Christmas Time in Coven: 18/12/2012

It's Christmas Time...

Hi there, it's been a long while! I wanted to talk to you today about a gig I did last week, again for mygood friend Sam Draisey. See, I've been involved again in the production of this year's Christmas Album, and what with Sam promoting it at his open mic at the Rainbow Inn in Coven and I wanted to go and support it myself, by playing my song and generally contributing to the night. As it was over 3 months since my last performance, I was coming at this one with a little trepidation. However, given my track record, this was probably to do with the fact that I hadn't practiced enough; something I avoided mentioning on the night simply because having to apologise for the way you're playing your songs - particularly your own - gets old and lame after the third or fourth time you've heard it. This is pretty much the only gig I've ever done where I've read the majority of my set from a music stand, a fact I'm not particularly proud of but I guess a lot of people do it. So here's what happened:

I opened up with Once In Royal David's City. This is a song I don't remember singing since I was in primary school, singing Christmas Carols off the same tatty carol sheets they used to hand out every year. My last Christmas there was 1996 so I doubt they survive now, and I don't usually go in churches or anything like that so I have no occasion to sing those songs any more. Which is a shame, 'cause I kind of miss doing it. I sang the first verse unaccompanied, and then brought in the guitar after; I had a capo on the 1st fret and played it in E flat so my voice was just about high enough to hit the top notes. The guitar could have done with a bit more rehearsal; the accompaniment for that song was originally done on piano or organ, and while translating it note for note onto guitar is all but impossible, I should at least have paid more attention to the unusual timing of the chord changes, but I managed without any monumental disasters so that was OK.

I then sang what I'm tentatively calling my classic: The First Footprint. This one will always be special to me because it proves a point that I've long tried to stick to while writing songs - write about what you know. This came from Adam Levine from Maroon 5, if you want to know. It was nice to sing it again and since a lot of the people there had heard it there was a nice sense of familiarity about it. It's something of a running joke that I can't seem to play it live without forgetting the words at some point, and tonight was no exception, although at least this time it happened between verses.

After that, I played my contribution to this year's Christmas Album, which funnily enough is called Next Year. I wrote it as a sort of sequel to All I Want For Christmas Is You, relating it to my current situation with Amy, where we're looking forward to moving in together but until then the distance between us pretty much forces us to spend Christmas apart. There was no small amount of Feeder in the melody and chord progressions, but you know what, they're my favourite band so that's inevitable. It went OK, Sam likes the song and I can see myself playing that in years to come which can be no bad thing.

I wrapped it up with another Christmas Carol Silent Night. This is one that's always been a staple Christmas song and there have been some appalling versions of it recorded in the past, so I really tried to capture the essence of what I feel the song is about. When I try to describe it, words escape me, but it is a beautiful song and I think I compensated for the fact that I find it hard to hit the high notes while singing quietly well.

So, not a bad night at all, I was very pleased with how it went.

Have I put a date on returning to gigging yet?

Well, I have and I haven't. To a certain extent it's going to depend on whether or not I'm still in the Midlands by the time I get back into it. If I'm not then I'll be far too busy trying to sort myself out to worry too much about gigging. But I'm looking at maybe April for what I'm pretentiously calling a 'Comeback.' That will mean I've had a year out and hopefully will have achieved what I wanted to achieve from taking it out in the first place.

Time will tell, but until then, see you all soon...

Heading for the End part 1: A Stormy Misdirection at the Hartley Arms. 23/4/2012

Hi there.

Not done a blog in a while; I'm afraid being obliged to write down the details of every single show I do can feel a little overwhelming at times, and I don't always get time to do it. I did a gig at Four Ashes a couple of weeks ago for example, and headed down to Amy's straight after. While it would not be literally true that I didn't have time to write a blog while I was there, she certainly wouldn't have thanked me for it. Which is a shame because that show influenced a lot of what it coming here:

I'm going to be taking an indefinite break from playing live. I can think of a few reasons for it but they basically come down to the fact that I've had enough. I gigged every week all of last year, and I've not done much less than that this year so far. Some shows I've enjoyed more than others, and what I've got out of it is refining my set to the point where I can put on a far more convincing show than I ever could before.

What else does that get me? Not a fat lot. I have very rarely been paid for playing a solo gig, (thanks to Sam Draisey for being the only one who has so far,) I couldn't sell a CD to my own mother (she's heard it all!) and usually the only way I can get anybody to come to a gig is if I drive them there myself.

Now I know that perhaps I should be doing more to change that. Burning off some CDs would be a nice start; getting a proper Facebook page, really promoting those gigs, get a decent contract on my phone so I can actually afford to send mass texts to people who might want to come. But the way it's been going so far hasn't put me in particularly high spirits and offering much incentive for me to do that. Plus I've been doing a lot of other stuff as well; I'm more in to my games now than ever before and it's taking up a lot of my time, and in many cases proving a lot more enjoyable. I think I need a few months off, give me some time to miss gigging and actually want to get back to it, during which I need the following things to happen:

• Get a proper Facebook music page
• Get a Twitter account to use with the Music page,
• Get some CDs printed off properly with a cover and everything
• Sort my PRS stuff out - I'm nearly there, I just need my birth certificate
• Write some new songs. Seriously, I've been playing most of the regulars for nearly two years now, and apart from the new one that I wrote at the Robin 2 that I've completely forgotten the name of, my most recent one is A Lonely Night and that's about 8 months.
• Get some sort of mailing list system going when I'm doing gigs so I can actually keep in contact with the people I talk to. Fair enough by now that would be some 20 people but it's 20 people I don't have now.

Now in true Matt style ducking out for a few months is out of bitterness, spite and disillusionment with music and its current state, and we'll find out if it's all worth it or whether I've been shooting myself in the foot when I come back to potentially find that all my old contacts and venues have moved on and I'll have to start all over again. Then again, that won't necessarily be a bad thing...

I'll pick this up another time, it's probably about now that I should talk about the gig I'm posting this blog for in the first place...

Ok given all this recent development I wasn't intending on being any good tonight, thankfully it was at  at the Hartley Arms and in the company of Sam and his friends with whom I enjoy a friendly familiarity to the point where I could get away with it. The first song I did was Fall Back Down by Rancid. I've know the song vaguely for a while, the chords are easy enough. I've only got a basic grasp of the words, but then listening to the record I'm not conviced Tim Armstrong knows it all that well either... Sam recognised it and everybody else seemed to enjoy it so there are worse songs to play!

I then played something I'd barely played before in my life and was a bit risque, Dark Heart Silhouette by Vendetta Red, who I'll happily tell anyone who'll listen that they are the best band you've never heard. That's probably the most offence I've ever caused in one song, with the lyric 'And I watched him take her, beat her and rape her, and he said if you tell anyone I'll have God kill your Mommy...' so I need to be careful where I'm playing that! It seemed to go down OK but no one really knows the band so I was playing it to enterain myself as much as anybody else.

Feeling that I should probably get some of my own material in there I decided to play Bitterness. It went down reasonably well athough I was at that point suffering from the coke and pizza I'd had earlier, and singing so hard I felt like I was going to be sick. I don't know what was worse, that or telling everybody about it afterwards.

I finished up with a false start - and subsequent retry - of Storm from the North. Once I'd got it, it was fine, though I shouldn't let that happen a great many times. Only last Friday I managed to get the giggles half way into it. I was conscious of the fact that Sam was filming this one and I wanted to give as good a performance as I can. If what Sam filmed comes out barely passable, I'll put it on the blog and see where it goes from there.

So I probably won't be at the Hartley Arms again too soon. I might go to the Robin when Sam puts it on but Wheaton Aston is a little far for me to go just to watch. Still, it's been good to me and has given me a nice platform to spring some new material from so I'm grateful for that!

Might see you Thursday, might see you Sunday...