But I believe many musicians, sometimes myself included, don’t recognise this. We name excuses but ignore that back of these lie fear.

News Flash: Musician’s Worst Nightmare Comes True - Life Happens

Many musicians want to become musicians to avoid reality. In the end though, reality has a habit of catching up to all of us.

For example, one sunny day you may wake up to find that you have suddenly morphed into a parent and are faced with a very real requirement from society - not to mention your little angel - to be RESPONSIBLE (Gasp! The Horror!).

Suddenly you simply cannot work 3 days a week in cafe for beer and rent money, using the rest of your time to jam and record.

Suddenly you just can’t get up and go on an underfunded tour of coastal cafes to build a following, knowing that you’ll get home hundreds of dollars poorer, not richer.

Suddenly you can’t sleep in until noon, jam all arvo, then go out and network with other bands? Why? Because little diddums gets you up at 6:30am, needs breakfast, entertaining, lunch, a nap, more entertaining, dinner, a bath, a night time routine so they’ll actually got to bed nicely (hopefully). Meanwhile someone also has to bring in some dosh to pay for those meals, those pyjamas, that hot water. And then you’ll need to go to bed before midnight because sure as the sun will rise, that kid’s gonna wake up with it.

HOWEVER!

This DOES NOT mean that you are trapped! It does not mean that you have no recourse!

You Are Not Trapped - You Are Just Letting Fear Fuck With You

There are still many options - it just means you have to be organised. It means you have to be creative and (if you’ll forgive the cliche) think outside of the box. There are many ways and means for you to get out there and make your music.

For example …

Worldwide music distribution - from the couch!

There is so much more to the internet for musicians than Facebook and Myspace.

For example, I recently set this online music distribution point up while I was sitting on the couch at night while watching TV and resting after a busy day playing Dad.

Here is a list of just a few other places I found - in five minutes of searching - to distribute your music online:

http://www.tuneshout.com/
http://www.muzic.com/
http://bandzoogle.com
http://bandcamp.com
http://www.musojam.com/content/index.php
http://www.whotune.com
http://www.unsigned.com/
http://www.broadjam.com

Now I don’t know much about most of these sites yet, but given that this is a minute sample, it is obvious that there are very few excuses for not getting your tunes out there.

Of course, just getting people downloading your free Mp3s isn’t going to solve all of your problems, but it is just one way to help you:

A) Get Satisfaction

Since setting up Seamus.bandcamp.com the other day, just under 300 hundred people have listened to my music there (or via embedded music players placed on other web pages, like this:

which bandcamp makes easy to do). And many of those people also downloaded the album. I didn’t make a penny but Jeez it feels better than looking a box of CDs growing dusty under the bed - huh?

B) Start Making Progress

“A journey of a thousand miles starts with a single step” and other corny - but true - cliches.

I know now that if I had spent the last 15 years slowly getting one thing at a time done, step by step, I’d be a wealthy man by now, but instead I was always looking for the short cut. Unfortunately, I know now, THERE IS NO SHORT CUT. Not one that you can deliberately take anyway.

This doesn’t mean you can’t work smart instead of hard but nevertheless, you’ll need to work and it will always take more time than you want it to.

Take the long way, it’s the only way available.

Ok - enough jibber jabber for now. My point is that we all have the chance to shine our light - no matter what the circumstances of our lives.

Back soon with more on this topic.
Click here to listen and/or download my music FREE (or pay what you feel).

Why am I SHOUTING?

Because I am excited about bandcamp.com that’s why!

I intend now to release all of the reckoning recordings in the same fashion, as well as all of my other back catalog (solo recordings, Quill, and more).

The new music marketing dilemma

Awesome. It’s an exciting time to be a musician.

When I was twenty, the problem was “how can we distribute our music out there into the big wide world?” the answer was that we couldn’t really, not without a record company.

Now I can beam my tunes out to the world in my pajamas from my couch, but the problem now is - how do you get anyone to care?

More on that soon …

So relax, will ya?

How I Made It As A Musician

I was sitting out in the sun a year or so ago (maybe two) and I suddenly thought to myself - what’s the hurry?

Hey, the sun will do that to you right?

But truly what is the hurry? What’s the big internal hurry to “make it” as a musician?

Suddenly I realised that I was here already. That I had “made it” already, so this means I have permission to just relax and enjoy being a musician just because I am one.

Just like Bob Dylan can. Or whoever your hero is.

Relax and Make Music As You Feel Like Doing It

Last summer I got really busy, played a bunch of gigs and met all kindsof new people. It was the most fertile music summer I have had in ages. Then winter hit and I retreated.

And it felt right.

Now spring is here and I am gearing up again to make some more music, do some more gigs.

And after a head-down-bums-up winter of hard work I have a new recording that I wannna get made and another year’s life experience under my belt (that just makes my music even tastier) and I feel even more Zen about it all than ever.

But not that bullshit zen attitude that I superimposed on my musicianship back in my late twenties. Back then I was flopping around, slacking off saying “hey man, every thing is nothing, I got no agenda” but really I was burning up because even though I was gigging all the time, I wasn’t living up to the defunct musician model in my brain.

So I had serious dissonance, discord, disturbance.

Now I know I am playing a kind of music that I will play all my life and then I will die. And that’s cool with me. there’s no permanence. Even the Beatles and Elvis will be forgotten one day (read some Asimov to give you that sense of perspective).

So all that matters is making music now.

And when you’re not making music, all that matters is what you are doing that isn’t making music now.

So yeah, I am looking forward to playing more and better gigs, and making new recordings. And if it takes off it takes off. But if I just enjoy playing so-called dive gigs for the rest of my life, well, I actually do enjoy 99% of them so what’s the big deal?

There is no big deal, that’s the lesson grasshopper.

YOU are no big deal.

So just play some music mofo, and stop moaning about how you haven’t made it yet - because you’re wrong about that.

You have made it.

This is it.

Go have a listen!

Hoping to get hold of some photos to put up later but that’ll have to wait.

I haven’t actually written a post since then, which is because writing it marked the end of a phase for me, as I had sort of ticked off the to-do list a big one which was to get out there and play gigs again.

I did so for a few months and that was ace but then I realised that:

A) winter had come and I was cold and

B) this meant I needed it to be a pretty good gig for me to go driving half way across the state at just-after-kids-bedtime on a Tuesday night and

C) I really needed to update my recorded product because the stuff I have is nonrepresentational of my (far more upbeat and humorous) current set/act.

D) I also run a business and it has been going through a major restructure so had to focus on that big time or else it was going to be normal job huntin’ time for me (no thanks).

This was, in truth, probably the major factor in my short hiatus from making music.

But now I am a little more stable in terms of self-employment again and looking forward to the having some extra cash to go do a new recording and getting out to do some gigs again. I have a couple of minor gigs, both music and stand up comedy (which I am seriously inexperienced at) coming up in August and hopefully this will segue into a busy Spring.

Also have had some fresh encouragement in that fairly major publisher is interested in reading a couple of chapters of a book I am working on so that is exciting, see how it goes…

Hoping to find time again to devote to my creative-side because putting it on the shelf for a few months - while necessary for the (financial) well-being of my family - had the unfortunate side-effect of intensifying my usual bout of winter blues to the point where I was probably as depressed and anxious as I have ever felt there for a while. It was no fun but I have always struggled with a roller-coaster slide down and back up out of depression on a semi-regular basis and it (thank God) always passes.

When I started out in music I had some pretty simple goals, make awesome music, get wildly popular, have a blast. That was about it and pretty soon I had accomplished this to a big enough extent that I suddenly found myself feeling empty inside and aimless. I then succumbed fast to all of the usual cliches of the young popular rock musician: drugs, booze, cheap sex.

Which was fun to an extent but was also dissatisfying.

Well fast forward 15 years and it seems I have really only now, as a musician, finally found my way out of the darkness and back into the light (to put it in a cheesy way).

I don’t mean I haven’t made any great music or enjoyed playing any great gigs, but I certainly do mean that my non-career as a musician since my early successes has been a direct result of first a misguided sense of entitlement, then a despondency that waking up to the falsehood of the former brought about.

By the time I was in my late 20s I started to believe that I was too old and had missed the boat. I felt bad inside about my self-worth and my music career chances in general.

It was a weird thing, because inside my heart I have never stopped being a musician (and have always continued to compulsively write songs and play gigs). And neither have I ever stopped (privately) nurturing the dream of becoming a professional working muso, but this dream has for years been held at bay by other factors, namely:

• lack of focus and work ethic
• lack of self-worth (due to a faulty self-identity model)

Lack of Focus

When I publicly started out in music, at the tender age of 18, I was very focused and there was little to distract me. I barely drank at all, I didn’t smoke weed, didn’t do harder drugs at all, and I was content with my steady girlfriend. I could also live off a very low income quite easily, due to life being cheaper then plus just being young and easy to please (i.e. wasn’t as soft as I am now, could sleep on a filthy old mattress on the floor in a damp and drafty old house and eat beans on toast and not mind a bit).

This keen focus brought me a lot of initial success but then as I said above, the lack of a deeper meaning in my life* left me with an empty feeling that I tried to fill with drugs, drink and one night stands. Predictably the band and my relationship with my girlfriend fell apart and my life descended into a very feral stage. I was having lots of fun and adventure on the surface but underneath it lay a shallow sense of despondency.

Yet despite this lack of focus on the work I should have been doing, being a musician (who was focused) I still thought that my early success was all the proof I needed that all I had to do was get up on stage and sing here and there and I would eventually “be discovered” and rocket to true success and glory.***

Sounds stupid now … and indeed, it was.

Eventually, around the age of 27, I found a deeper meaning in my life. At this point I might have gotten things back on track, but no sooner had I pulled my head out of one pit did I promptly plunge into a different hole in the ground.

Lack of Self-Worth

I used to have a very strong sense of self-worth, but then as I pushed thirty and still hadn’t “made it” as a musician (read: Rock Star) my sense of self-worth as a musician deteriorated rapidly.

Why? Well, because my paradigm was all wrong. The model I had based my self-worth on (sad as it may sound) was the young-rock-star-in-the-making model.

I have always enjoyed the first part of the rock star (movie star, entrepreneur, etc) biography where the young star-to-be had to struggle and fight and hope and pray that one day their talent would get noticed and they would make it to Easy Street. And this is how I saw myself, as the young star in the making, who could happily look forward to hitting thirty as a well known and wealthy musician. Sounds stupid I know, but this fantasy kept me going and made me feel secure. It was in fact my whole self-identity.

So when I left my twenties behind and this fantasy hadn’t materialized (due to point above about lack of focus and work ethic, duh) I found myself at the wrong end of a defunct self-identity model and I quietly stopped telling everybody that I was destined for musical greatness. Even though a little voice inside me still claimed it was possible if I would just readjust my parameters, a louder voice inside me pointed out the fact that I had missed the rock n’ roll boat. This fearful voice said I should shut up about it and try to find other ways to make some good money.

Then five years went by very quickly. Fine years, happy years on many levels, but not on a career level.

Then one and a half years ago almost to the day, I was holding my brand new baby daughter in my arms, marveling at the miracle of Life, when a voice - a higher aspect of my own voice - spoke to me quietly (in my mind).

“What are you going to teach her? That it’s ok to just give up? Or that dreams can come true for those who persist?”

Well, I knew the answer straight away and recommitted myself to achieving success. BUT I had to go back and construct an entirely new model of success** because the old one (young David Bowie style rock star) was completely out of date - I just don’t even relate to that cliche anymore at all.

So I was thinking about this, soon after the baby holding incident, and was thinking about the age thing and suddenly, sitting in the sun one day eating my lunch, I suddenly thought “What if my goals took me another fifteen years to materialize? What if it took me another 30 years? Would this be so bad?” and the answer was “No - not as long as I enjoy the process.”

And I do enjoy the process, and you are never too old to be a successful musician, and success is something that you get to define your own way anyway.

So - think, and grow rich - that’s all I am saying

Analyze what’s going on inside your mind and see if you are holding yourself back with your own lack of focus or with limiting self beliefs.

And here I am one and half years later, well into a protracted, inspiring process that has brought me nothing but deep satisfaction. I am not the musician I once was, I am a new model, Musician 2.0!

Hope this helps somebody out there!

Cheers,

Seamus

*No I did not eventually become a Born Again Christian (been there done that as a child) but I did find my own kind of “spirituality”, for want of a better word. As it happens I am currently documenting this process in a series here.

**My new model of success is more than just “a musician” but I prefer to let it take shape in the arena of life rather than spell it out to people, it keeps my power from being wasted on “gonna do’s”.

***Musicians SHOULD NOT wait around to get “discovered”. In fact this whole post was inspired by reading this line over at Digital Pill “musicians … are not waiting to be discovered, they have discovered themselves and go about doing their job of telling people what they have discovered through their music.”

Just got back from an ace gig and not at all sleepy, so - please - allow me to ramble on….

Saturday April 4th 4 - 6pm - Empress - with Dirtbird

I originally intended to make this gig a multi-act line up. More specifically I wanted it to be a half-half music and comedy gig. I was going to call it “Laughing Vs. Singing” with 5 minute comedy spots between 15 minute singer/songwriter spots.

Unfortunately this idea fell flat (mainly due to my failings) and I really had to confront myself and face the fact that it is in my best interests NOT to add the hat of “promoter” to my fashion range but just to focus on being a “performer” - which is all I truly care about anyway.

Turned out just fine. My mate T K Bollinger (who is one of the finest, most original - and challenging - acts I have witnessed of late) recommended his mates “Dirtbird” to me. Or vice versa - Dave from Dirtbird got in touch with me and asked about doing a gig with me in Melbourne.

Turns out Mr Dave lives in Castlemaine which is a goldfields town in rural Victoria. I said sure but I want to swap for a gig in Castlemaine. OK said Dave.

I wanted this odd time-slot (4 - 6pm) because, frankly, since I started gigging in earnest again I have become painfully aware that my mates have all gone soft (due to children in some cases but NO excuses afforded to the childless). Basically bugger all of them had been rocking up to support me so I figured that a nice easy Sunday arvo gig would entice them out (turns out I was only partially right).

OK, look - long story short - it was an ok gig, not a bad turn out - lots of children. Bit of a crèche really. And let me tell you nothing weirder ever than opening your mouth to deliver the next barrage of four letter words into the mic only to look down and see one’s 18 month old daughter staring up at one from the edge of the stage!

Turns out Dave, who I picked from the get-go as having been around the block once or twice, was in a band who were pretty darn popular (especially in Adelaide from whence one hails) once upon a time, called the Bedridden. I kinda missed them (too busy being lame out in the suburbs) but later ended up being pretty good mates with the late-Baterz who was also in the Bedridden. (We used to do gigs together at the Crown and Anchor Hotel in Adelaide back in the late ’90s.)

Dave, you still owe me a goldfields gig. (I resemble an elephant in more ways than just girth!)

Tuesday, April 14, Ruby’s Lounge

I live in Belgrave and I am really fucking grateful that, hick town that it proudly is (why I moved there), it actually has a music scene - and of course Ruby’s is pretty much the apex of said scene.

Whenever I do gigs in the city I always mention Ruby’s and it never fails to get a cheer, such is the fame and popularity of the joint as pretty much the only out of town joint (That I, in my ignorance, know of) that gets decent touring acts and also has some style.

Anyway, I am by no means (yet) a star of the Ruby’s thang but this year I have managed to get myself a regular gig there (ok, not actually that hard).

This night wasn’t my finest. At least not for the first set. BUT it was important for me because I was really learning some tough lessons about the idiosyncratic nature of my “comedy meets edgy-folk-poet” act.

Herein lies the lesson: If you have a nice fat crowd to perform too, and they are listening, you can ramble on and crack jokes and (if you have any talent) they will dig it

BUT

If you are just some schmo in the corner of a cavernous pub and there aren’t many people there and those that are in the venue fucking are NOT there to see you, better just sing your songs and leave it at that. Music seems to cut through and win people over (or at least *cough* mine) but comedy on the other hand needs an attentive audience. It is a very, very different dynamic.

Thank fuck I have the music is all I can say.

Three more points worth mentioning about this gig:

1. First is that I road tested my new song (mentioned in my last post) about The Scarab Bar (which is across the road from Ruby’s Bar in Belgrave). Not surprisingly this seemed to go across a treat with those blessed yokals who were paying attention. The song itself is called “An Interesting Life”.
2. A certain Mr Jeff Springfield, Belgrave’s music scene Godfather, the very man who produced my CD and is also the sound guy at Ruby’s of an evening, was in attendance which is in itself not unusual but the lovely thing is that he was just so totally positive about my music and attendant ambitions that it made my pathetic narcissistic heart truly sing. Look forward to catching up with you next time bro, upon which occasion I will be sure to pucker up and kiss thine holy and no doubt fragrant arse.
3. I did a terrible set to start with, and it was meant to be my only set so I was massively depressed that it just sucked so fiercely. But then while I was sitting with a dreadlocked guy who made guitars, watching his mate (extremely talented guy  - I think he had dreadlocks - whose name MIGHT have been shane or shaun  - oops!)- I found out that the band had failed to show so I got up and did a 2nd set. Ok no big deal BUT in the meantime I had eaten some humble pie and realised that you can’t force a scripted show on a pub crowd and the 2nd set went much better and since then I have truly embraced a loosely scripted framework (of between song banter) let go wild with improvisation and it is surely the way.

(Note to self: Round gigs up one by one … this is FAR TOO EPIC!)

Friday 24th April, Vibe On Smith, Songwriters in the Round 8pm with Shane Walters and Kerrin and the Nips

OK for the record SITR are fantastic wonderful beautiful gigs. I LOVE these gigs. They make me cum. It had nothing to do with Kerryn’s lesbo jokes or Shane’s crackling lead, although these were extra highlights for sure. I could go into massive detail but A) who’s going to read it all and B) I am fucked - it’s 2am! Suffice to say: wet dream of a gig.

Oh yeah - and “The Nips” are actually Kerryn’s tits, as it happens…

Saturday 25th April, 5:30 at the Brunswick Hotel

Meh. Frankly this is a great venue that needs a crowd (and I wasn’t the guy to attract one). Lovely sound though.

Sun 25th April, 4 - 6pm at the Empress with Brooke

Brooke (whose surname I am completely ignorant of) turned out to be a talented and sassy young thang fresh back from the ubiquitous European sojourn and thank God she brought her friends and I really loved the gig, although again having my little girl hanging her cute 18 month arse off the front of the stage frankly put me off my hard core shit. Great gig though, loved it. Nice crowd too.

(Just like to point out that I can barely type anymore … this is simply too much … )

Friday 5th May “Songwriters in the Round” with the insanely beautiful and talented Siobhan and Brad who is both talented and beautiful as well (to be fair).

Full house.

I repeat:

F.U.L.L.  H.O.U.S.E.

I got called in last minute. Everyone there bar two were there to see the other two performers.

Lucky me

Personally, after 15 years gigging, I feel confident in saying that I was in top form. Truly you do all the shit or half-good gigs to prepare you for the night that the room is full.

I can’t write anymore tonight but I would like to close by thanking God and you, should you be weird enough to have read this far. (My advice to you now, faced with the vortex that the cessation of my dribble will surely leave is:

* Male?

Are you kidding? Beer. Porn. Weed. Sport. The choices aren’t exactly endless but they’re pretty fucking good.

* Female?

Sorry … no fucking idea…

P.S. Tonight I debuted “Gimmee A Frontal Lobotomy (and a Glass of Wine). It went ok but had trouble with subtley and the microphone tonight, just couldn’t get good responsiveness from the microphone, but I knowthe song is a winner…. and may I say, kudos to Aaron the sound guy cos this is the first time I have had any complaints at this gig and the room was chokkas which changes the acoustics and I am talking a pro level subtlety - and also there are actually no foldback monitors at this gig due to the “in round” format… … … Goodnight.

This year has so far been characterized by my return to the music scene. Not unsurprisingly this momentous occasion has been heralded with the kind of fanfare usually reserved for the delivery of new text books to old fashioned libraries, but nevertheless, I got back on the horse and have been off the couch and gigging consistently since December last year.

This has been a colourful time then as a result.

I’ve gigged enough to have enjoyed some amazingly wonderful dream nights. Nights where the stars have aligned to introduce me to new and (hopefully mutually) beneficial relationships, to seat me in front of lovely audiences who were apparently on the same bizarre wavelength that I transmit on, where every word I uttered or sang was understood and appreciated. Nights where my voice was golden and my fingers just did what they are supposed to do and otherwise left me to it.

On the flipside, I have had some Hell-gigs, although more often (thankfully) just hell-moments. I tried to throw the biggest night of the year so far to end up slightly embarrassed at the smallest ever turn-out of friends and, for that matter, strangers. The same night I got heckled every time I tried to kick back and explore the dubious realm of the humorous monologue. (“Play us a song Mr Piano Man!” … “Yeah, thanks for that, Mr Tattooed Bogan. Give me a sec - I’ll just get the old baby grand out of my bag.”) And I’ve followed the microphone south during the odd song until I was singing bent over almost double, unable to rectify the situation without stopping the song, pleading with my eyes for a friend to hop up and adjust the stand to no avail, wondering if people were smiling ‘with’ me at the funny lyrics or ‘at’ me and my predicament.

And then there were the nights where my hands shook, the nights I played 100% sober.

That sounds really bad so I need to explain that my hands don’t shake in the absence of alcohol normally, just during gigs when nervous energy seems to make my hands go all crazy and, well, with apologies to spastic people everywhere, spastic. One or two drinks really calms them down. But I must repeat that I don’t drink to make my hands stop shaking at any other time … I just drink to get drunk (ha, ha)

So here’s a quick round up of the gigs so far this year:

Tuesday 20th January – Ruby’s Lounge, Belgrave

This venue is local to me, or has been for the last two and a half years, so it was cool to finally play a gig here. I rocked up on time and was pleased to discover that the sound guy was Jeff Springfield, who sound-engineered my CD. My business partner Steve Mills, also a local, came along but apart from that I knew nobody.

I was pretty sober and out of practice. This meant my hands were shaking and also they simply couldn’t remember what they were supposed to do. Also I had done so few gigs in the last couple of years that I found that everything I was doing was too subtle for a noisy bar. I soon pulled out some good songs that I knew would cut through the noise, but I certainly remembered at this gig that an unknown musician needs to forget subtlety when playing in a rowdy pub and just bust on through the wall of indifference with something exciting, humourous, or at least LOUD.

After the gig I hung around and got quite drunk and met several locals. I also met a couple of musicians who were on that night. I gave away a bunch of CDs.

Yes, that’s right, I give CDs away at gigs. Maybe I will explain why in a separate post one day.

Wed 28th January, Empress Hotel, North Fitzroy

A lovely venue to play and only the third or fourth time I had even played here. I organized the gig and got two others, my mate the talented Shane Walters and a friend of his, the equally awesome Faye Blais, to play as well.

I went on first, because my friends are a bit old and so I figured they would be more likely to come along on a Wednesday if they knew I would be onstage by 8pm or thereabouts.

Turned out to be a fantastic gig, it was incredibly hot (bushfire season here in Victoria, Australia) but not too bad inside the very dark pub. A good little crowd were there and they seemed to dig what I had to offer. It was the first gig where I deliberately told some pre-written comedy material and it went down a treat. It just seemed to come out of my mouth (for the most part) as if it was spontaneous, which I am discovering really makes all the difference. And of course I threw in some off-the-cuff funnies as well; to various degrees of success (the funniest joke of the night always seems to be one of the better spontaneous remarks). You can view some of the songs from this gig here at YouTube.

Songwriters in the Round, Vibe On Smith, Friday 20th January

This was an unexpected gig (and a pleasure) that came my way via a recommendation from Frank and Robin who organize the Empress Hotel’s open mike night, which I played at in December last year.

I had no idea what the night was going to be like but it turned out to be fantastic. The ‘songwriters in the round‘ is a really interesting concept. What it is three solo acts ‘in the round‘ onstage (well, on chairs in the middle of the room) at the same time, taking turns
to play, with chairs and couches all around the songwriters. Sounds odd but it really works. Lots of funny repartee, and in fact this was the first time I gave some extended and several short comedy bits a go in between songs and realised that I was ‘home’, that this is the missing element from shows. I had known I’d wanted to do this for ages, but it took me a long time to actually do it, but so worth it. Mind you, it wasn’t and still isn’t easy, as the following tales will outline, but this night it went smoothly and I got lots of laughs plus the songs went over well also.

Sat March 7th - Brunswick Hotel, Sydney Road, Brunswick

This was kind of my Hell gig. In actual fact there were several good things about the gig, one being that I got paid for once but as a whole the night was a stinker.

For starters I really put a lot of effort into promoting it as a CD launch to my friends, but weirdly, less of them showed up on this night than the usual smattering of random friends. This sounds so sad but it is in fact a sign of the age that my friends are at now – when you are twenty and you throw a CD launch, everyone comes, when you are 35, nobody really cares. Sad but true.

And the fact is, I don’t care either. What I mean is, I don’t care about getting my friends to come to gigs. What I care about is developing an audience of people who are interested in what I do enough to come and see it.

So I tried my best to be Zen about the no show factor and enjoy hanging out with the few people that did some along. I had to stay sober to drive home too, which in fact exaggerated my down mood, because not drinking when I am in a pub is frankly, depressing for me. I don’t know how people who abstain can even stand going into pubs at all, but that’s just me.

So yeah my hands were shaking because of non-calmed-down-by-beer nerves and then to really make it fun, some bogan up the back heckled me severely when I was trying on a comedy routine and I discovered that I need a little practice at dealing with that. I wasn’t upset, I just forgot where I was and the bit was ruined. Thankfully, unlike most regular comedians, I have cool songs that I can launch into and hide behind.

Friday March 13th - Vibe On Smith, Songwriters in the Round

In direct contrast to the last gig, my second go at Songwriters in the Round was a fantastic and nearly perfect gig. It just all went so smoothly, the songs, the comedy, and the guys I was onstage with were awesome too. I just want to replay that gig every night for the rest of my life.

Wednesday March 18th Ruby’s Lounge and Scarab Bar

Back to my local area, I started this gig to a massive crowd of Jeff the sound guy, the bartender and my best mate from when we were teenagers, Peter (who just suddenly appeared in my life again).

Thankfully by halfway through the set a few people did arrive who were keen enough and so I ended up extending my set to play the songs they had missed earlier. The music went well, but the comedy on this night went down like a lead balloon, except for the spontaneous comments.

Two girls gave me a piece of paper with some lyrics for me to sing. They were certainly very talented at songwriting I must say, and this was probably the best song of the night *cough*. Was a good laugh though.

After the set I hung out with the people who had been listening to my set and gave them all CDs. Then we went across the road to the Scarab Bar, a tiny bar that stays open late. I was relieved to discover that despite the way I had carried on there the other week (like a mad, hairy Irish boozehound) my arrival didn’t raise any eyebrows amongst the staff. I guess it’s just that kind of joint.

I got speaking to the band, and they asked me to get up and do a set, so being quite sober still (but not hand-shakingly so) I got up and did a nice little set and in fact the sound was lovely. It seemed to go down quite well, although again my comedy bits were off.

I then proceeded to hang around and get utterly smashed seeing as I was just up the hill from my house and all.

In the morning this excuse didn’t seem as convincing as it had the night before, causing me to write this song lyric:

An Interesting Life

It’s one thirty AM,

I’m at the Scarab Bar again,

Drinking and carousing with my new friends.

Legends,

One and all,

None of whom I will recall,

Tomorrow,

When I’m writhing ‘round in pain.

It’s the cost,

It’s the price,

Of an interesting life.

You take off into the air,

Just like a plane.

You climb higher,

And higher,

Until your wings catch on fire,

Then you plummet,

Back to the planet,

Once again…

I wrote this years ago but it is still the best song I have to end a set with.

The story is about a young guy, Steve, who I was working as a kitchenhand with at a restaurant called Torlanos on Fitzroy Street in St Kilda, Melbourne back in the mid-late 90s. The head chef was Iain Hewitson who Aussies would know from TV. (By the way, on TV he is very jovial, but my memory of him - not necessarily reliable - is of a tough-as-nails swear-bear who really used to rip into the apprentice chefs … having said that he never gave me a hard time at all, in fact he barely spoke to me.)

Although Steve held a full time job as a kitchenhand and had done so for some time, he was apparently homeless, I can’t remember if it was by choice or not. He was a great guy and an incredibly hard worker.

He used to talk a lot about becoming a DJ but in fact he never did because he suddenly died.

He never used to miss any time at work but one day he didn’t show for a few days in a row until it was eventually learned that he had turned up dead in the Yarra River.  And this is where it gets weird… Shortly after learning about Steve’s death, which was reported as accidental (the police said he slipped and fell to his death while urinating in the river), I was visited by Steve’s ghost.

(I  should point out here that I am not particularly interested or frequented by ghosts, in fact if not for this incident I would probably poo-poo the idea, but this definitely happened - call me crazy.)

One night I was minding a friend’s house and dog, a doberman. I was awoken by the dog going crazy one night, and I just knew somehow that Steve was with me. Steve proceeded to tell me about how he wanted everybody at work to know that he didn’t die accidentally but was deliberately pushed. He told me some details, which have become hazy with the passing of time, but from what I remember he said he had been walking into the city, all the way from St Kilda (a long walk) with some people, one of whom was a young homeless lad who was giving him a hard time about something. Steve described the guy’s clothing to me, and later I was told by a co-worker that they had seen Steve shortly before his death, walking up Barkly Street in St Kilda, towards the city, with a young guy wearing clothing that matched Steve’s description. According to Steve (or his ghost anyway) it was this guy who pushed Steve to his death while he was “cracking a whizz” over a steep riverbank edge.

I told people at work this story, and if it hadn’t been for the corroborating evidence, I am sure they would have dismissed my wild tale out of hand. As it was they just sort of said “wow, trippy” and left it at that.

Steve had two other things he wanted to tell me. Firstly, that he regretted having never made the time to properly pursue his dream of becoming a DJ (he used to work long hours). He pleaded with me not to make the same mistake; timely advice seeing as I was treading water at the time instead of getting on with my music. These were his actual words:

“If you’re going to do it, then go ahead and do it before it’s too late.”

As a result I walked out of the kitchen half way through my double shift one day soon after, and went out to have dinner with some friends of mine who were in a band called The Mavis’s. We ended up partying with Kylie Minogue that night which I took as a sign that I had done the right thing. (In retrospect it would have been wiser to go and do some work on my music career rather than get pissed - but 20/20 hindsight and all that…) I have always kept this advice close to heart, and whenever I find myself off track, I make sure to correct my course and just get back to pursuing my dreams, rather than worrying too much about money and security.

The third thing Steve wanted to tell me was that death is ok; it’s nothing to be afraid of. This has been an issue in my life, despite all my Zen posturings, so I like to remind myself of this when I am succumbing to fear (on airplanes, for example).

Well this last week or two have been bloody hectic and challenging to say the least. For starters the deadly bushfires have been raging here in Victoria, Australia and seeing as me and my little family live about 40Ks from the action, and are ourselves in an extreme bush fire danger zone (we basically live in a suburb that is also a forest), it has been playing on our minds to say the least. It’s not just that we are feeling cautious for our own safety but our hearts have also been moved by the tragedies our less fortunate fellow Victorians have been going through.

The Monday after the worst fires had started was a weird day in Melbourne, and I was not sure what to do with myself. We’d given money but it felt like we should get in the car and go help, but when we called around a couple of organisations to ask if they needed help they told us that all they really needed was money. This left me with little choice but to go to work as per usual. 

Now according to my public goals challenge for 2009, I am supposed to be working on three things, and I have to say I have been doing so but to varying degrees of application. Namely, I have been working on the music goal extensively, the speaking French goal sporadically and the losing weight goal abysmally!

BUT the year is young!

In the last two weeks I have lined up some more gigs for myself and have also been working very hard at improving my act by building on the humourous spoken word element of the show. Namely, in order to really get my head around making the bits between songs as entertaining as the songs themselves, I have started moonlighting in the foolhardy realm of … stand up comedy … that’s right my friends, call me insane but last night I did my first 5 minute stand up comedy routine in front of a pretty damn hefty crowd at the Evelyn Hotel in Fitzroy, Melbourne. I think I am going to write about this experience separately and in more detail so I will leave it at that for now but for to say that it was a freakin’ trip my friends, a freakin weird and wacky trip.

Meanwhile, in a classic case of what is probably the closest I get to woo-woo Law of Attraction type beliefs, traditionally called creating your own luck*, I got a call the other day from a guy about doing a pretty cool sounding gig this Friday night, once again in Fitzroy. This chap, who’s name (I kid you not) is Ziggy, invited me to an “artists in the round” gig which is apparently a thing where three singer songwriters sit in a semi-circle (a triangle?) and take turns to play songs. The opportunity for exposure to new audiences and a bit of fun abounds so I am really looking forward to this gig this Friday 20th at Vibe on Smith, 123 Smith St, Fitzroy. The really cool thing is that Peter my old musical comrade and best mate, will be in town that night so he doesn’t know it yet but I am going to pull him up on stage with me for a guest spot. You can see a Youtube video of me and him gigging together here.

After that I have a belated CD launch for the Dogs May Bark disc which is at the Brunswick Hotel on Saturday 7th March. This is going to be an awesome night, but I will write more about this soon. 

So yeah, really gung-ho about the music but need to apply myself a little harder to the French lessons and the weight watching. Not that I haven’t been doing anything about them, just not enough. I will report back soon, oh ye breathless masses and ye will be able to sleepeth at night for knowing all about my progress on these vital fronts! 

*The reason I say this, about making your own luck, is because I got the call about the gig when a bloke I met recently recommended me to somebody else. What happened was a few weeks ago I drove all the way into town (a 45 minute drive minimum) to do a fifteen minute gig. This was hard to do, as in it seemed a bit of a big effort to drive all that way just to play three songs and also I went alone and this is never easy (I get nervous and fidgety out-and-about on my own and tend to avoid it) BUT I want to get my music happening again so bad I did it. What happened was the night was fantastic, well worth the drive, the people who ran it were lovely, and they helped me to get the “real” gig I got at the Empress Hotel happening (well they told me who to ring) and then this bloke calls me because the organisers of the initial 15 minute (open mic) gig passed my name on. This is what I (and others) call making your own luck and frankly, I don’t reckon ANY amount of Law of Attraction style New Age Twaddle makes up for the “luck” that ACTION and HARD WORK and BALLS brings you.