Online Diary (April 2011)
May 2, 2011 Latest News
30/04/11
Its been a few days of gigging and next week is another busy one. Bottle Bar tonight, Decades tomo, Grand Pier and Illusions on Monday, Mixing the next 4 tracks on Tuesday, London Inn open mic on Wednesday, Vertigo (Truro) on Thursday then 3 days in Dartmouth for the music festival. Hopefully have another chat with the legend of Mark Ely with regards to the tracks so far and the changes I implemented on Secret after his advice. ‘Harmony gimp’ Gavin Cox will be at hand and he is kindly offering his expertise in backing vocals for the tracks as I wanted to get something a bit different on the go and I believe he is the man for it.
Tim Allen (he taught me Pro Tools at college) is currently playing around with the ‘Secret’ stems to give a hand with production and a possible remix from a mystery musician is hopefully on the cards too.
I have been applying for festivals, even though it is a bit late to at least get the contacts list growing in preparation for next year when the album will be promoted wildly. The video below is from a band discussion we had after recording last time at ‘The Studio’ so hope it is of some interest – you can also see my newer shorter haircut. Gotta keep up with Bieber!
Other than that there ain’t nothing going on but the rent – which reminds me I really need to find some more work in June/July so I can keep living in a nice house 
If you would be looking to hire a musician for your private parties or venue then get in touch.
Oh and it looks promising that I will definitely be in Dubai for the first week of Sept. HOLIDAY!!!
25/04/11
Ryan has been kind enough to give me the ability to contribute to this section of his website, he obviously trusts me not to ruin the brilliant job he has been doing so far! Hopefully it will keep people who take the time to read this up to date on those days when Ryan decides he needs large amounts of sleep!
Being part of Ryan’s band since last year has been a great experience. Through him I have worked with some amazing players/engineers, and performed/recorded in some stunning places – one of which was a life ambition. So cheers Ry, and thank you to the rest of the R.I.B. team!
However, yesterday I got the rare chance to view Ryan as a fan again. Working with him on arrangements, production, vocals etc for the full band album has been incredible, but having been a fan of his for many years prior to this it was great to get back to basics. It is also inspiring to see that Ryan can still cut it on his own! With a band or solo, he is certainly a talent.
So, bring on the rest of the album. Can’t wait for y’all to hear it, and to the investors I’ll say this;
“money well spent!”
Steve (Bass Guitarist)
24/04/11
Been on The Grand Pier today and had a great afternoon singing to hundreds of people. Passed out a few business cards and all the beer mats were taken which is always a good sign… unless of course they got blown off and landed in the brown water underneath. Took a picture of my view before I set up my equipment and also a pic of me riding the little special yellow fun bus that gets the equipment up to the pier. WIll be very up for playing there more often over the summer… having the sun on my face and seeing everyone frolicing gayly on the beach was cool. Belinda Lee Day came and sang a few songs which was amazing as always and Hannah Johns provided some sweet violin on a few songs too.
My housemate Tom has introduced me to cool new game on the iPhone called Tilt To Live… so far my high score is over 300,000 so if you get bored and fancy playing it then I certainly recommend it.
Yesterday gig was really good for a private 30th birthday party. Was great to play to such a nice bunch and some of them joined in too. The handsomist boys from Glastonbury allegedly… basically been a good couple of days.
23/04/11
Last nights performance at Fifteenhands (going on all weekend) festival went well I think except for the lyrics to the first verse of F.A.F leaving me momentarily! We rehearsed throughout the day just to practice them since we recorded in THE studio and it’s nice to play them back after hearing them in the car for the past couple of days. Time to start ironing out the kinks on My Weakness, For You, There’s A Scene, Look FWD, Panic, Sea Of Tranquility, Footprint, Destiny & Forgive Me. Then it will be a case of deciding on which songs will make the album tracklist.
I need to start thinking about my performance at The Bedford on 23rd May; would like to have a better idea of what I am going to say on stage between songs. I think it would be a good idea to have something a little more scripted than my usual mumblings
I have some contacts to get in touch with regarding the music video. Would like to see what my options are and see what is going to work best. Have contacted 3 so far from different parts of the UK and look forward to hearing back from them.
I have contacted The Blue Bar in Porthtowen, Cornwall about maybe performing down there. I would like nothing more than get out and about playing new and preferably beautiful places here is their website if you wanna have a look.
I’m playing a private gig today in the afternoon so have the evening free. Prob spend it with my housemate Tom over some beers in town. One other thing… I have asked the other band members to add to this blog as and when they feel the need to do so and we had a discussion about album launch in the future where we will more than likely do an ‘online’ launch rather than a live one to begin with. This will mean it is available to anyone anywhere and it will also be potentially viewable at any time. Of course some live performances will follow but the launch itself will most likely be purely online.
20/04/11
I have made some tab for One Step At A Time and uploaded it to Ultimate Guitar.com. Looks a little like this: It should be available in guitar pro format soon if you were interested in learning how to play it. My main reason for doing it is to copyright the material as I believe a piece of music is copyrighted as soon as it is in a document – here is an excerpt from the PRS website. You should be registered to PRS if you write your own material. I am but still have not earned any royalty cheques 
When does Copyright begin?
In music, copyright begins automatically once a piece of music is created, and documented or recorded (eg. on video, tape or CD or simply writing down the notation of a score)
I have had my acoustic repaired and will be collecting it today… a few guitar lessons later followed by open mic tonight. Nothing else to do at the moment other than learn some songs for a wedding gig coming up and work on my tax return – hurrah. Just finished learning Rhythm Of Love by Plain White T’s – such a tune
19/04/11
First lesson of the day: having a manger who bigs you up is more credible than doing it yourself… I have received a message today from someone who was a member on my facebook group giving some advice about how I represent myself and my music which I think I should take on board (although not to take away anything from what I have done so far) It IS a fine line between actively promoting oneself and coming across pushy or arrogant (neither of which are my intention) My only aim from yesterday was to share a new piece of music which was recorded live specifically for the benefit of giving away for free in exchange for some help with promotion. If you did not get the message I offered the track in exchange for help adding more members to my facebook group. It does appear however that for every 30/40 good comments I get back I do get the odd 1 that effects me more because I hate to come across badly when it was never my intention to do so.
I think one problem I am having is I have so much I want to promote I can’t send it out fast enough but I feel I am constantly holding back on telling anyone in case I become a burden. I get mixed messages from some saying they love to know whats going on, where I’m playing, what’s happening with the charity, links to new recordings and remixes etc… but then other times I get feedback asking me to remove them from their news feeds… which is actually easy to do yourself if you want rid of me.
I guess what I mean is that I dont want to feel like I’m coming across in a bad way and that if I do it does sadden me. But conversely I’m not sure whether I should be worried about what EVERYONE thinks because you can never please everyone anyway… should I just carry on doing things as I have done or put my career into the hands of someone who might represent ME better than I could? Oh I don’t know the pitfalls are all over the place. The thing with promoting through facebook is that you get the coverage but not the true intention or personability of the character behind the message.
Maybe a should get myself a PR team? Maybe I’m just crap at even the slightest amount of critism and should man up? Maybe I should not be ashamed of being proud of where I am? Maybe this, maybe that…
18/04/11
Just been speaking to an acquaintance from a few years ago by the name of Rhys Hayward who contacted me after reading my article in The Scene magazine. He works on music videos and just so happened to contact me just when I was on the lookout for some help with mine. Going to meet up with him tomorrow to discuss some ideas.
Editing the video for ‘One Step At A Time’ Myself and Hannah (Johns) did a single take at the end of the studio session so that a little video and a live recording could be given to my wonderful investors and anyone else who would like a copy because I’m nice like that. Also spoke to Angela Cassidy from Nova radio (107.7fm) who will be playing it live on her show sometime before Easter Sunday to promote my gig at The Grand Pier as well as getting a little bit of exposure for myself – excited I remember when I first had ‘If IFall’ played out over Star radio back in 2007 (you can hear how it went HERE) Joe Malik was kind enough to play it for me and Steve Mitchell was there too (Evanfly/Moderations)
I have uploaded a little video that I found from just before I performed Blackbird back in January. The link to view it is here
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v2rnLI7cHZg
I have enquired about performing at this years Bristol Harbourside Festival so fingers crossed I can get a slot with the band and get this album promoted in Bristol
17/04/11
(14:10)
Arrived bright and breezy (ahem) to the studio at about 10:30. Spent the evening chatting to Edward Bell, his girlfriend and her friend over a lot of wine and some drinking games If you haven’t heard Edward’s stuff then visit his slicethepie profile by clicking on his picture.
I soon got started on the acoustic parts for the 4 songs. Did a few takes and made a few errors along the way – strange how your hands fail you as soon as the record button is pressed!
Hannah has now arrived and is making a start on the violin parts. Very much enjoying the sound of it from the control room. Who says you need spend ages scoring string parts – just come up with them on the spot and harmonise them and hey presto it sounds immense!! my face is doing that weird curvy mouthed, squinty eyed thing – is it called smiling?? seriously though this shit is sounding so good I might cry
Here is a video of our little band meeting after yesterdays epic studio session http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Vep-naQE6A8
EDIT: I retract my comment about not scoring string parts… I got carried away since the first song went so well. If you don’t have them decided upon before getting to the studio you can lose a lot of time writing when you should be recording! gonna get the vocals started now while Hannah has a sit in the control room working out some parts. Feel Any Feeling has a string part that just works so well. How Things Change now has a new ending but the other 2 need a little TLC and nothing too intrusive or ‘fluttery’
Had a little think about the strings and have now simplified the parts to Starlight; I wanted to have a harmony part for the bridge but nothing to get in the way of the chorus melody so its just a 2 note fill, went into the live room and practiced the parts together and they fit together well. Lost is also now a chorus only part and stays the same throughout to keep the element of familiarity. Now it’s my turn for some vocal goodness.
(19:06)
Just finished the vocals and my throat is a little sore but I think we got all the takes we needed. Something worth thinking about next time is the order of the songs. I think I did them in the right order to best warm up my voice as we went along. Feel Any Feeling was first then Starlight, How Things Change & Lost was last – I got all the screamy stuff out early.
Next we’re gonna do a live version of One Step At A Time for your viewing pleasure and start packing things up/mixing studio versions to take home with us and copying all the session data to my hard drive ready to get to Tony Hobden for mixing in a couple of weeks when he is next free. Apparently it has been nice and sunny outside… not that I would know as I have almost literally not moved from the control room for the past 9 hours… my pastey face will need some sun tomorrow I feel.
Here’s a picture of Hannah:
16/04/11
(9:06am)
Sat in studio 3 at A B Road studios while Kris (Burton) sorts out the patching and Sam (Evans) sets up his drum kit. Aiming for three songs over the next 2 days with the possibility of a forth if we make good time. I will be aiming to record another live video at the end of the day too, most likely a version of ‘One Step At A Time‘ I have brought my Takamine EG522SC for such a purpose and will aim to get that to you asap. I realise how long it’s been since you heard something new from me!!
While I am at a loose end for the moment I shall be doing random tasks via the medium of cyberspace and consolidating areas of my fractured life… also need to find somewhere to sleep tonight in London.
(12:47pm)
Finished setting up the instruments ready to do our guide tracks… we did however bring pre recorded guide tracks with us at correct tempos to save some time (little hint there) Feel Any Feeling is at 99bpm (6/8) How Things Change is at 115bpm and Starlight – well we didnt do a guide for that before we got here so that will need to be done but shouldn’t take long. Tea & buscuits anyone?
(15:10pm)
Drums for the 3 tracks are complete and we shall have a short break to sharpen our ears and minds for the bass parts which are next. Starlight was at 168bpm and Sam has put some PHAT beats all over it (15:48) we are getting the bass down now.
(17:16pm)
Lead guitar parts are now complete and I am about to get the acoustic guitar tracked. Starlight is first as it is in standard tuning then the ending to Feel Any Feeling needs some work after I’ve done my rall at the end. How Things Change should be fairly straight forward as the guitar part is pretty repetitive throughout (shhh don’t tell anyone) It is also worth mentioning that fellow STP financee Edward Bell has offered me somewhere to sleep tonight which is a much better option that sleeping in the car and plus it’s gonna be a good chance to meet him in person.
(19:02)
With all drum, bass and lead guitar parts complete for the three intended songs we have found the time to do one more and have chosen Lost as we were all very confident in performing it. The tempo was decided to be 76.5bpm! and after the third guide run through Sam was happy with the drum take and so went from there. An overdub of a ‘marching band’ snare for the middle 8 – 3 to 4 times over and then Steve is re-doing his bass part. Once Adam gets his guitar done we are ready to pack up for the day leaving myself and Hannah with the vocals, acoustic and violin parts tomorrow… overall pretty damn productive if you ask me.
13/04/11
Working on securing a remix of ‘Secret’ with a strong name in the industry and so far I might have got something going with someone who has worked with Groove Armada, Amy Winehouse & Ian Brown to name a few. More info on that as things pan out. I do have the vocal stem available for anyone seriously considering a remix. It would end up being sold as a package deal when the single is released; Single, acoustic version, remixes and videos all in one as an option. Need to start thinking about single artwork too.
Still at the number 1 spot on Talentwatch thanks again to those of you who have rated my videos – I am looking fwd to the site taking off and granting those at the top added exposure and opportunities. If you have not been there yet follow the link
Got a meeting tonight with Lene and Simon from LS Wedding Designs to hopefully secure more gigs in the wedding arena. It’s always good to have steady work and people just keep on getting married don’t they seriously though LS Wedding Designs aim to be a 1 stop shop for all your special days needs with local businesses offering deals
“We are a one stop shop for all you will need for your big day – from photography, hair and mackup, flowers, music, food etc… LS Wedding Designs LTD are looking at pulling in other companies so we can offer a full service, and make the stresses of organizing your big day just a little bit smaller”
Fifteenhands festival is next week (I will be playing Friday 22nd 9pm) at The Thunderbolt in Bristol. If you would like to come and hear the newly arranged material performed with my awesome band then please come along. You will most definitely not regret it click on the flyer below to go to the event information.
Also Slicethepie have put up a little news item which you can see here:
http://www.slicethepie.com/About/NewsItem.aspx?NewsId=1078
11/04/11
Been editing ‘Secret’ today and scaled it down from about 4 1/2 mins to 3:14 which I think is good for a single and it did not take away anything important or make any awkward changes. Thanks to my friend Mark Ely for helping me see these changes needed to be made. The original length version will also be available but with this shorter one the music video will be easier; not having to find over a minute of visuals could save a shit load of time. The stems are now being sorted for Karl G’s benefit and the vocal is going to become available for some potential remixes which will be released alongside the single. Will be aiming to get at least 1 relatively big name to do one so it has a bit of clout. fingers crossed. I am particularly happy with the vocal so will be more than happy to pass it around.
Will be in the studio this weekend. Need to sort out accommodation for Sat night but shouldn’t be a problem. Looking fwd to a couple of days in that atmosphere and to getting 3 more tracks properly underway Other than that I have enjoyed the weather for the past 3 days with BBQ’s and sitting in the back garden – nice. Had my haircut today and I now look a little like a shorn sheep…
Just had an idea of doing a ‘COMING SOON‘ video for the single; a 15 – 20 second promo including a small section of the song as well as a montage of footage taken while recording. With this I may be able to drum up a little more interest from potential new fans and post it absolutley everywhere – you could help with this too.
Still needing some ideas for the music video so if you have any images that you think would help with inspiration or you would like to share any ideas you have then please do. You will get credit for your work and help towards the first of many projects I am eager to get you involved with.
Been passed this article by a friend (Jim Worley) via TWITTER (follow me) and will be looking to promote the shit out of the new recordings when they are done. It doesn’t feel worthwhile promoting the solo acoustic stuff for something like this as it probably wont get picked up… actually scratch that I’m gonna make my profile and get things rolling.
It also brought up the point of my PRS membership; when the site asked me for my PRS ID I had a little look through old emails and actually found it which is going to be handy at some point. royalty checks would be fucking awesome!! Imagine that
06/04/11
Morning world! I am now in first place on TalentWatch.net so thanks to those of you who have been rating my videos on there. If Talentwatch starts getting more attention then so should the artists and opportunities may arise for those who are in the top spots… happy days
I have written off to STP today to let them know of some news so hopefully there will be a news item up in the next few days. I will be recording demo versions of tracks today to then pass onto the band to add their parts just so we are prepared for next weekend at ‘The Studio’ currently looking for somewhere that myself and 5 others can sleep for the night in London. If you know of anyone or you own a hotel then please get in touch. The next 3 songs to be given the special treatment are How Things Change, Feel Any Feeling and Starlight. I’m very pleased about how those 3 in particular sounded live and in rehearsals last night. I think the rest of the band are equally as enthused about it all too.
I dreamt about jumping out of a plane last night and it felt great! I remember landing and thinking that I really wanted to do it again… I can’t frikkin wait til Aug 5th now… all I need in the meantime are a few more volunteers to jump out with me. Right better make a facebook event for the next Illusions open mic, get the home studio tidy again ready to use today and get on the phone to Pizza Hut delivery because I want a lot of fast food and I want it NOW!
Got 2 gigs booked today, one at Decades on May 1st and another on Weston’s Grand Pier 24th April so I hope to see some faces at those. Also uploaded a track to the Radio 1 talentsearch thing they are running, to be more precise my friend Tom Whitfield upoloaded it on my behalf and he seems to think it will be a good idea so I’m happy with that.
03/04/11
Well another session at ‘the studio’ has been booked for the 16th/17th April and we aim to get Starlight, How things Change and My Weakness recorded in that time. I am still looking to get some time with Tony (editing) Karl (production) Kate (photography) Handley (image/fashion) and come up with some good ideas for the music video for Secret. Tonight I will be at Illusions Magic Bar hosting this evenings open mic. The theme this time is Take That so have been learning a couple of their tunes in preparation.
The 2010 Footprint footage that was held at The London Inn on Dec 12th last year has finally been edited together so please take a look. We don’t spend money raised on fancy videos so the quality is not high but the point is to raise awareness between the musicans in the southwest that we are here to offer support to young talented musicans and that we like to showcase talent at our events.