that I had when I first heard them. My intention was to make an ‘old’
record, not a ‘new’ record. To be able to have three of the surviving
Funk Brothers play on all the tracks was unbelievable. There was one
moment when they were tracking ‘Heat Wave’ that I experienced a wave of
happiness and wonder that this was actually happening to me! I learned
more about production skills and the wonderful songwriting of those
concerned whilst making this album, than I have from anything else. To
those pioneers… much love and gratitude.”

The songs slated for inclusion on “GOING BACK” range from the
album opener, the Temptations’ Holland-Dozier-Holland-penned “Girl (Why
You Wanna Make Me Blue)” to the moving album-closing title track, a
Collins-arranged version of the Gerry Goffin/Carole King tune “Going
Back,” made famous by Dusty Springfield. In between, the collection
captures multiple songs by Stevie Wonder — “Uptight (Everything’s
Alright),” “Blame It On The Sun,” “Never Dreamed You’d Leave In Summer”;
Martha And The Vandellas — “(Love Is Like A) Heat Wave,” “In My Lonely
Room,” “Jimmy Mack”; and the Four Tops — “Standing In The Shadows Of
Love,” “Something About You,” “Loving You Is Sweeter Than Ever.”

The Temptations get another shout-out with “Papa Was A
Rolling Stone,” while the Goffin-King team is again represented by a
second Dusty Springfield track, “Some Of Your Loving.” Curtis Mayfield
and The Impressions are captured on “Talking About My Baby,” while Phil
hails the Ronettes with “Do I Love You?” The Motown-fest continues with
Smokey Robinson & The Miracles’ “Going To A Go-Go,” the Supremes’
“Love Is Here,” and Kim Weston’s “Take Me In Your Arms (Rock Me A Little
While).”

The career of Phil Collins is one that, by any measure,
stands among the most creative, prolific, and impressive in the history
of modern music. It is a career that really has been many careers —
musician, singer, composer, producer, actor — from art rock beginnings
to pop stardom, from big band leader to film soundtracks and
Broadway. It has been an exceptional musical life spanning four decades,
some 100 million solo albums sold (250 million if you count his work
with Genesis), an extraordinary string of hits, eight Grammy Awards, an
Oscar, a Golden Globe, numerous industry accolades, and, above all, an
inestimable influence on countless fellow artists and passionate fans
around the globe.