Hi all, I have an exciting gig, an overdue song / music video explanation and some good news to share. We’ll start off with the gig.
Next month, my band and I are competing in round one of ‘The Underdog’ – Bristol’s biggest battle of the bands. It’ll be at The Thunderbolt on Saturday 7th February, with five other local acts on the bill. There’s lots of info about times, tickets, how you vote for your preferred band etc. – I’ll leave all that at the bottom of this post. Primarily, we’re just thrilled to be back gigging again, especially since we’ve had some really exciting ideas to embellish and breathe more life into the songs the last couple rehearsals. Also, the gig falls on my birthday weekend. With all that in mind, it’d be great to see you at this one.
Side note: my old band and good friends Hoaster were in the competition last year and they made it all the way to the finals at the O2 Academy. They showed the sky’s the limit… so who knows?
Now – where’s the music video?! First off, for the uninitiated, early on in December we had a video shoot at The Blakehay for my upcoming single. I had lots of extras and helpers kindly volunteer their time and as a result it was a great success. However, in the midst of it all I stated with great confidence that the single and video would be out in early January…
Given that we’re now staring February in the face, people have quite justifiably asked why they haven’t seen the fruits of their labours yet. Namely my parents. Well, fear not Mum and Dad, it’s all still coming, the timeline is just protracted. Partly due to Christmas busy-ness, but also because of a technical hiccup; I wasn’t able to mix the song with my go-to engineer this time round (‘mixing’ being the process of gathering all the recorded instruments and effects for a song and combining them into what you hear as the final track).
In light of this fact, as well as dwindling funds and my hesitance to work with someone new, I decided I’d have a go at mixing it myself – hence the delay. Apologies if you were excited to see it already, I’m so keen for you all to see the good work you did, and to hear the final recording the band and I have worked so hard on. In any case, we’re now looking at an early to mid February release for ‘Spot In A Blue Sky’. Oooo.
Another side note: I really quite fancy mixing some other stuff besides my own. So, if you like what you hear when my single comes out and you have a song of your own, please consider contacting this amateur.
Lastly, some good news. I’m on the radio next week – twice! First is courtesy of Dan Rees at GTFM; it’s always worth tuning into his show, he has a wonderful ease when describing music and a great taste for artist’s off the beaten track. He’ll be playing some of my music the evening of Wednesday 28th. After that it’s over to Bath Sound on Saturday, where they’ll be interviewing me(!) from 10:30am. It’ll be my first time talking live on the airwaves (do people still say that?), so I imagine I will be perfectly eloquent and it’ll all go swimmingly… I’ll be in the good hands of Ollie Lewis, at least.
That’s all the big things for now then. Other than that, I’ve been booking all sorts of gigs for the rest of the year, originals and covers in various forms, so it’s worth keeping an eye on my ‘gigs’ page if you want an early peek.
You also might have noticed I’ve been posting to my socials more routinely, with weekly ‘New Music Mondays’ videos and other gubbins. I’m giving my original career a big push this year, and despite the unfortunate necessity for working artists to be on the internet constantly, it has provided more of a framework to my topsy-turvy life. It made me write this blog post, for example! Thanks for reading.
Underdog tickets + info: https://www.fatsoma.com/e/sem6e1cx/la/4sad