Welcome to the next level...

hmmmmmmmmm....

Ok this is not going to be an emotional blog today....just a quick sneak peek at what chaos my life is in at the moment... :oP I actually love that....peeps always think their life is chaotic or more so than the next person, which is, in a sense totally true and not....you are the only person who can truly say what you are feeling at one given time so no-one can really take that away from you....just perhaps put you in your place... :o)

Okies....to start with, I produce and manage a band "Devil's Cartel" .... www.devilscartel.com ....we've been around for about 2 and a half years already and we are slowly growing our fan base....its no easy task I can tell you and sometimes it just seems all to easy to throw in the towel and start all over again, but we persist...its the only way we are ever going to get anywhere and you never hear of any band really making the big time in 6 months...the norm is generally a few years...anyways...

My problem....after spending a year producing everything in the studio my vocalist up and left to go to the UK...this was devastating as, for any band, if you lose your vocalist you lose the essence of what you have created....so while she was away I started up other projects to keep myself busy and promoted the band quite heavily as I had a suspicion she would come back....and she did....joy is me !!! We can now finally take the whole thing live and start promoting and marketing ourselves the way it should be done...its amazing what a beautiful girl can do for a band ;o) ....

Now the task begins of having to move everything from the studio into a live setup....sounds easy doesn't it...not a chance...we relied heavily on computers to do the studio productions and now to change that to live gear is an absolute pain and I refuse to just plug up a PC and play the track out....it has to be live performance, I want people to see that it is a live performance otherwise I might as well just plug up my iPod and some pretty light and sit back, although this is all an exciting process is still fairly daunting....I have over the last year purchased some synths and drum machines but it is never enough so we've also enlisted the help of another very talented producer to co-produce....then we lost out bassist as he has had a very exciting opportunity presented to him and I cant hold him back...so now to find a new bassist...which is looking fairly promising as atm...

What a few ppl don't realise is the need for a rehearsal room...generally they need to be where people wouldn't be bothered by the sound so its normally in some dodgy industrial area...which Im not entirely comfortable with leaving all my gear in...so it needs to be close...preferably cheap and secure...hmmmm...there have been some nice spots but each have their own set of issues so you have to weigh up what works, what doesn't work and what ideally will be best for the band....right now it seems like my studio at home will be it until we get complaints... :oP

The next challenge is updating "our" sound....after 2 years you can get very bored of what you produced so its up to us to actually write a number of new tunes...again, just issues....when I was working by myself everything was self contained, when you are working with others who are used to different systems it takes awhile to find where the middle ground is....we have settled on an application that im unfamiliar with so I'll have to train myself up in a hustle so that we can get the ball rolling again...so far we have all been very unproductive...nothing has really happened since the vocalist came back besides one track that is sitting in mid limbo....this scares the hell out of me....if the vocalist gets bored, she may want to leave the band and I'll be well and truly fukt...but that's just my own paranoia kicking in...


On a more personal front, the vocalist moves in tomorrow....this should be an interesting scenario to say the least...where it goes, no-one knows but I feel comfortable with the risk of it all...

And I see my ex tonight....to say this girl damaged me is an understatement....it took me nearly 4 years to get over her and it was only towards the end of last year that I felt really comfortable with seeing her again....she is an incredible girl which doesn't make matters easier but since she slept with my best mate last year November I kind of realised that this is her and this is the way she is....she is no slag but she enjoys life and is one of those "dangerous" girls...the ones you cant help but fall in love with, knowing full well that you will get bitten sooner or later...luckily for me I was probably one of her more serious boyfriends and I hurt her as much as she did me...puts us on a kind of even medium again....

I'm looking forward to seeing her again and although I don't love her in that way anymore I still miss her a lot...

What else...oh, work is chaos and the fact that this is a 4 day week doesn't make it any better....everything gets compounded into 4 instead of 5 and its all urgent !!! urgent !!! urgent !!! ...its fine, I work better under pressure so I do enjoy it, I take my time out when I get home and morph out to BBC doccies...nothing better to take your mind off things... :o)

They are also forcing me to take leave :oP ....I have 3 weeks accumulated and this is after the week I took in Dec to Mozambique and the 10 days over my birthday...so I go to the midlands in September for a week....Wahoo !!! ...horse riding and trout fishing....two things im totally unfamiliar with...should be interesting...m just wondering if we could combine the two....sort sit on the horse while you fish, I did ask but they said it would get rather uncomfortable after awhile....

Anyways...that's a bit of whats going on...there's more but I personally hate reading long blogs so im trying to keep this one short and sweet.... :o)