blues @ temperance | Felix Rabin band

2025 BIO 
- FÉLIX RABIN -

 
Swiss born French musician Félix Rabin (pronounced Ray-bin) is a distinctive and seriously impressive singer-songwriter-guitar talent where the terms “pop-rock” and “crossover blues,” in terms of his stylistic and accessible songcraft, firmly apply. 
 
But even those genres don’t fully do justice to an artist who blends rock, blues, European soul-pop, some funk (and even a touch of prog), to extremely fine effect. 
But with influences such as Hendrix (an early go-to for a young Félix Rabin), Gary Clark Jr., John Mayer and Pink Floyd, Monsieur Rabin was always going to be a highly individualistic artist who turns heads and pricks up ears. 
(Make no mistake, this soft-voiced singer has the six-string muscle to remind of those guitar greats just mentioned, whilst having very much his own sound, melodic phrasing, and tone). 
 
Félix Rabin also has a musical backstory that is as interesting and impressive as the songs he writes, records and performs… 
 
First picking up a guitar at the age of 15, Félix found himself fascinated with the guitar and Stevie Ray Vaughan (no bad starting point). 
A few short years later the young six-string talent started to play around Switzerland & France and, rather impressively, appearing and playing at the prestigious Montreux Jazz Festival– not once, but on a number of occasions. 
(Fun facts – in 1982 David Bowie was so impressed by a then unknown outside of Texas Stevie Ray Vaughan at the Montreux Jazz Festival that he hired him to play on his Let’s Dance album. Thirty-three years later, when Félix played, none other than the legendary Quincy Jones invited him to his table to compliment him and offer advice).

With such encouragement, Félix took his music to the UK, a territory that had always attracted him, not least because of the many British bands he admired, including Floyd and Rory Gallagher. 
Starting at low-key club level, his obvious talents moved him step by step to larger stages and the attention of classic rock legends Wishbone Ash, who brought him on board as support on their 50th Anniversary Tour of the UK. 

This was the first under the spotlight sighting in the UK of Félix, who made an impact with songs such as the moody, heavy soul of Little Hurricane, slow blues tour-de-force Heavy Rain (Felix’s softer vocals complementing his tasteful yet feisty blues licks) and his slow-build cover of Hey Joe, where he gave it the full Hendrix towards the end.

Those songs, along with three others, featured on 2018’s promotional EP ‘Down Our Roads;’ the perfect calling card and memento of his earliest, successful forays into the UK. 

In 2019 Félix headed for the United States, dipping his toes in that country’s musical culture and musical genres (of which there are many, further influencing him); he recorded material in Los Angeles with Ross Hogarth, a Californian producer, sound engineer and mixer who had worked with the luminary likes of Van Halen and REM. 
The results of those recording sessions became his first official EP, ‘Pogboy,’ the title a nickname coined by Ross Hogarth relating to Félix’s favoured effects pedal, the Pog (a significant factor in the inventive tonal sounds Félix was now creating, and calling his own). 

Released in early 2020, the six track ‘Pogboy’ showcased the multi-styled, song writing growth of a musician still only in his mid-twenties but showing creative, broader scoped maturity well beyond his years. 

For proof, check out Walk (a progressively styled, melodic monster of a song with Felix in full Polyphonic Octave Generator cry), the pulsating groove of the horns backed Moving On, or seven minute standout track Death, which resonates like a downplayed blues version of ‘Like a Hurricane’ mixed with film noire and Pink Floyd vibes (complete with a solo David Gilmour would be proud to call his own). 
 
Returning to the UK before the spring of 2020, Félix won the Best Act award at the Giants of Rock Festival. He then spent a month on the road travelling through ten European and UK countries as support to American roots blues artist Samantha Fish. 
Unfortunately, Covid curtailed any later 2020 touring; the chance to push and promote ‘Pogboy’ further was lost. 
 
Undeterred, and after the quieter downtime of 2020 (courtesy of the still lasting effects of Covid), a refreshed and re-energised Félix went back out on the road in 2021; he played the main stage of Giants Of Rock (a return invitation following his 2020 Best Act award) before going on to perform more than fifty shows across Europe. 
 
Félix then started writing for his next EP; several months of recording led to a quartet of singles released between the autumn of 2023 and the summer of 2024, starting with the shimmering Euro-pop-rock of ‘As She Comes,’ followed by atmospheric and sensitive ballad ‘Find Me.’ 

The vibrant, hard-pop arrangement of Bruce Springsteen’s ‘Dancing in the Dark’ was the perfect fit for a refreshed, post-pandemic Félix, while Indie styled instrumental rocker ‘Run!’ offered yet another sonic shade. 

Forthcoming tracks ’What You Need’ beautifully highlights that this is a musician who is also comfortable delivering a heartfelt, soulful love song, completing this new EP named “Blue Days” 
 
All musical roads travelled by Félix have led, by natural progression, to ‘Down Our Roads’ (highlighting his blues rock side) and, two years later, ‘Pogboy,’ where he broadened his musical identity and found his sound. 

However it’s the recent singles, forthcoming EP ‘Blues Days’ and upcoming debut album that fully define who Félix Rabin is as a songwriter, singer, and melodically atmospheric player – one with a European sound (2025 will see him make further inroads on the European circuit) but with British rock & blues sensibilities. 
 
Pogboy. Rockboy. Popboy. 
All apply, but each is but a facet of Félix Rabin, an artist who has been on a ten year musical journey, slowly but assuredly progressing from bluesier beginnings to the tasteful playing of the highly accomplished, crossover artist he now is. 
And he’s just getting started.

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