Artwork for my new album.

The art work is finished for my upcoming solo album. It's quite an uncomfortable feeling for me to bare my soul and record songs for posterity, but with no other creative musical option on my cards and some downtime. I felt it was time to take a big deep breath and just do it. I'm very pleased with the results.

For the artwork, there was no question but to work with Kenneth. He was the first person to listen to the tracks and gave me some support on continuing with my ponderous soul searching songs. He came up with the theme of baring my soul and not having anything to hide behind. We toyed with the concept of nudity and nakedness, and at one point thought of shooting me naked surrounded by all the instruments I'd played. With the fear of other people listening to my songs, the nudity was the least of my worries, but we abandoned the idea.

One summer evening when we were kicking our heels we went for a drive to the Dunaskin Industrial Heritage Centre. I don't think its open any more, but you can still get in and wander around the old buildings and all the industrial age machinery from the coal mines there. We wandered around with his dog Ruby and took influence from a bygone age.

A few days later, Kenneth sent through the draft album cover with the title "bare buff". I couldn't come to terms with nudity, nakedness and laid bare as an album title without thinking of sepia tinged shots of me staring into space like a pre raphaelite poet. Bare Buff means naked in a more archaic, joking, colloquial Scottish way, which I was much more comfortable with.

I found the artwork a little sparse initially, but it slowly grew on me. It has a darkness and the broken crane gives it a theme of interrupted productivity. There is also light at the end of the tunnel and hope on the horizon. Trying to build a future on a rusty history. I think it is as good a visual representation of the album and where my head was at when I recorded it as I can imagine.

Early morning with Tamira on English Breakfast Radio

I set my alarm clock for the first time since I left the office job today. Tamira had scored an appearance on English Breakfast Radio. The drawback was that we had to cycle out to the docks at the north of the centre just after 7 in the morning. Tamira surprised me by being wide awake!!! The truth was that she hadn;t been to bed which seems to have been the way to go... she was a lot more awake than I was.

There are real benefits to getting up this early.... the weather was lovely and the sun was just rising:

We went in and met Neville and he introduced us to the other guys. It was much more relaxed than our last radio appearance. The guys really welcomed us in and were keen for us to get involved in all aspects of the show. I think I embarassed Tamira by being a little too candid about some of the songs about her love life, but I think it made good radio. The guys were great. They played two of the tracks from Tamira's CD. There was lots of banter and they put us on the spot a few times but I think our 'eh's' and 'um's' fit in quite well the atmosphere they create. We also played one of Tamira's songs live and did our cover of Crazy Train.

By the end of the show I;d had enough coffee to feel human and we went to a cafe and had a chat with the guys. All in all a great experience. I'll probably need a siesta after my early start though.

You can stream the show from here

My Dutch TV debut

At last week's Jam a great guy came in called Alex. He was Malaysian but had spent a lot of time in Australia and he had the best of both destinations. He was a singer, guitar player and songwriter and he was over in Amsterdam as part of a TV series called Vakantieleifdes(Summer Love) The program reunites holiday romances to see if love blossoms on home turf. As part of the program they had decided to film Alex plying his trade in Amsterdam, so they chose a few of us to come back to CC Muziek Cafe on Saturday and be filmed playing with Alex.

On the Saturday I turned up, not quite knowing what to expect; it was very much off the cuff. The TV crew turned up. They were all great people and it was good fun watching how these things come together behind the scenes. We were snatching 15 minutes between the main bands to quickly run through a few songs. We'd decided to do one of Alex' songs, Another Brick in the wall and Hotel California. Luckily Ali came in, as he;s a much better guitarist than I and he can do the Eagles solos justice.

We got set up and Alex started playing his own song. I was playing along before and they were filming before I'd even worked out what key he was playing. It sounded great, but from my perspective I wasn't doing much. Ali took over and did Another Brick in the wall and Hotel California.

A few weeks later it was on the telly. Watching it online, it was edited very well and my fear that I looked a little useless was unfounded.

You can watch it here.

Jamming with Sandra and Manuel

Sandra and Manuel joined us this week in the Jam Session. It gave it a great boost. We did an excellent version of Ramble On by Led Zeppelin. I played bass and made the mistake of knowing the bass part. I don't play bass often, so my Bass playing finger stamina is pretty low. We kept it going for about 15 minutes and because I knew the bass part, I hadn't worked out the underlying chords, so I had to just keep playing through the pain.....

Day 2 - Mixing Fonz

I'm back in the control room. The control room is a big comfy seat in front of my speakers with the laptop on my knees. I've got 4 tracks to mix for Fonz and then 6 to master. I was a little apprehensive as I've never done this for any type of music other than rock and pop, but luckily everything still works out the same and they are sounding great. The electronic element means I can get away with a little bit more production in the vocals without it sounding too polished.

I think the result is really good. It is still rough and human like my other stuff but it's applied to a genre where things are often a little smooth.

Sandra's back!

The sun has returned to Amsterdam and Sandra has come with it! She's on good form, having learned some great songs to play with her wonderful guitar playing boyfriend Manuel. Look out for the three of us doing a great version of Ramble on by Led Zeppelin in pub near you(If you are in Amsterdam that is)

Day 1 - Recording Fonz

It feels great turning the living room into a recording studio again. I have great memories of recording Sandra and then Tamira in a similar setting.

First up is the guitar:

He's using a virtual amp and effects, so we don't need to worry about microphones and isolation. This means we can monitor the whole thing on a wedge monitor as he's playing and get a bit more feeling about the playing. Headphones can be annoyingly restrictive.

Alfons is a pretty good guitarist, so it;s a pleasure to watch him exchange 80's metal riffs with more modern hip hop beats. We decided to record various guitar elements for all the songs and then build a guitar part from what we like later:

It's going well, and we're flying through the tracks. Once the guitar is recorded, we move onto vocals. This is always a tougher affair. Most of the tracks have a rapping section, which are quite challenging at the best of times. Eventually once we find our groove, we're getting full takes without mistakes.

Before we know it, it's 8 O'clock and we've been working hard for 7 hours solid. The rough takes are sounding good and we think it's best to call it a night. I can't wait to get the tracks mixed and see how good I can make it sound. The type of music(Hip hop/Rap/crossover) is a far stretch from what I'm used to working with so it;s a real challenge.

New recording project - Fonz Fonzarelly

Starting as I mean to go on, I went to Melody Line today for a meeting with Alfons. I know him through Tamira, and he's been to a few of the Jam Sessions. He's a multitalented guitarist/singer/rapper. He's keen to pull together various music endevours into a mix tape that he can promote both virtually and physically to bring his music to wider audiences and hopefully move up to the next level.

He has some backing tracks, but needs my help to play guitar, rap and sing over them and mix and masters the results, so we agree to meet at Wagging Tail Studios(My living room) the next day to see what we can get recorded.

Pastures new

I'm now officially redundant. It's been a tough year so far, mostly spent sitting in an office where everyone knows that there is a big changing coming up. I decided that the sooner I got on with life the better. This equated to stopping working on the 1st of April. My plans??? I don;t really have any. I'm going to finally get rid of time as an excuse for not doing music. When I get bored or the money runs out I'll think of the next stage. This will be the longest period of my life without working since I was about 16.

Couch Jam

Our neigh ours dog is on holiday. I didn't have to babysit this Friday, so I was able to go to the excellent Talia CouchJam. It was the usual wonderfully relaxed affair, with great food and great music. The highlight for me was a medley of impromptu Pearl Jam songs. I was amazed that so many people there knew all the words.

My Dutch Radio Debut

I really made the most of my day off work this week. Tamira has been asked to appear on the radio - Amsterdam FM. She asked me to come along for a little moral support and to add a second guitar to some of her songs.

We were appearing on the 'literature hour'. This meant that several authors had come along to be interviewed about their music and Tamira and I would play songs in between. We started with Randy - one of Tamira's own songs. They asked Tamira about her album etc.

Between songs we had to quietly sit and listen to the interviews. Tamira was pretty worse for wear from the night before, so I think her lasting memory of the evening will be an hour spent stifling coughs. We also played Crazy Train which we'd been practicing.

I think it went pretty well. The hosts were pretty happy.

Crazy Train(Ozzy Osbourne) - Tamira Herrebrugh & Neil McKenzie

Video from yesterday's practice. I managed to work out how to use iMovie to replace the audio in the video with a mixed recording of the audio and then sync them both together.

Thursday Jam with a sore throat

I have almost no voice at the moment, so I did absolutely no singing at the Jam Session. I felt I had to make up for it by making sure that I put in plenty stage-time as a drummer, a Bassist and a guitarist for the night.

My second technorati article - Google Adsense

I was a little frustrated at losing my Google Adsense account for these blogs. After a litle investigation, I discovered that it's not so easy to make money from Google Ads. I wrote a short article about it for Technorati:

http://technorati.com/business/advertising/article/does-anyone-actually-make-money-from/

I'm hoping to put together a bigger article about how to make a little money on the side for music activities from blogs and advertising on your site, but it would appear that it's not as simple as I first thought.

Neil McKenzie - Solo - Cafe Del Mondo, 26.02.2011

Last night was a special occasion. It was my first ever solo gig. I've had lots of opportunities to prove to myself that I can do it, but this was the first time that it was only my name on the bill and I had no one to hide behind.

I swithered as to whether to take the gig or not, but I knew I had enough material, so I went for it in an attempt to take new steps and grow a little.

Cafe Del Mondo is a great little bar on the Nieuwmarkt in Amsterdam which itself is full of terraced bars. By day these are full of coffee-ing tourists having a well earned rest on one of the most picturesque squares in Amsterdam. By night the place opens up to a nightlife that is a little more respectable or older than that on Leidseplein or Rembrandtplein. The Proximity to the red light district means there is also a steady traffic of tourists wandering around.

I'd been in the bar before for coffee on a saturday to recharge the batteries during a morning market session, but I'd never been in at night. The bar is quite small as a music venue, but let's call it "intimate". This is good news - I'm not expecting a big crowd.

Karolina and I introduce ourselves to the owner and set up a makeshift stage on the mezzanine level at the back. It creates a lovely homely atmosphere:

I play my first set(see below). The audience are unresponsive but seem pretty happy, The odd person sings along and people slowly trickle in which at least tells me that I'm not scaring punters off. A few times, big groups of English tourists in track suits pass the door and I pray that they don't come in. Luckily they don't.

Before I know it the first set is over, which lets me know that everythings gone fine, the owner is happy and all the equipment works. I am able to relax over a beer and talk to karolina about how it went. By now it's about 10:30 and the night is in full swing for most people. Everyone has had a few more drinks. The rain has started which means we're unlikly to get many new audience members but it also makes the ones we do have less likely to leave.

I kick off the second set, and the crowd are clearly far more responsive. The singing is geting louder and I think they are enjoying the laid back but well known songs that I'm playing. Before I know it the set is over and it's time to go home... All in all - another mountain climbed!!

Here's what I played:

Open Mike @ Mollys - February 2011

With the hectic uncertainty of the Jam Sessions, it's nice to come home to Mollys and know what's happening. It also feel like ages since I played with Fraser, cos there's been so much musical stuff in the past month.

Fraser's knackered cos he's working 2 jobs this week. I'm not much better due to the stress of work. We start with a pint of guinness and a fish and chips and that puts us right.

Having prepped a few tracks on Sunday - we wanted to knock them out early, but the voices also need to warm up first, so we did Ziggy Stardust and Dancing in the moonlight to break our voices and then did our two prepared numbers:





I think they went down pretty well. 'In the air tonight' is possibly a little dour. There was no danger of that tonight. An inebriated vision-in-red decided to join in for our last choruses providing some comic relief to the emotional climax to the song.

After this Tamira and Lisa came up and we did No woman no cry, I alone, You can leave your hat on and stuck in the middle with you. I hate no woman no cry - it's one of those songs that is so overplayed that I have never learned it - so any time anyone suggests it we end up staggering through it unconvincingly. Hopefully no one noticed.

After all the regulars, Ali who is a regular at our Thursday Tunes Jam plays some alternative tuning wonders for us. Included in the 4 songs were Romeo and Juliet by Dire Straits and So Lonely by The Police. He was excellent - especially The Police cover which people really liked.(Translation - If Neil can sing this one he's going to steal it)

After this Fraser and I returned to the stage to do Boys are back in Town, Fat Bottomed Girls and Man in the Mirror. Fraser gave in to his tiredness and headed home leaving me to hold fort. He was swiftly followed by Tamira(not like that) who headed over to The waterhole

This left me on my todd - so to speak. A Mystere helped me out by performing three of his own songs(Need, Free and Fog). They were wonderful as always. At the open mike when people do their own songs, there's always a difficulty in keeping the audience attentive, but they seemed to enjoy them.

After that we had a Mollys Debut from german guy who sang songs in a German Dialect(Platt??) which is similar to Dutch. He was very good - very entertaining. Unfortunately other than his name(Stefan) I don't have any other details.

As our second Debut of the night, Francisco came next. We had spoken online. Unfortunately there were some language barriers in the way and at first I thought he was a guitarist. Once I'd worked out he was a Bass player, we did a few songs to end and then called it a night.

Gig this Saturday - Café Del Mondo, Amsterdam - Neil solo

Last minute booking for this Saturday in Café Del Mondo

It's a bar round the corner from my house, so I was keen to take the gig and add another local to my portfolio(can drinking establishments be collected in a portfolio???). Sandra is still in Sweden, Tamira is off seeing Zack Wylde, Fraser is working, so I have no one to hide behind. I'm going to knock out 2 sets of covers that I've been singing every week at the Jam Sessions.

Poster as always by Kenneth Clarke.

Sunday night practice

Yesterday a very tired Fraser came round early and we ran through a few songs for the open mike before he had a kip on the couch. We are toying with Movin on up by primal scream, which Eoghan had shown me could work well last Thursday. We also mined Phil Collins catalogue for the first time. This has resulted in us trying to work out if 'in the air tonight' is too dour for the open mike.

In the evening, once Fraser had sobered woken up, Tamira came round and we ran through a few more ideas. We tried an acoustic version of 'you can leave your hat on', but we're not sure if the bass and minimal guitar fills the spaces in the verses well enough. I continued to try to get everyone to enjoy Sympathy for the Devil and we we also worked on 'I alone' by Anouk/Live.

Last month was very good, so hopefully we can keep up the standard.

A percussivley policed jam

We had a few firsts at our jam session this week. We had our first Didgeridoo and the police came for a a listen. Not Sting and Stewart Copeland (although if you're listening boys, you're welcome to pop in), but the boys in blue, the fuzz or the Rozzers.

Other than the police following up a noise complaint, it was a damn good night. we had a lot of new faces. Multi-instrumentalists Nate and Francisco were there from the onset and we had some cool chilled out jams with the Didgeridoo and some percussion.

Once a few more people had arrived, despite having had a dodgy throat all week, I kicked the singing off with a few of our standards:

Luckily Eoghan arrived again to taise the bar and teach a few new songs. we did a pretty good jam on 'Movin' on up' by Primal Scream:



Now that I know it, I think I'm going to steal Eoghan's idea and Fraser and I will try it at the next open mike.

Ali also showed up around this point. He's a wonderful lead guitarist, but what I didn;t know is that he prefers acoustic. Ali and Eoghan then did a version of romeo and Juliet with David:

Ali then did some great folk in DADGAD tuning:

Christoph the drummer also made his first appearace at this Jam session. We had many a good Jam at the Mine with Christoph and it was great to see him again. He was there with another new face; Pascal. Sensing some serious talent I paired them with Lorenzo and Robert and we heard some of the best music that the Jam has produced so far; assisted throughout by Nate and Francisco on percussion . Well done boys!

A usual, the CC Muziek Café lounge was pretty full too:

After this the police arrived, so Tamira's set was particularly quiet. The regulars then kept the Jam going until I unplugged things at 1:30am so that I could go home to bed before work.

Article published on spotify

I had an article published on Technorati. It's a short piece about the returns from spotify for amatuer musicians when using CDbaby. The title should read "Spotify for the amatuer musician" but somewhere along the way an "is" got added. So it looks positive in nature, whereas I intended it to be unbiased. Please comment, share and retweet and let me know what you think. If I get some response, I'll do this kind of thing more often.

http://technorati.com/entertainment/music/article/spotify-is-for-the-amatuer-musician/