Deep into the recording

Oay, so recording is going really well at the moment. I've got most of the tracks down for Stormbreaker, Batter Up, She, Does he listen, Sunny Side Up, Fallen Leaves and Starbucks (one you may not have heard). I need to record drums for a few tracks which is proving to be a bit of a problem as I've only got 2 microphones. Might need to book some studio time somewhere for that.. or obtain an 8 channel mixer and a set of drum mics!

The tracklisting is currently looking like this, although I think I may add one or two more depending on time (i want to have it finished by March)

Stormbreaker
She
Sunny Side Up
Fallen Leaves
Jimmy Choos
The Soldier
Batter Up
Louise
Does he Listen?
Starbucks

Jimmy choos is a bit of a pain in the arse to record, I can't get it to sound right. Don't know if it should be a full band performance or an acoustic song. neither sounds right at the moment. Louise is probably going to be the next track i get to work on. Need to put some nice organ on there, and build up the instrumentation at the end of the track. The soldier is shaping up to have lots of samples of strings on there, with snare rolls and just the acousitc and vocals. Some of the songs need a bit of editing to tighten them up too. Lots to do!!

In other news I've recorded a live demo of stormbreaker. Head on over to www.myspace.com/jealousofgirls to have a listen. I'm hoping to get some gigs on the back of recording this demo, as I haven't played in ages.

That's all for now!

Recording the new album

So, I finally started recording my album yesterday! It's taken half a year but I've finally managed to scrape the finances together to complete my home studio. My finished setup includes a drum kit, bass amp, guitar amp, macbook, mbox and pro tools, a C1000 microphone, and an SM57 microphone. All the basics for getting some recording done basically! I had a bit of a nightmare with the SM57.. I saved up for 3 months to buy it then ended up going cheap and buying a fake on Amazon. Disappointed, I returned it and bought a brand new one for £90. With all this in place I sat down yesterday and laid the guide acoustic tracks for Stormbreaker, She, Sunny side up, and Fallen Leaves. The ideas have started flowing and I've got a long road to travel before the album is complete!
Also, my writers block seems to have disappeared of late..I seem to be quite creative at the moment! :)

Pre Production

So.. i finally dragged my ass up into my studio tonight to demo my 'difficult second' album. I've got 10 tracks down so far and the ideas have started flooding in. I feel like im getting excited about these songs again and cant wait to lay them down properly. Think i'll go back in and demo the drums tomorrow. Initial thoughts from listening back to my songs makes me think that i need another chorus on the end of both fallen leaves and batter up.. and i need to remember how the horn part for the soldier went. argh! im gonna be busy with this over the next few months. im glad the excitement has come back. i may even start playing some open mics again!

Oh, the album will be called 'Strawberry Kisses' BTW :D

Night and Day Tonight

Hey guys, I've been given a last minute slot at the Night and Day Cafe tonight.. i'm onstage at 10pm. It's £3 if you mention you're there to see me. See you there!

Laziness.. again

Hey ho, in the middle of festival season at the mo so I've been way too busy having fun rather than concentrating on music! I've been off work for a while too with an eye injury relating to a thrown snowball back in February (thanks Phil). Currently looking at building a home studio - i've got the room, and the pro tools, just need some microphones, some sound prooding and to move my instruments in there. Then I should be able to start work on the long overdue album number 2!

The long search for a band still goes on - I jammed with a band last Tuesday - had real fun and we played a few of my songs but they havnt got back to me about joining, which is a shame as I thought we really clicked! Oh well, if anything its taught me that I really do want to get a group of musicians together to play my music with so the search will continue!

I think this may have been my first update without any pictures...

Caught in the tornado

Well I guess I better give you a quick update! Played a couple of great
sets at the Bearded Theroy festival. The second of which was ended
abruptly due to a tornado ripping through the tent I was playing in.
Panic ensued!

I got the first set on video so I'll try and get that
uploaded at some point. Music on the website should now all be working
as I've re-upped all the tracks from my first album. Next album: now
have a pro tools set up, a couple of mics and a mac so I'm expecting to
get down to some hardcore recording after the festival season.









Glastonbury next week, I'm going to try and get on the rabbit hole open
mic in the park. Watch twitter for an update! I'm playing at the Night
and Day again on Thursday 2nd July. Come along if you can make it! Flyer for cheap entry below :)

Being Broken Into Sucks!

I must admit I'm keeping up with my laziness on updating this blog! Its been a bit of a crap month actually - I had my house broken into and my laptop stolen, which included quite a lot of my music. Just waiting for the insurance company to pay out now. Not impress. They ended up getting away with a TV, PS3, laptop, mobile phone, ipod and some jewlrey. Grr. Luckily I backed up most of my hard drive in November so I've got most of my important files backed up :)Im pleased to find out the Castle hotel is going to re-open and focus on acoustic acts. They're even renovating the back room. Looking forward to playing there again once its all done up - heres hoping they renovate the toilets too! From memory they were quite disgusting! Theres more about that here http://www.manchesterconfidential.com/index.asp?Sessionx=IpqiNw86JDTqIaqiNwF6IHqi&realname=Castle_Hotel,_Oldham_Street_to_reopen
I found im definitely playing on the Campfire stage at this years Bearded Theory. Of all the festivals I've emailed about playing they're the only ones so far to give me a slot, which is quite dissapointing. Im thinking I havnt played nearly enough gigs recently so Im going to pull my finger out at the weekend and arrange some more local gigs and I might possibly start playing some open mics again this week.
On the website front I was less than impressed that my old hosting company decided to terminate my account just because they'd move over to a limited company and didn’t let me know I needed to give them my credit card details. Hence jealousofgirls.co.uk is now hosted by fasthosts who are giving me 2gb of webspace and unlimted bandwidth for £5 a month. I do need to re-upload Self Titled this evening, and I'm thinking of changing the website layout a little.. Laziness depending!
Oh, need to update my myspace at some point too!

Night and Day (again)

Well, I've just had a (non) eventfull week off work with a didgy eye due to a snowball being thrown full whack at my eye and scratching & bruising it. Cue a week of blurred vision and painfull eyetests. Its getting a lot better now, my vision is about 19/20 at present!

In music news - Havnt yet found out if im out of the running for the glasto comp. I guess no news is good news! I've emailed a bunchload of festivals to try and get on the bill, with little success! Most of them are wanting a full press pack which i dont have - which probably means im gouing to have to put one together at some point. it would be nice to get a few reviews to stick in there! Apparantly im on the bill for bearded theory but i havnt heard anything back from the organisers about it so i need to get back in touch with them. I think this years event is shaping up to be a lot bigger and better than last years - its getting shouts out on Radio1!

Starting to get ideas in my mind over the next album.. i really cant wait to get some good quality versions of my new songs - its a bit crappy having a myspace with sub-par versions of my songs. I want people to log on and like the music and crap versions of songs is really doing me no favours! Im in the dillema of should i upload my old songs which are good quality but not as good, or the new songs which are great songs but rubbish recordings?

Anyway onto the reason im blogging. Im playing another gig at the Night and Day in Manchester on Monday 2nd March. Print out the flyer for reduced entry. Hope to see you there!

Nottingham

Im in Nottingham at the moment with work, currently sat in Crox's studio watching his band rehearse. Played a couple of open mics in Nottingham this week which I really enjoyed. Played at the Golden Fleece on Monday night and the Runner on Tuesday night. The first night had some pretty appauling acts on to be honest, but the second night had some pretty talented guys playing so it made up for the night before.
Must get round to playing the Trof open mic in Manchester on Sunday when I get back. Its really got me int he mood for playing open mics again!

Glasto Unsigned Comp

I've just entered into the Glastonbury Unsigned Competition. Go check me out! http://tinyurl.com/8aaktr

Not entirely impressed that it wont let me edit the track names, so unfortunatly im being judged on 'sunny side up 4 track demo' and'back in love (range)'!!!

in other news the years starting off slowly - with lots of guitar hero being played! I should be getting a couple of days in a studio in Nottingham next week so Im either going to spend the time working on a single song, or just demo the album. Think it would be a good idea to do the latter but i could really do with a version of Sunny Side Up that i'm really happy with for demo purposes!

A great end to a pretty good year

Happy New Year!

2008 was a pretty decent year, hooked up with my girlfriend, went to loads of festivals and played some great gigs. The highlights being the open mic on the Leftfield stage at Glasto
9and my friends hearing me from outside the tent not knowing i was on) and last weeks gig at the Night and Day. Thanks all so much for coming along, it turned out to be a really good night, i brought more guests than all the other groups combined and earned myself £40 which isnt bad for a nights getting drunk. Need to ask them if i can play again sometime, hopefully in a better slot next time!



So to 2009! Im gonna enter the glasto unsigned competition again this year. Last time i entered a few crappy demos, so its no wonder i never got anywhere. This time im going to enter my 2 best tracks - probably Sunny Side up and back in Love. Although the competition always seems to me to be geared more towards bands who are already on the verge of being signed anyway.
Then its another case of trying to play as many gigs as possible! Think im going to record a new album this year. Its my intention to buy a Mac, pro tools and some decent microphones so the end product should hopefully end up sounding really good. I've got a crapload of songs demoed for it so im excited about actually getting down to recording them.

Which reminds me - I recorded a new version of Fallen Leaves. You can listen to it on my myspace Let me know what you think!!