I’m currently sat all beatnik-ed up in my room, ready to go and perform at the inaugural night of The Village Preservation Society‘s monthly residency at The Betsey Trotwood this evening.
Slight changes (or rather: additions) are now afoot in my cabaret offerings following my jaunt up to the Edinburgh Fringe last month. I went up to busk on the mean streets of the Royal Mile and prepared some cover versions and original bits to sing and play guitar to. I even made the very serious investment of purchasing a kazoo and bastardised harmonica holder to spice up the proceedings.
Considering I would never have dreamt of singing and playing in front of people under normal circumstances, coupled with the fact that I haven’t picked up my guitar regularly for ages, it went really well! I made a few bob (I do really mean ‘few’), didn’t have rotten food thrown at me and massively upped my confidence levels. I had NOWHERE NEAR as big a crowd as some of the old hands, but it was muchly useful nonetheless.
I subsequently had a radio interview on Leith FM, where I played a couple of my original songs (I’ll upload the catchily titled ‘A Chinese Food Loving Vegetarian’s Lament’, based on a song you’ll aaaaall know, soon…) and a couple of gigs at the legendary Bongo Club Cabaret where I had a fantastic time and realised that playing and singing in front of people and actually speaking(!) in between that, isn’t actually all that bad. Lovely friendly place to discover that. Thank you Bongo and Rhymes with Purple! Who’d’ve thunk it? Lois of the Lane made a brief but triumphant appearance at the Bongo too. She’s definitely here to stay 🙂
So, on the back of this, I’ve decided to start writing some more songs and do them on the comedy/cabaret circuit – as well as Ms of the Lane – and this evening I’m premiering a jaunty new song entitled ‘The Last 2 Zombies in the World‘ which I knocked out on Sunday. A month or so early I suppose, but it’s good to be prepared. (You never know when they might strike..) I’ll get it recorded at some point soon and stick it on my singing page. Keep your eyes/ears peeled for more…
Since I’ve been back from the beautiful ‘burgh I was a part of Jennifer Farmer‘s première performance of her new immersive theatre/sound play ‘Conversations I Wish I Could Overhear’ which was part of the Spit ‘n’ Scrub open studios at ASC Studios in Bow. I’ve also just found out that I’ve got a cracking part in a great piece called ‘No Surprises’ by Mikail Chowdhury, that’s going to be part of a one off charity event on the afternoon of Saturday 16th of October. More details on this one soon. Really looking forward to getting my teeth into it!
Until then, here’s a couple of picture of me busking on the Southbank, just before heading up to Edinburgh, taken by my friend Sarah:
You’ve gotta love a kazoo…