Two pieces of great news!
The first is that from October, I have a weekly residency, playing every Wednesday night at U Maleho Glena a great little music club in Pragues’ Mala Strana.
Looking further ahead, next year sees my 30th anniversary as a working musician and I shall be marking this occasion with a show at The Half Moon, in Putney London SW15.
This legendary venue was the scene of so many great gigs for me as both muso and punter in the 1980s and 1990s. Plans are still in the very early stages.The actual date, February 12th 2011, was only confirmed recently.
For those of you who have facebook, I have created an event page where any
updates will be posted .. please feel free to pitch in with ideas too.
If you haven’t joined my artist page on facebook here is a link to it.
In September I have four gigs with Vera and Lenka, and one show in Prague
with Dani. I also have a gig opening for Danis’ Hendrix tribute show at Vagon ..
my first time playing there.
I have a solo gig in Mosaic House on September 22nd, and will very possibly
play at Jama once we have settled on dates.
First things first – thanks to Toby for giving back my WordPress blog after some no-life in Indonesia hacked into it. I have upgraded my version of WP and got a new password so I hope there will not be a repeat of this.
Busy time week ahead of me – today I’m off to Cernosice just outside Prague to rehearse with Vera and the band P.R.S.T for our forthcoming tour which starts in March and continues for another two months .. something like 15 gigs in total .. all of them Concert Hall venues which will be good. Monday is my 6th anniversary of being in Prague and I am celebrating in two ways … first by playing to two groups of school children which will be a blast, then in the evening having beer and curry with the GOM (Grumpy Old Men) despite being neither grumpy nor old.
Curry at the wonderfully quirky Himalaya restaurant (more like a takeaway place with two plastic tables and four garden chairs) with food cooked by a young Bangladeshi. Beer will be taken in Privni Pivni Tramvaj a former tram drivers refreshment hut at the end of the 11 tram line .. amazing range of micro and small brewery beers. And there was me stopping drinking beer in February. I was introduced to it by my friend Chris who despite being a Man Utd fan is still a decent bloke . we went there just before Xmas and I drank some amazing 19 degree (7.9 a.b.v) Xmas beer brewed by the monks in Strahov monastery. The only place it’s available in Prague outside the monastery is in this little gem of a bar.
Tuesday I do my TV show Na Plovarna … Bez Plavek .. this time with Vera as a guest. We’ll do a song together but I have no idea what yet. Maybe we’ll discuss this today. Shooting has moved to another studio now .. smaller and for me at least not a ritzy as the casino but I’m still very happy to be part of the show. Gigs on TV are hard to come by here and I am the only non-Czech or Slovak muso I know who plays regularly on television in this country .. which is really something.
Wednesday and Thursday I have gigs at Red Hot plus my buddy Simon arrives from Holland for a few days. Friday I have brunch with my friend Gerd Kohler from Bonn in Germany .. and a gig at Esse .. then Saturday Dani and I play once again at Jazz Dock. I will also be seeing friends from London who are in town this coming weekend.
So my no beer pledge will take a very serious test (which it will fail gloriously)
Shot in High Definition this 8 minute clip features me playing live and solo in a Prague music club.
It is a condensed version of a gig I played in July of this year. I’m very happy with it.
shot by my friend Jimmy on his phone cam, there is a hi-def video of highlights of the the same show in the editing suite right now.
It will be posted to youtube very soon.
I was asked about a month ago to be the “house musician” on a TV talk show broadcast on digital in both the Czech and Slovak Republics.
The TV station is called public.tv
The offer came out of nowhere really .. the producer had seen me play, loved what I did, and called a mutual friend whose premises we are using as a studio and bingo.
The first show was aired this week on September 8th (my parents wedding anniversary co-incidentally) and can be found by clicking this link you will need to download the silverlight player to see it.
Soon as I get copies on DVD I will rip them and put them here.
There are also some photos posted here for shows 1 and 2 and here for shows 3 and 4
and below are a few samples
some really good news on the song writing front, I am collaborating with a long term friend and fellow muso singer/songwriter Clive Gregson .. hopefully this will lead to a new recording for me that’s the plan at least.
We have one song already finished .. news updates as they arrive. This might be a long process as Clive is so busy putting his studio together but I hope that with this and other collaborations a new album will be forthcoming.
