December Gig Booked @ Fuel, Manchester

My friend Ruby Tingle is having her first solo exhibition and the release of her first EP at Fuel in Withington, (Manchester) on Monday 10th December and she's asked me to come along and play some songs too!

I'm a big fan of her music and recently discovered her art work too so I'm honoured to be asked to play on her big night :-D

Ruby Tingle (Tumblr)

Where?
Fuel (Withington, Manchester)

When?
Monday 10th December 2012

When I find out more closer to the time, I'll post it up!

Catholic Cemetery (Lyrics)

Lyrics for one of the new songs I'm playing at the Dry Bar gig on 16th Sept! 30th Sept!


Catholic Cemetery

I took you to a graveyard
Parked up the car
Camera in your hands
Visionary heart

Headless statues
Angels without hands
Jesus on a headstone cross
Trees overhang

And I sang by the church wall
On the edge of the valley
Thinkin' 'bout the endless skies
And the heat of your body

Words soaring
Through my lungs, to the air
Watching you clamber through the stones
Artistic prayer

You returned to the church side
Kissing my neck
Feeling shivers inside
And your hand on my leg

Luscious green life
Ivy covered tombs
Bathing in the ether
Our sparks in the gloom

You shuffle closer, so we're
A jigsaw in bed
With your beard
Tickling the back of my neck

I'm driving with my hand
On your inside thigh
You lean over and kiss me
And this is my high

Gig @ Dry Bar

Nice pies.

Just booked my first gig in Manchester since returning!  I'll be playing at Dry Bar on Oldham Street in the Northern Quarter on Sunday 16th September. Gig has now been changed to Sunday 30th September.

I've been itching to do something different from the standard 1 vocal + guitar for a while now so I'm going to debut some new material at this gig in a slightly different direction to my other stuff with the help of my iPad... Tracks called "Catholic Cemetary" and "Don't Let The World Get In The Way" and "Beautiful Man In A Suit".

I'll deffo throw a cover song in too!

I Only Wanna Be With You (YouTube Cover)

I've been playing this one for a while but only just got around to recording it... it makes me happy to sing it, I've always loved this track - both the Dusty Springfield version and the Vonda Shepard version too :-D

Love Me Or Leave Me YouTube Vid

Woo! I was meant to be working on another one (which hopefully I'll put out this week too) and then I remembered/found this song on friday...I've only heard the Doris Day version (which I've loved since I was about 10 years old...) so I guess that will have influenced a lot how I sing it...

Hallelujah YouTube Video (Leonard Cohen cover)

Big respect to Leonard Cohen!! :-D

I've heard there was a secret chord
That David played, and it pleased the Lord
But you don't really care for music, do you?
It goes like this
The fourth, the fifth
The minor fall, the major lift
The baffled king composing Hallelujah

Hallelujah, Hallelujah
Hallelujah, Hallelujah

Your faith was strong but you needed proof
You saw her bathing on the roof
Her beauty in the moonlight overthrew you
She tied you to a kitchen chair
She broke your throne, and she cut your hair
And from your lips she drew the Hallelujah

Hallelujah, Hallelujah
Hallelujah, Hallelujah

There was a time when you let me know
What's really going on below
But now you never show it to me, do you?
And remember when I moved in you
The holy dove was moving too
And every breath we drew was Hallelujah

Hallelujah, Hallelujah
Hallelujah, Hallelujah

I did my best, it wasn't much
I couldn't feel, so I tried to touch
I've told the truth, I didn't come to fool you
And even though it all went wrong
I'll stand before the Lord of Song
With nothing on my tongue but Hallelujah

Famous Blue Raincoat (covering Leonard Cohen)

Covering Leonard Cohen's "Famous Blue Raincoat"

It's been a difficult few months since I left Athlone back in September last year... I moved to London into a job I wasn't suited to and into a shared house that I couldn't make into a home and then had a lot of money stolen from me there... So you live, and you learn.  But I got some good songs written from the experience, some of which I'll be going into a studio to record later in the year :-)

I've started a new contract job in Manchester for a few months, I've got my own own apartment living in the city centre (2 mins walk from Piccadilly station :-D  ) and I finally feel settled for the first time since I was in Athlone (even though I won't be here that long!). I have time to sing, to write, to exercise and to cook too (cooking is like my alternative therapy to music...lol)

So this was recorded on Friday night in my new pad, had a nice evening of drinking red wine, eating chillies and recording this favourite Leonard Cohen track.