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/

Review of the CC Muziek Café Jam Sessions in the Amsterdam Stun

Andy at the Amsterdam Stun has given us a great write up and photos in this month's edition. It's available here.

Led Zep and press interviews....

We had another great night last night. The previous week had given me a little confidence in the fact that I could sit back and enjoy the night a little. When I arrived, Robert and Fergus were already playing away. I quickly got everything set up and joined in. We now have a big enough group of musicians that there are several regular faces who are showing up – Bram, Ali, Wally, Roberto etc.

It was a very “Jammy” night, I don’t think I sang until about 23:00 and I was even playing the drums for quite a while.

After last Friday’s couch Jam – and a few new friends came along. Thanks to David and Elisa.

The band I'm playing in all came along(sans Tamira) and we ran through a few of the songs that I still need to work on before Saturday:

Lisa looks particularly annoyed, but no one is really sure why.

We also had a returning drummer in the form of Wally, who kicked off a medley of Led Zeppelin songs:

We managed to make it all the way through Stairway to heaven with nearly the right words. Whole Lotta Love with no words, and Thank You with a lyric sheet. It was great fun too loud, and very entertaining.

While all this was going on, Matthew was interviewing various Jam Session hosts and regulars for a promo video for the bar. Watch this space - embarassing-interview-youtube-moment on the horizon.

As with last week the night closed magnificently with a Set by Giovanni and James which featured lots of guest stars:

Roll on next weekkkkkkkkkkk.............

Branching out.....

I wrote a small piece about the Amsterdam music scene in the winter for an Amsterdam Travel blog.

The perfect Saturday

Today might have been my favourite day of the year so far.... except for our Easter Sunday.

The day started badly with finance problems fuelled by false requests for municipality taxes. Sandra soon brightened the gloom and doom by arriving with breakfast… so we has one of those breakfasts that lasts until lunch time. Sausages eggs, bread, fresh fruit, veg…. and South Park… with the sun blaring in through the window.

Oops…. This is a music blog.

We dragged ourselves from the Breakfast table about 1pm(told you), we then headed for Dam Square, where some film makers were recording footage of Sandra busking for a youtube magazine show that is starting…

 

from there the film makers joined our entourage of happy wanderers and we headed to Amstelveld where Sandra has been asked to play at wedding:

The wedding was at Café Nel, and the plan was to play for 30-45 minutes. We had prepared a set of songs and I expected it to be a fairly relaxed affair. Once the guest started to arrive, I was feeling pretty underdressed:

We played a great set sitting in the sun with the wedding party all very happy and the children perplexed by the multi-coloured musician that had graced their party:

We walked back from Amstelveld with “music earned” money in our pockets on a lovely day, so spirits were high. We found Tamira and Hanan and decided that white wine and Greek food was the perfect solution for the lovely day. Sandra serenaded people(and Lincoln Continentals) along the way…

We closed the night about 3 am with a burger after a night in the mine with Anna and Coco.