May 2015: Gigs with the Revisted, Singing Improvements and a Ukulele...

May was a busy – and as it turns out rather affluent – month for me in terms of gigs and music. Here’s how it all went down:

As I mentioned last month, I did a couple of gigs with The Revisited Covers Band while they look for a new permanent bass player. We played shows in the Rock and Fountain in Shrewsbury, and The Western in Leicester. They were good gigs and we were reasonably well-received, however I don’t enjoy playing in covers bands enough to want to commit to The Revisited on a mid-long term basis. It was fine with NQA as we’re all friends anyway, but with the Revisited, I barely know them; it’s a lot of the same covers I played with the previous band, and many more songs that I haven’t got enough investment in to want to commit to learning. I’ll be available as dep bass player if they need me, if not, it was a reasonable way of getting some gigs, so thanks to the band for the opportunity.

I've actually been forgetting to do this a lot just lately,
here's my #viewfromthestage at the Newhampton
Inn earlier in the month.

I am aware that I’m shooting myself in the foot a little bit here because it sounds like covers bands aren’t really my thing, which is true. I’m at the point now where I need something else to keep me engaged. As I mentioned in the previous paragraph, I was friends with the lads in NQA anyway, and there was a certain amount of fun and regularity with the gigs that made me want to stay with the band long after we’ve essentially stopped being one. And as I talked about last month, there is a certain creative element in The Fakes where we have to work the songs we play around our own limitations of gear and musicianship in order to play the songs we want to play; jamming those songs is actually really good fun. So, as long as there is something else going on to keep me engaged, I don’t mind being in covers bands – but I wouldn’t want to be in one for its own sake.

I also mentioned last month that I was doing a gig with Ellie Hawthorne. It was in the interlude of a quiz night and it went reasonably well, if a little rushed in terms of setting up. However, it did give me an insight into how well my voice has improved over the last year. We played I See The Light, which if you remember was the song that inspired me to pick up the singing lessons in the first place. And I was hitting all the high notes with little to no strain on my voice. I was up to a high G at one point; I’d never have been able to do that at this time last year. So, thanks to Ellie for inspiring me to take up the lessons, and thanks to Vie for teaching me. It’s working!

I’ve also started to play the Ukulele…

Now, I’m not fond of the Ukulele sound at all. I prefer deep and powerful sounds to high scratchy ones; probably one of the reasons I developed an intense dislike of indie music circa last decade. However, I attended a staff meeting with DPA at the early part of the month, where we were joined by our colleagues from Sandwell, Walsall and Wolverhampton, and there was a representative from Birmingham there as well. During the day, data on the popularity of the instrument was brought to our attention, and I’m pretty sure all the other music services are running Uke groups. When I found out later in the month that a student that I will hopefully be taking on next year wants to play Ukulele, I decided that DPA can ill afford to ignore the demand and bought a Ukulele from Stourbridge. I will teach myself to play it over the summer, and hopefully teach others to play it when I return to work in September.

However, I did find myself thinking that now that I have a Ukulele, what if I did like it? What would that sound like? So that’s something I’m going to develop over the next few months.

See you all again in July!

December: NQA Gigs, Big Band Bass Playing, and Soundcloud

It’s been a busy month for me!

My #viewfromthestage at the Olde White Rose in Bilston.
That was a good night!

I’ve been gigging almost every weekend with No Questions Asked, and I’m actually getting a lot tighter on the bass now. I was always good at it – I think I’ve said it before, but I’ve got a natural affinity with bass that I just don’t have with guitar – but now that I’m practising and playing on a regular basis, I’m feeling the improvement my skill level. That can only be a good thing! I’ve also been working on my slap bass technique. Not for any particular reason, as there’s not much call for it in NQA, but it does seem mandatory to be able to do it and it sounds awesome, so I thought I might as well give it a try. I’ve actually been doing it a lot on the acoustic guitar as well, so a lot of the technique was there – I just needed to do it on the heavier strings and wider frets.

With regard to the band, we’re making progress as a unit, and we’ve got gigs booked to next December. It’s encouraging to see the places re-booking us; it’s always appreciated. We’ve not had any rehearsals this month so there’s no new songs on the list yet, but we’ll see what happens next month. After a tough month of gigging, I think certain members of the band were rather looking forward to a break!

One of the things I was involved with in DPA this Christmas was a rare staff concert. It came about because the roof of Dudley Town Hall had fallen in meaning we had to re-locate the Christmas concerts to two different areas, and was a joint concert between the staff and the choirs of six different schools. Del, Russ, Kelly and I were providing the rhythm section for both; I was on bass guitar.

It was a good experience for me because it reminded me of two things: First, I’m quite good at sight reading, and Chris was very complimentary to me about that. And second, cutting my bass-playing teeth in the Ounsdale High School Jazz Band was a great experience that I appreciated at the time and appreciate even more now. The ‘Staff Concert’ section of the performance was a lot of swing/big band songs, and much of it was in the keys of E flat, B flat and A flat. These keys, as I understand it, are fine for brass and wind instruments, but they’re not very friendly for stringed instruments like guitars because the open strings are no longer fair game. Nonetheless, I’d had a lot of experience playing in those keys in the jazz band, so they don’t frighten me. Nearly 10 years since I last played with them, it all came back to me for this staff concert; I won’t pretend there weren’t mistakes, but I did a good job, I think. Apart from anything else, I was really enjoying playing the big band material; I could get in to that!

In other news, I’m now on Soundcloud! I put together the account purely for the purposes of being able to upload my Christmas song to it so I could share it on I think Monday 5^th, and having done this I thought I might as well upload some other recordings. I’ve put my entire Bitterness EP on there, which is a little after the fact as those songs were recorded over three years ago. But it’s all I’ve got that remotely resembles a professional recording, so there you go! Here’s the link to my profile, give them all a listen and tell me what you think: https://soundcloud.com/matt486

And incidentally, the photograph that I used was a bit of a funny choice but it’s the only picture I have near that time that doesn’t make me look like I don’t quite know where I am. It was taken at the Varsity in the Summer of 2010 when I was a little thinner than I am now, and I think the image came from a video John Gordon took of me playing Walking On The Sun by Smash Mouth.

 

We’ll see what happens in the New Year. See you then!

September: Social Media, and Depping in NQA

Back again! As blogging can be more work than fun if I try to do too much of it, I’m trying to limit my posts to 700 words or thereabouts. Thinking about it, I’m not convinced people would want to read much more than that in one sitting anyway…

 

September was a little quiet for me on the gigs front. I did a couple of Sam Draisey’s open mics, which went reasonably well and I’m becoming very fond of The Rainbow Inn as a place to play. I also did a short set at Codfest on their Open Mic stage; this didn’t go too well, largely due to me forgetting my capo and my hands being freezing cold. I’ve added Wetsuit by The Vaccines to my repertoire of acoustic songs; it’s a challenge for me to sing but I’m getting used to it.

However, two major things happened in September that I want to tell you about:

The first is that I’m now doing a run of dep gigs for the band No Questions Asked that’s going to take me up until the end of the year. Dave from the band asked me to come and play bass for an ‘audition’ for the singer they’re currently using, Mike. I knew Dave at school and we’ve kept in semi-regular contact since, mainly at jam nights he helps to run, some of which I’ve played bass at. Though it rarely takes me long to learn simple songs for my acoustic set, I’ve got an affinity with bass that I just don’t have with guitar; I can watch what Luke on guitar is doing to know what notes to play, and sometimes even the keyboards as well. I can lock in to Fred’s drums and keep the rhythm going, and provided I’m not concentrating too hard, I can put on a show with it as well.

The upshot is that Dave seemed really pleased with what I was bringing to the band, as I played all the songs he’d asked me to do and many more besides, and Mike was pro-active in establishing his involvement with them. Dave asked me to play the gigs they’ve got booked up to the end of the year, and as I can play all but three of them, that is what I’m going to be doing for most of the weekends between now and then! I’m not a permanent member of the band yet; I’m going to see how it pans out over the next few months and how much investment I have in the band before I commit to it entirely.

At the time of writing I’ve done my first gig with them and it went quite well. Watch this space for more!

The second thing is that because of some of the training I’m getting working for DY3 Solutions, I’m now making a much more structured use of social media. I now have a dedicated Facebook page for my music: https://www.facebook.com/mattdoonermusic and I’ve been making much more use of my Twitter page as well. I’m advertising the gigs on there, trying to pace out my content and keep people engaged with what I’m doing musically. This is where all my regular updates will be posted. I know it is a folly for musicians to rely on social media entirely – but when it can be done from the comfort of my bedroom, it shouldn’t be ignored.

The Rainbow Inn, Coven: 24/9/2014. There's Sam and Kayla.

As a part of this, I’ve also started making use of the hash tag function on both, uploading pictures I’ve taken from the stage. I’m hoping people will find these photos, tag themselves in them if they were there, comment on them if they weren’t, and generally increase the level of engagement when I’m not actually doing gigs – which as this is at the very most a few hours a week, is actually not that much. So, watch out for the #viewfromthestage tag – if you were at one of my gigs, chances are you were in one of the photos too!

Some big news coming up for next month, but I’d like to see how that pans out before I announce it. I’ll try and get these blogs out on the first weekend of the month after the one I’m taking about, if that makes any sense.

See you at the next gig!

Matt

What's the Story at the Blue Brick? 2/7/2013

As promised, I played the Jam Nite at the Blue Brick on Tuesday Night...

My set list was much the same as ever it is these days, however there were a couple of things worth talking up. First, right before I went on I went on with the band to play Summer of '69 on bass, something I don't think I've done since the Jack's Legacy days. It has been a while since I've picked up a bass guitar, my own having been in its case basically since Aki Maera called it a day, but I have a kind of affinity with it and I remembered the song pretty well. Thanks for letting me play with you guys!

Then when I went on, my set list was:

The Boys of Summer
Zephyr Song
Bitterness
Never Forget You
Morning Glory.

I think with Boys of Summer the first few minutes may not have come across all that well because of some sound balancing issues that it took a change of microphone to sort out. I really should try putting that later on in the set, or last, as that has a bigger impact I think and I don't want it to be blunted by sound issues.

Bitterness was unplanned; I made a joke about forgetting my capo and somebody lent me one! That was very kind of them, I'd have done Storm from the North otherwise, but I was hardly going to say no once they'd lent it to me. Perhaps unsurprisingly, it was this song I enjoyed playing most tonight.

Morning Glory was something of an encore, and my old friend Rich Sadler got up and sang the chorus with me and played tambourine. Rich has developed quite a powerful voice over the years and it was cutting right over my gravelly tones; a bit of light and shade never hurt anyone! I enjoyed playing the song and it was great to get a guest musician up with me.

A very good night in all, and it had a lot of support from a local following that Dave and Rich have obviously worked very hard to nurture. They're doing it on the first Tuesday of every month so it would be worth popping down, especially if you like playing blues-rock, they love it!

Tomorrow I'm playing St Mary's school in Brierley Hill for the Insight group, I'll be on at roughly 12:30 if anyone wants to come and have a look. It will be mostly, if not all, covers; as it's a summer fayre it would probably be better to mind my Ps and Qs, so don't be expecting Bitterness, and I certainly won't be playing A Lonely Night, otherwise it will be a lonely car journey home.

See what I did there...