"I'm no stranger to this place, where real life & dreams collide"

It would seem that, owing to the devastating lack of response, that I was right; You just can't knock Abba.

May I just say: Starsailor's new single, "In the crossfire" is chuffing ace! Not that it fills me with hope for the album, mind you. The lead single of their last album was bloody great but the album itself turned out to be just bloody grating.

Apparently there are only 3 words in the English language that end in GRY.
Angry.
Hungry.
Any ideas for the last one? Dream Girl needs to know for some reason.

Over at Mark's place he did a groovy little meme type thing that I am now legally obliged to bring before you lovely people.
So here it is...

Leave your name and
1. I'll respond with something random about you.
2. I'll tell you what song/movie reminds me of you.
3. I'll pick a flavor of jelly to wrestle with you in.
4. I'll say something that only makes sense to you and me.
5. I'll tell you my first/clearest memory of you.
6. I'll tell you what animal you remind me of.
7. I'll ask you something that I've always wondered about you.

If I do this for you, you must post this on your journal. You MUST. It is written.

Play away peeps, or not.

For No.7 Mark asked me how far I'd taken my musical ambitions when I was younger.
I didn't feel able to do the answer justice in his comments section, so I'm going to answer it now.

I wrote my first proper song when I was 14. It was called "Wishing" & in all honesty in weren't too bad. Then in the 4th & 5th years at school I took Music as one of my options. The course was broken up into 5 (I think) sections. One of these was composition. The wonderful thing about this was that I actually got to record my songs using the technology of the day. I also had my utterly fantastic music teacher helping me out. Then as now, I was not a musician. I am a musician in my head but the only instrument I can play is my voice. Anyway my the end of that 2 year period I had recorded about 10 songs of wildly differing qualities. After leaving school I worked in a shop & had Wednesday's off. My ace teacher had free periods on Wednesday afternoon & I use to go into school & use the facilities. This was probably a mistake as I ended up chuffing about with some of the songs & my attempts to embellish them only really made them worse.
Anyhow, before we go on let me talk you through my repetoire from the time.
"Wishing": A very simple song but quite a good one. It featured real bass & real guitar. I was proud of it.
"Mother's Girl": A great melody & some very iffy lyrics (I was just a boy!). Again recorded with proper instruments & sounded pretty good for the time.
"When I look at the stars": Hmmm. Dreadful lyric (looking back) & awful vocal. Musically though it was hella cool! It had some funky guitar on it & a (no exaggeration) utterly fantastic Saxophone solo. The re-recorded sample heavy version featured The Duke Of Jokes on backing vocals, quite remarkable.
"Backlash":A song I think so much of that it's very likely going to be on Album 2. Lyrically it's still pretty much ok (though I'll probably tweak it a bit). I was very proud of it musically as I had painstakingly played everything myself. Overdid it with the samples a bit though.
"State of confusion": At the time it was far & away my best song (IMHO), not sure how well it's dated but it was an up tempo almost rocking affair. I pretty much ruined the best version of it by sticking samples all over the bloody thing.
"Luscious fruit": I nearly forgot about that one! I always really liked this one, the recorded version was far from perfect (forgot to put any cymbals on it, doh!) but it did capture the spirit of the song, which was all about revenge.

Those 6 were probably the pick of the bunch.
There were others ("That midnight kiss", "The word is love", "Indirectly", "Broken hearts", "You are my drug", etc) which weren't quite so good but hey I'd put them all together on a tape anyway.
The first time I parted with one of these tapes was in October 1986 when I thrust one directly into the hand of a certain Mr. Vince Clarke prior to a gig in Bradford.
"What's this? A demo?" I remember him mumbling, to which I replied "yes".
"Cheers I'll give it a listen".
Ace, that was it I just have to wait till Vince listens to it then he'll be in touch & I'll be signed to Mute records before you can say Fledgling Superstar!
I don't know if he ever did listen to it but "spiraling" off Erasure's next album is not very different from "Indirectly", back me up here DOJ!

Some 6 months later, I threw a copy of my tape onto the stage at Bradford St.Georges hall. In an envelope also containing 20 odd pence in coppers so that Nik Kershaw could buy a stamp for when he wrote to me telling me how thrilled he was by my "Sound".
I must have been a couple of pence short as the diminutive genius also failed to respond.

Thinking back now I really don't know why I never made up loads of tapes & mailed them to all the record companies. I did however take a trip down to London one day armed with some tapes. I walked into the foyer of Chrysalis records & up to the receptionist.
"Hello, I'd like to see an A & R person please"
"Erm.. excuse me?"
"I'd like to see someone so I can play them my demo"
"I'm afraid it doesn't work like that..."
"but I've come all the way from Yorkshire!"
"you can give it to me & I'll pass it on to someone"
"ok", there were tears welling up as I gazed upon the array of gold & platinum discs that adorned the walls. Then I left knowing I'd have to wait a bit longer till my name was on one of them.
I then tried to find Mute records, which I never did despite walking around the capitol for about 5 hours.
And that was that.

I always had great confidence in my ability as a singer & as a songwriter. I recall when having a meeting with the careers adviser before leaving school she (Miss Fittun, remember her DOJ?) asked me what I was going to do. I told her I was going to be a professional recording artist. She went on about how that may be a difficult goal to achieve. I didn't let her negativity bother me though and I told her as such. She then suggested I should think of something as a back up "just in case it takes a while". See until this point I'd never even considered what job I might do. I was going to be a pop star, I didn't need a job!
"What about a job in a shop?"
"S'pose"
And that was that.

When I was 18 I moved to Crapsville for love (doh!) & though I kept writing the odd lyric, things kind of died. I was by now convinced that the quality of my earlier recordings were simply not good enough. I had no means of making any new recordings & money was tight as all of a sudden I had to be totally financially independent. There was (still the case!) no music scene to speak of in Crapsville & no outlet for my "talents".

I went to work at Butlins at Bognor Regis in September 92. Here I found a renewed vigour for my songwriting & I also had regular Karaoke to exercise my voice. It was here I met Temper Tantrum (who of course I would go on to spend the next 10 years with). Initially Temper Tantrum was most excited by her boyfriend's creative side. She'd gush about how great I was & promised to help me achieve my dreams.

We eventually settled up in Wakefield, where after some months I became the lead singer in a band called Strangeworld. Crap name aside, Strangeworld was a really good band. ShitHotGuitarist & I forged what I thought was a fantastic songwriting partnership. We played quite a few gigs round Yorkshire & very slowly we were starting to attract a very small following.
May I just quote the Yorkshire Evening Press after our very first gig together, only 10 days after I'd joined the band, at Fibbers in York: "...excellent keyboard playing & a new singer with a fantastic voice were the highlights of their set". Yay!
We had a canon of 15 good songs, some of which were lyrically about Temper Tantrum, & we were starting to find our own sound & musical identity.
We were also waiting on some studio time that the band had won in a battle of the bands competition with their previous singer. This never came to light.
What did come to the fore though was Temper Tantrum's attitude. I feel the need to explain that because she was in a strange city with no friends & we were living at my parent's house, she'd always come along to all the gigs & all the practice sessions.
"What else am I supposed to do?" she would ask.
As time went on the rest of the band grew more & more sick of her. And Temper Tantrum & ShitHotGuitarist's wife started bitching at each other, which from what I could see was all Temper Tantrum's fault.
Eventually it all got too much & ShitHotGuitarist quit the band, taking the drummer with him.
The remaining 3 of us tried to carry on, we managed to recruit a new guitarist but struggled for a drummer. At the same time Temper Tantrum & I decided to move to Crapsville.
And that was that.

Once settled in Crapsville in our own home, the opportunity arose for me to join the only original band in Crapsville as lead singer. This was great as I was already firm friends with the drummer. For reasons I still don't know, they all decided to jack it in after about 2 weeks. I don't think it was me, but you can never know, eh?
And that was that.

There followed about 5 years of creative stagnation. My muse sensationally returned to me at the time of the She Who Changed Everything saga. I wrote loads of songs within a few weeks, this time I had some outlet as by now Reckless had learned to play guitar. Due to the lyrical content of my new songs, I couldn't play them around Temper Tantrum & I was very rarely out of Temper Tantrum's grasp. She found the lyrics to "All too human" (No.1 single in the right hands, I swear!) & all hell broke loose. The lyrical theme of the song being I'd do anything "..when it comes to you". I managed to spin her a yarn about how I was trying to think back to how I'd felt when we first met & recreate those emotions. It worked but from then on all new songs had to be hidden away. And as Neil Hannon once crooned; a song is not a song until it's listened to.

On the occasions that I'd get to hang with Reckless sans Temper Tantrum the songs would come to life.

Eventually I left Temper Tantrum.
This may all sound like I blame her for not getting anywhere or doing anything. I don't.
I blame myself for not standing up & saying "No, Fuck you! This is who I am & what I want to do" but I've never been that strong. I am a very weak minded individual.

Since then Reckless & I tried to form a band in Northampton, which crashed & burned pretty quickly as Reckless, bless him, can't keep time to save his life. A problem that was never evident while it was just guitar & voice. I tried whoring myself to Simon Cowell & his cronies on last year's X factor which was a complete waste of time.

And then I found Reason & made "Confessions of an idiot" of which I am fiercely proud. I do believe that despite technical issues & limited musicianship it shows that I do have a talent.

Now, I am reasonably content to potter on making an album on my computer here & there. It's quite fulfilling. In fact all this thinking about it (which I've been doing for the last 48 hours) has given me fresh impetus to crack on with Album 2.

Or perhaps I should just have answered: Not enough.

Actually, now I've just read that all back to myself I find myself feeling very sad.
It appears I have become the very thing that I always said I wouldn't be: One of those people who says when they're old; " What if...?"
And that's that.