The ramblings of an insomniac.

Hello fellow bloggerites, or bloggerions or whatever you want to be called,

This is a bit of a spur of the moment post, I'm lying in bed, which is apparently when my mind decides it's time to run wild and think about everything in the world. It's true I over-think things, so I thought I'd try writing down what I was thinking, while I was thinking it, and see what happens. Just for shits and giggles primarily.

I started off thinking about college, and  then wondered why the fuck I am there. A music degree, in my personal opinion, isn't worth the paper it's written on if you want to be a working musician and not a teacher. If I went into a bar asking for a gig there, they would ask for a CD, maybe an audition of some sort, and if I said "No, but you can have a copy of my BA certificate" they would most likely laugh in my face. The reason I want to study music, is to learn skills I can apply in every day life, and so far at Gateshead college, I have learned VERY little. I feel like Barcelona FC coming over to england to take on Willington FC, I'm being taught things I already know, and it's frustrating as shit.

So I thought to myself, what would I do if I wasn't in college? Maybe start my own company with little to no initial investment? Sign on to the dole because nowhere will give me a job? Up the ante on my gigs, and get sucked into the club singer route and end up dying an old man with a sparkly jacket and a fake tan, singing Sweet caroline for the Butlins masses? All of these ideas sound thick to me. But of course, this is all hypothetical.

Chances are I'll stay at Gateshead college, showing no enthusiasm for my work whatsoever, finish with a mediocre grade, and then end up taking one of the above routes anyway. Because let's face it, unless I hit it big and tour the world and what not, or become a wedding singer (shudder) I'm not going to make anywhere near enough money to support myself and my son. Maybe a change in career? But what? I can't do shit other than music. I could go work in a shop or something like that, but I feel like doing that is taking the easy route out and giving up on everything I have dreamed of... Platinum selling albums, selling out arena tours, Ryan Gosling playing me in the movie adaptation of my life. I really don't know what to do with myself, every idea opens so many new problems and opportunities.

The bottom line is it's a huge world out there, and the trick to succeeding is finding out exactly where you fit into it. Some people fit into the 9-5 role, some people fit into religion, some people fit into superstardom. And the only way I'm going to find out where I fit in this big fucked up world, is by having a look around it, maybe poking my head around some doors and asking questions.

Okay, so I've strayed away from my original thoughts pretty quickly, welcome to my mind. I over-think everything and when I get an idea as to where I want to go, I dismiss it and go back to square one. Who knows, maybe that's where I fit in? Maybe I'm destined to be that fat guy living in a council house, drinking cans of special brew in my overgrown garden and shouting at the neighbours kids. It's not what I want, but somebody has to fit there, don't they? Isn't society built on a ladder of classes? The council flat alcoholics leech off of the 9-5ers. The 9-5ers leech off of the business higher-ups. The business higher-ups leech off of the rich and famous. You get my point.

At the end of the day, I'm 20 years old, I (probably) have a lot of life left. And the question I have to ask myself is do I want to spend it surviving, or living?

So yeah, I hope you have enjoyed this tour of 5 minutes worth of thinking in my mind. Please be sure to take all personal belongings and exit to the left of the vehicle.

Gan canny lads and lasses.

(A very sleep deprived) Stephen.

PS. If you like this blog, please share it with your friends. Partly to inflate my ego, and partly so I can get a broader range of a opinions on everything. But mainly the ego thing.

Work in Progress update, and a diary of a sick night.

Okay lads and lasses, I’m going to do one of those boring blogs I tend to ignore on the internet. You know the type? The one’s that are something like “Today I went to the shop and I bought a mars bar and I ate it and it was nice”. I’m going to talk a little bit a bout Work In Progress, and a little bit about last nights relatively tame awesomeness.

Work in Progress; a work in progress. Part 1.

I suppose this is the first real log of how the EP is going, and for a lot of you, the first time you will have heard in any detail some of the shit I’m putting up with from this recording.
Basically, I am low on money as any student is, so I can’t afford to purchase Logic pro, meaning I’m trying to struggle through garage band (sigh). I have managed to get each track sounding how I want them to, the main problem is arising when I’m actually bouncing the tracks into an audio file format. The volume differs so much between different MP3s it physically angers me to the point of shouting things at my guitar, because that’s obviously where the blame lies.
I have asked people for help on this matter and the biggest answer I got was to re-record the quiet tracks at a louder volume, however doing this has helped less than Gazza with a fishing rod and a KFC bargain bucket.
I’m starting to think that recording in Garage Band is only ever going to end in tears, and that I might unfortunately have to postpone the EP release. I’ll keep you posted on any more details as they come to me.

A relatively sick night, bitches.

So last night, I decided to use my first saturday night off in a while productively, and go to the pub. After the ravaging Newcastle took at the hands of Fulham I think I needed a pint.
As always I asked a few of my mates to come out, and as always it ended up being me and Joe (who I’m sure will crop up in this blog several times).
The night started in spoons (obviously) where Joe started talking to someone he knew, I wasn’t informed at the time that this was his ex girlfriends uncle. If I had known this at the time, I would have taken every opportunity to make it as awkward as possible. Gutted, these are the chances you will never get twice. We digress...
My plan was, we would have a pint in each pub then move on, and see how much of Durham we could drink in. Moved on to The Angel, hellish pub, but didn’t stay any longer than we had to to finish the pint, even though there was a delightfully original band playing songs such as Sweet Child O Mine and Crazy Train, which I have never heard covered in a pub before... Pub count at 2 so far
Next to the Head of Steam for one of the most manky pints I have ever had the misfortune of tasting. In their defence, I did order carling, for what reason I couldn’t tell you, probably because I’m a cheap fucker. We also got raped by the quiz machine, seriously, if you have a music question on one of these things, do NOT turn to me for help. I may be a music student, and music fan, but that doesn’t mean I know who was married to the manager of Bucks Fizz. That pushes the pub count up to 3.
Where next but Fabios? It’s always Fabios, ALWAYS. However this is where Joe met his ‘stalker’ (to use his wording) from a couple of weeks earlier, she was a lovely lass, the only question is what she saw in that little dickhead. Two drinks in here so Joe could get to know his future wife and mother of his little gay children. Pub count at 4.

Next to Lloyds, which I always begrudge paying £3 into. It’s a Wetherspoons, stop being a divvy man! Two drinks and a shot of something that made my soul weep and forfeit, still not entirely sure what it was. Chilled in here a bit then sodded off in a truly legendary manner to truly legendary places. End of the pub crawl
This brought the final bro-tastic pub total to a pathetic 5. I’m pretty sure an 8 year old with no limbs could score better than that. Next time I’m heading for double figures, just you wait and see.

I still feel the hangover I am nursing at the moment was well earned though even though I didn’t drink too much. Aerosmith is curing this bad boy, got a twinkie that was brought back for me from America sat next to me staring me too, but it’s been on the side all night and I don’t know if it should have been in the fridge, so I think I’ll stay clear for fear of my insides exploding or my stomach sprouting a life form like that scene in Alien.

Hello to all of the new people I met last night too, you’re probably all dickheads, I’m not friends with nice people, it’s boring. Especially this bloke from Devon at the cashpoint who Joe was trying to get stuck into. What a dick, not in a good way.

So yeah, just a diary for the internet really. Next time I’m going to talk about something serious and thought provoking again don’t worry, but you’ll get this every now and then, and do you know why?

Because I’m awesome.

Gan canny everybody.

Stephen.

5 little facts about musicians.

Why hello there,

I suppose this is my first ‘proper’ blog post, doesn’t that give you a warm tingly feeling inside? You’re reading a part of history, you’re welcome.

I thought I would start by dispelling a lot of myths about singer songwriters, and musicians in general which have been created by films, the media, and that phrase ‘overnight success’, that’s bollocks.

1. We don’t get all the girls.
This is probably the oldest stereotype in the book, and unless there is just something inherently unattractive about my performances, I find it to be almost 100% bullshit.
Let’s create a situation for any ladies reading;
You are sat in a bar with your friends. A guy walks up to you with sweat dripping down his face, making his hair look like something a cat spat up in the process. This guy proceeds to sing Enrique Iglesias’ Hero to you with an undeniably good voice. Would the power of his beautiful voice be enough to make you look past the sweaty mess which is the rest of his person? The answer is most likely no, if the answer is yes, then by all means, give me a call.

Also, I can't speak from a girls point of view here, because of my distinct lack of a vagina and breasts.

2. We don’t appreciate being payed with beer.

Okay, don’t get me wrong, I love a nice pint just as much (if not more) than the next guy, but you wouldn’t see this as acceptable in any other profession. Let’s say you’re a car salesman (or woman) and you sell a shit load of motors one month, you would expect a decent paycheque right? You would not be happy if your boss said something like “You’re fine with being payed with a few bottles right?”. No, you would stand up and say “SHUT YOUR SHIT!”, admittedly maybe not in those exact words but you see my point. Any bar owners/landlords out there thinking it’s okay to pay musicians with alcohol, have a word with yourself, give your head a wobble and give them a decent amount of pay, it’s not   easy work. Which brings me nicely onto my next point.

3. For a lot of us, this IS our real job.

If I had a quid for every time I heard someone say “You should get a proper job” I would ironically never have to work again. Just because you see musicians on the telly making millions from touring, or putting out a new album every couple of years, doesn’t mean we all live like that. For the vast majority of us, it’s playing gigs every weekend for 2 hours a night, plus set up and pack down times, plus driving time, plus time spent booking gigs, plus time spent preparing our set lists and practicing them to perfection. I could go on but I’m sure you get it. Let’s take me for example; I make on average about £120 per covers gig which consists of two 45 minute sets either side of a 15 minute break. I know this sounds brilliant, but first consider this; £20 can be taken off straight away for petrol money, sometimes more depending on the distance. Also there is occasionally money to be subtracted to go to a promoter, which is normally about 20% (if you’re lucky and find a promoter who won’t rob you blind). Now, like I said I play two 45 minute sets with a 15 minute break, then let’s add on 30 minutes to set up/take down all of my PA system, an average hour and a half driving for the whole night, and also however much time is spent booking the gig. This works out around 4-5 hours, which gives me about £20 an hour (if we aren’t counting all of the time spent learning a setlist and keeping it up to date, also any extra playing time for an encore). Still sounds good right? But you have to remember this isn’t a consistent paycheque, gigs come and go when they please, I can often go weeks without a gig and make no money.
So I know on the surface it seems like easy work, but it’s very tiring, and yes we do it for our love of music, but we also do it for our love of food, shelter, and others things which require money. I’m extremely fortunate in that I have my dad to help me out with booking gigs and things such as that, but a lot of musicians don’t have that kind of support, so the next time you think about telling one of us to get a proper job, think about all of the work that goes into what we do.

Wow, that one got quite wordy...

4. We don’t all want to go on the bloody X Factor.
I must get this at every gig I play. Someone will come up to me and say something like “You’re really good, you should try for the X Factor.” or “Have you ever thought of going on Britain’s Got Talent?”. Now I’d be a liar if I were to say I hadn’t considered it, and I actually went as far as to audition for a TV talent show on Sky one called Must be the music, however I didn’t get past the first audition stage. I really do think everybody interested in a career in music should at least consider this route, it isn’t for everybody, but there are people it will work for, and you would be a fool to overlook it by sitting up on your high horse and saying it’s destroying the music industry. I must admit, this isn’t the route for me, I tried it once and it didn’t feel natural even when I was sat in the waiting room. But if it is something you want to do, go ahead and do it, it’s your life. Just don’t come up to me in a pub and tell me to do it, because I WILL tell you to shut up.

5. There is no quick route to success.

Myspace. Youtube. X Factor. The media have pushed the idea that people have become overnight successes using these things. With the possible exception of The X Factor, this is pretty much complete rubbish. I have been on myspace and youtube for years now and I get little to no interest in my songs/videos. I would love to know how people get millions of video hits, but the most I seem to manage is a couple thousand if I’m extremely lucky. Most of the time I barely hit 100. It’s a common misjudgement when people say the internet has made it easier for musicians, or any other form of artist to be recognised. Unless you’re gimmicky like Justin Bieber for being so young, (I may post a seperate blog about this little div at some point.) you don’t really have much of a chance. In my opinion it has made it a lot harder, there are now millions of other people to compete with, and people are very set in their ways a lot of the time. For instance, if someone finds a band they like on youtube, they may keep listening to that band for quite a while, making it more difficult for other artists to even get a look in. This is just my opinion and I’m sure some people will disagree, and I would love to hear all of your opinions on this.

So yeah, that’s all for now, I may add a couple more to this list at some point, but for now I’ll leave it at five. I have an obsession with multiples of five, so if I got to 7 or 8, I would probably have to get ride of any above 5, just thought you should know.

I’ll be back soon to deliver more ramblings to your interwebs.

Gan canny.

Stephen.

Welcome to my sexy new born blog.

Hello,
I'm Stephen Wilson, I'm a singer songwriter living and working in County Durham in north east England.
I thought I would start a blog as  I have a lot to say, and sometimes 140 characters just isn't enough.
Basically, this first post will just be me introducing myself and trying to get used to the whole blogging thing.

Here comes the big stupid list of things I am/have/do...

So yeah, I'm 20 years old living in a town(/shithole) called Willington. I have a 2 year old son named Isaac Joseph Towers who I'm sure will feature in these posts from time to time, as I love him more than life itself. I am a musician, (if you couldn't guess that from the title of this blog then please leave now) I'm studying music at Gateshead College/Northumbria University and I sing, play guitar, bass, ukulele, and have recently taken up mandolin. I'm recording my debut solo EP which will be called work in progress and you can see the cover art from it to the left of this text. I'm also a huge movie buff, I've lost count of how many DVD's I own, and yes, I have watched them all. Last but not least, I am a football fanatic (soccer for you americans who decided to adopt football as a name for your sport which uses mainly hands) and I support Newcastle United Football Club, and always have. Coming for Europe! TOON TOON!

Now, for the important bit; what you can expect to hear me ramble on about in a blog.

I'll let you all know how frustrating it truly is being an artist and trying to get your work recognised by anybody who isn't related to you. I'll try and offer any advice where I can, and I would gladly take some advice if you have any to give.
I'll probably let you know any good and bad experiences I have while at a gig, and I'll keep you all up to date on the creation of the EP, which is proving much more problematic that I originally thought!
Occasionally, I'll talk about films, my crazy nights out, sports, or maybe just life in general (which is also proving to be much more problematic that I originally thought.).

Okay, this was only meant to be a short post, and it's gotten a bit wordy so I'll sod off for now. But I'll be back shortly to explain more of my inner workings!

Until then, gan canny!

That means take care for all of you not familiar with the geordie dialect...

Stephen.