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This is going to be a busy week with rehearsals on Monday and Thursday, a full photo shoot on Thursday and another warm up gig at The Grove Tavern Thursday night. This requires a great deal of practical organisation, something I have realized is essential when running a band.

Key considerations are making sure that everyone knows where to be and when they need to be there. I often joke “Thank god we are not a 12 piece band” as meeting up requires a fair bit of planning. I always pay band members for rehearsal and gig time as I appreciate that its a tough life working as a musician. Today I’ll be figuring out what I need to take to the photo shoot followed by the gig. Here’s my list so far, but this is just the provisional list, there will be more items

1. 2 Bud Henriksen amps
2. 1 Blu Henriksen amp
3. Furman power supply
4. 2 Genaray lights
5. 2 Sony MV1 cameras
6. Blackwood tenor
7. Baritone uke
8. Gregor instrument
9. Moses strat
10. Bliss audio gravitas pedal
11. Rat stand
12. 2 mic stands
13. 2 Heil Finn mics
14. SM58
15. Heil Mic
16. 2 XLR leads
17. 3 instrument cables
18. 2 tripods
19. Tuner
20. Hat

We will be rehearsing from 3.30 pm and then doing a photo shoot at 5pm with the gig at 8 pm. Practical considerations about when and where to eat are important as well as transport. I use Karen Turner for all band photography and in the past flew her overseas for one festival because she is that good. Many bands in my view fail to appreciate the value of visuals both in stills photos and video. Often photos are “OK” but not great and video can be sub standard in picture and worse still sound quality. As I have said many times “You never get a 2nd chance to make a first impression”

I have realised that I am developing a problematic habit of needing an increasing number of instruments for a 50 minute set, but I am a fan of having lots of variation in sounds and this Thursday may be the first time ever I have included an electric guitar.

Other considerations include how much space there is on the stage for gear and players. There will be five of us at The Grove, but fortunately the Henriksen amps are small and sonically brilliant. All of this means a bonkers amount of detailed planning and I have a new appreciation for band managers and crews for touring musicians.

I write, record and play for the love of music and am lucky to be able to fund it from other work. I’m lucky to play with many superb musicians and the experience of writing, recording and playing live is an experience like no other.

I’m now in full preparation for the May 11 album launch for The Caravan of Dreams “Tales of Dark and Light” album. This is a monumental amount of work which involves hours on social media, organizing a photo shoot, planning warm up gigs and rehearsals and costing the whole process!

I’m a big fan of making sure everything is of the highest quality and previously I organised the album launch for The Small Change Diaries “Lullabies for Cynics”. That launch was a massive amount of work where I had three support acts 175 attendees and a huge space for the live work. I also had the major challenge of our longstanding double bass player being seriously unwell and Dave Bowie saved our necks at the last minute by stepping in.

The May 11th launch will be a ticket only event where attendees will receive a copy of the new album, released on the day.

Book tickets for May 11th HERE

Trouble at Mill are organizing the event again and they have years of experience in providing superb entertainment for the public. Ahead of the launch we have a few low key gigs to work up the new Caravan of Dreams material. This means lots of rehearsals and that means a great deal of time management! I semi jokingly comment “Thank god we are not a 12 piece band”  as its a challenge to be able to get everyone in the same time and space to practice.

I have a policy of paying all band members for rehearsal time as I have the greatest respect for anyone working as a musician. This means lots of practical considerations for costing and to wonderfully quote Blackadder “Sometimes I feel like a penguin. Everywhere I look, there’s a bill in front of me!”

That said, I really wouldn’t have it any other way and its an absolute joy to play with such talented musicians. I am also flattered to already see some good ticket sales for May 11th and never take for granted those who come to see us play live.

“The Pink Moon” was inspired by my good friend Zeke Schein who has told me many amazing instruments over the years in New York and who wrote the brilliant “Portrait of a Phantom” book about the lost photo of Robert Johnson.

Here are the lyrics

The Pink Moon (Song for Zeke)

Dm G7 Cmaj 7 C
The pink moon in Brooklyn, turns a shade of blue,
Mojo man is writing, all his tales are true,
Coffee’s for the morning, Robert’s in his dreams,
Portrait of a phantom’s, all is what it seems

Em Bm Em Bm
Sun sets on spring street, yellow cabs ride by,
Em Bm A Bm
Story’s for dreamers, under New York skies,

A Hatful of fiction thrives in this old brain,
Waitresses are peeking at what is here again.
Made your mark on Bleeker, for 27 years
Set us kids in motion, opened up our ears

Instrumental
Music is our language, it’s our common bond,
Power to awaken, the joy in every song,
Transforming spaces, transcending time,
Here at the crossroads, all is here to find

Em Bm Em Bm
Sun sets on spring street, yellow cabs ride by,
Em Bm A Bm
Story’s for dreamers, under New York skies

REPEAT FIRST VERSE

If you love music and/or a great read, buy the book here – https://www.amazon.com/Portrait-Phantom-Robert-Johnsons-Photograph/dp/1455622451/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1546984341&sr=8-1&keywords=portrait+of+a+phantom

Tickets are now available HERE

Attendees also receive a FREE COPY of the album

I’m in the process of planning the next 18 months for all music projects. A key aspect of this will be the album launch for The Caravan of Dreams album “Tales of Dark & Light” where I have now finalized the tracks.

To date I have written and recorded 40 original tracks which to my amazement is on average 10 each year since 2014. Here is a list of everything to date including the track listing for the new album.

ADAM BLAMES EVE – THE SMALL CHANGE DIARIES

1. Adam blames Eve
2. This Perfect Place
3. Airport Codeine Blues
4. There’s only one of you
5. One day I’ll disappear
6. Birdman
7. Miles Ahead
8. I’m driven here to comment
9. This Heart wants
10. Five String Man
11. Hey Rona
12. Amish frame of mind
13. Cold Mountain

PROTEST SONGS – THE SMALL CHANGE DIARIES

1. Not one of us
2. Big Tony
3. Commons Sense
4. Draw you out

LULLABIES FOR CYNICS – THE SMALL CHANGE DIARIES

1. Hold on
2. Huggie Crying thing
3. I know what you’re saying
4. Not one of us
5. Kicking down doors
6. There’s no trees
7. Draw you out
8. Voodoo Doll
9. Birdman 2017
10. Slow news day
11. You can drop by anytime
12. Lullaby
    You got the looks (unreleased)

TALES OF DARK AND LIGHT – NICK CODY AND THE CARAVAN OF DREAMS

1. Tales of Dark and Light intro
2. Dunning Kruger Blues
3. The pink moon
4. All that loving, all that fighting
5. Grey Skies
6. One finger to block out the sun
7. He’s shooting blanks
8. When the pain begins
9. Say what you’re thinking
10. No more street parties
11. Open up
12. The Other me
13. Here in the silence
14. Tales of Dark and Light

I grew up in the 1970s in Surrey and used to shop at ‘Threshold Records” which was owned by The Moody Blues. Back then they stocked the store with an amazing selection of music, including the original Jimi Hendrix albums on Track Records, the Yes albums and all manner of 70s psychedelic music. I remember buying “Layla and assorted love songs” on a sunny day and I still listen to this music decades on. An album cost two pounds fifteen pence on average until Elton John priced a new album at 2 pounds 45 pence.

There had been attempts up until this point to introduce a new tape music format and in 1971, the Advent Corporation introduced their Model 201 tape deck that combined Dolby type B noise reduction and chromium(IV) oxide (CrO2) tape. This meant that music was portable for the first time, but the sound quality was not great. For those of us recording music in the 1980s the 4 track cassette recorder emerged and then later the Adat which I personally detested with a vengeance.

Phillips produced the DCC as a digital alternative to the cassette and Sony went one further in creating the mini disc. DCC never really took off but I quite like the mini disc, especially when they introduced high capacity discs. The world changed in 1982 with the creation of the Compact Disk or CD and everyone I know had copies of “Brothers in Arms” by Dire Straits. No more tape hiss, scratches or warped vinyl, but many swore that digital sounded harsh compared to vinyl. In 1999 Sony and Phillips created Super Audio Discs or SACDs. By 2007 the general consensus was that this medium had not really taken off. As well as the hard to find general SACDs (these will not play in a conventional CD player) there are the more obscure by excellent Japanese SACDs. These have lavish packaging and the discs are all emerald green. I have never seen these outside Japan.

In the 2001 mp3s began to become popular with the introduction of the I Pod. This is a compressed format and is “OK” for listening on the move but not the best sound, commenting –

“Digital music files download quickly, but suffer a significant loss in quality. Bitrates for most tracks on iTunes average 256kbps AAC audio encoding, which is drastically inferior to the quality of recorded source material in almost every case” Neil Young

Other lesser known formats that never took off include DVD audio that appeared in 2000 and never took off. I confess to loving high fidelity where you can hear the full recording rather than what is essentially a filtered version. FLAC audio has appeared in recent times and now its possible to hear high resolution or HD files which can be truly superb. Of course any listening experience is only as good as the original recording and HD FLAC shows how good or bad the original mastering was. If you are not already exhausted by now, there is also the DSD as a file format .

On August 28, 2013, the Acoustic Sounds label launched SuperHiRez.com, which sells mainstream albums from major record labels that were produced with Direct Stream Digital or PCM audio formats.On September 4, 2013, Acoustic Sounds announced an agreement with Sony Music Entertainment to provide the company’s new digital download service with albums that have been produced or remastered in Direct Stream Digital format.

I have music on all these formats, but prefer high resolution HD flac and DSD files on my home system and portable Sony HD media player. There can be a massive difference in terms of listening experiences, but great music mostly sounds great regardless of what you play it back on. I miss the artwork that came with original vinyl albums, but love the sound of high resolution files which require a good playback system with a digital audio converter.

Vinyl is now making a come back and digital formats remain massively popular. With the closing of HMV, I suspect CDs will continue to decline. According to a new mid-year report released by RIAA (Recording Industry Association of America) this week, CD sales are falling at an extraordinary rate, with revenue decreasing 41.5% in the first 6 months of 2018, compared to the same period the previous year

Often people will say “X format sounds best” but so much depends on what kind of system you choose to listen back on and what sounds good to your own ears.

I originally come from a business background and one of the major lessons I learned was to seize opportunities when they appeared. “The music business” is of course no different, although many can have a very romantic vision of what it is to be an artist. Don’t get me wrong, I have no problem with romance, but at the same time any music promotion and artist development requires ongoing work and application as well as seeing and seizing opportunities. This means thinking long-term, rather than cutting corners. Above all, it means having the commitment and stamina to seize opportunities and see projects through to completion.

“Something comes along and you have to jump on and do it. You can’t stop until it’s done.”

Neil Young

Some opportunities are created of course and I’m amazed at how many artists totally miss what I call “the elusive obvious” I have always advised artists to pay attention to their online presence, social media activity and musical development. In this talent show era, a lot of this seems to be forgotten as many (not all) artists have almost delusional expectations about their musical ascent. Again I applaud anyone aspiring to develop as a performer and to earn a living as a professional musician, but often there’s a lack of strategic thinking at a most basic level. As I blogged previously, creating great music is only one piece of the puzzle these days.

I don’t claim in any way to be an expert, but producers and established artists all confirm the need for relentless focus and perseverance to create any kind of success. A common issue is not completing tasks. This can include websites, songs or replying to live gig requests. In short these days, any artist wanting to reach a wider audience needs to both create and spot opportunities and crucially to act on them. I’ve realised that each person has to find out for themselves that works. I have also given up offering advice and making suggestions about “the elusive obvious” as some folks either really don’t get the need to move on opportunities and/or are stuck in a very narrow way of thinking and not seeing the bigger picture.

One thing is for sure. The way in which music is created, promoted and received is changing at some rate. As I type I just heard that HMV has gone into administration. This is the second time in 6 years, after there was a bail out in 2012. Of course as one door closes another will open in some fashion…

Over X Mas I finally had the chance to watch and listen to “Springsteen on Broadway”. I’ve been a big fan of Bruce’s work since I bought “Born to Run” in 1975. His autobiography is a wonderful testament to his brilliant storytelling and work ethic. I bought the audiobook version and found his story absolutely captivating and I had no problem in listening to his story for hours.

Over the decades he has written many superb songs and crucially is always on the move, never sticking to one group of musicians or specific style. He periodically would revert to the classic E Street band ensemble, but I have come to love his solo appearances.
He is also a brilliant businessman and enthusiasts can obtain many of his gigs dating back to the 1970s on CD and many digital formats including high end DSD format. Almost nobody else takes this amount of care to deliver so much material to a fan base. In my view the sign of a great artist is one who can sing his or her material stripped back to a single instrument. On Springsteen on Broadway, this is exactly what you get, pure magic and entertainment at its very best.

In an era of belief in instant fame, its inspiring still hear artists who have spent years crafting songs with an interest in great lyrics and melody.