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LENNY ZAKATEK |
Biography |
Lenny Zakatek was born in 1947 in Karachi. (At that time it was India, but since partition has become Pakistan). At the age of thirteen, the family moved to England and it was there that Lenny began to experiment with music.
By the age of seventeen Lenny got the chance to put everything he learned to use and take his act on the road with a band called Funky Fever. A few years later he would form a band called "Zakatek" and take off for Denmark.
At the top of the 1970s, Lenny would join his next band, Gonzalez. "We were the sort of Earth, Wind and Fire/Tower of Power of the UK. We had Steve Feronne on drums who's now doing everything from Eric Clapton to Chaka Khan. John Giblin was on bass for two years." Before leaving Gonzalez, Lenny sang lead on their biggest hit single "Haven't Stopped Dancing Yet".
In 1977, Lenny sang vocals on "I Wouldn't Want To Be Like You", from The Alan Parsons Project album "I Robot". Not only did this begin a long association with The Alan Parsons Project, but he also ended up singing many of the hits, including "Damned If I Do" and "Games People Play".
Lenny worked with The Alan Parsons Project for many years, and also performed vocals for the band at their first live concerts in the early 1990s.
In 1979 Lenny released his first solo album on A&M Records. Alan Parsons produced and engineered Lenny's self-titled solo album, while Bairnson and Elliott lent their support as well. Robert Ahwai and John Giblin also helped, the latter also writing songs for the album.
Lenny also did a couple of singles for London Records including "Say I Love You / Where Is The Love?", then later got the chance to do another record, called "Small But Hard".
More recently Lenny has been working in the business end of the music industry: publishing, managing and producing. Lenny has had success managing Japanese artist Hotei (ho-tey). Hotei has sold almost twenty-two million albums in Japan, and performed a guitar solo at the closing ceremony of the Atlanta Olympic Games.
For more about Lenny Zakatek, see Issues Six and Seven of The Avenue.
LENNY ZAKATEK
Selected Discography
| Lenny Zakatek Solo Albums | |
|---|---|
| YEAR | ALBUM |
| 1979 | Lenny Zakatek |
| Small But Hard | |
| Work With Other Artists | |||
|---|---|---|---|
| YEAR | ARTIST | ALBUM | |
| 1975 | Gonzalez | Our Only Weapon Is Our Music | Guitar, Vocals |
| 1977 | Gonzalez | Shipwrecked | Guitar, Vocals |
| 1977 | The Alan Parsons Project | I Robot | Vocals |
| 1978 | The Alan Parsons Project | Pyramid | Vocals |
| 1979 | Gonzalez | Haven't Stopped Dancin' | Guitar, Vocals |
| 1979 | The Alan Parsons Project | Eve | Vocals |
| 1980 | The Alan Parsons Project | The Turn of a Friendly Card | Vocals, Vocals (bckgr) |
| 1982 | The Alan Parsons Project | Eye in the Sky | Vocals |
| 1984 | The Alan Parsons Project | Ammonia Avenue | Vocals |
| 1985 | The Alan Parsons Project | Vulture Culture | Vocals |
| 1987 | The Alan Parsons Project | Gaudi | Vocals |
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