There are two sides to my interest in music - playing
performing, and listening to music
Interests: Performing.
I have been playing one musical instrument or another almost non-stop since
I was four, so music comes fairly high on the list.With respect to playing, my
first instrument was the violin, which I played until I was eleven, by which time
I realised exactly how interested in continuing with it I was. It wasn't all bad,
just 90% of it; the orchestra gigs were cool, but the soloing was crap. During
secondary school I briefly flirted with the piano before settling on the one true
instrument for playing "the one true music".Having learned
the rudiments of the various styles of said music I was determined to branch out.
I helped form a rock band which had limited success (due to the tendency of the
other members to argue over the name) and then with a close friend of mine formed
a short lived soul band of immeasurable quality. This twelve-piece played a few
short sets of classic numbers by the likes of Otis Redding, Aretha Franklin, James
Brown and others, before splitting due to the pressures of A-level studies. The
next band I joined was the once great Bristol pub band
Aliens Exist. We persevered with this band, which
was actually quite good, but my interests didn't remain with the jazz-punk ethic
of Tom the main songwriter, so he closed the band down with the intent of moving
towards a more rock based setup. Meanwhile Alex the bassist and myself were busy
acquiring equipment for the new project - the Holy Church
of Jazz (Foundation).
Interests:
Listening
I listen to and enjoy many types of music - from blues to jazz, from rock to metal,
from dance to dub. As you may have read I have played in few bands, and have very
recently started a deep dub/dance band with a couple of friends of mine. It is
all very amateurish of course (Alex is still doing A levels) and purely experimental,
but it will certainly be interesting to see and hear how it comes out. Some bands/artists
I actually like:
Massive Attack
Portishead
Tricky
Suicidal Tendencies
Donald Fagen
Herbie Hancock (Mwandishi)
Tales From The Woodshed
G Love and Special Sauce
And many others. So there you go: a brief history of my interest in music,
complete with music tastes as of 29/6/95. Can't say fairer than that.Oh. You
want more, eh? How about a summary of recent gigs I've
been to? And the venues? Beers?
Pizzas? What do you want? Tell me, by email.