Perfectly Fine ALBUM LAUNCH PARTY, 6th Dec 2010

 

Acoustic Rooms Presents....

Marc Reeves' 'Perfectly Fine' Album Launch Party at The Rescue Rooms (Nottingham)

6th December 2010 - FREE ENTRY - 7:30pm onwards

Happy hour prices on drinks all night!

With support from:

The Golden Troubadours

Gerry Trimble

Johnathan Millett

Angelo Panzera

It's going to be an awesome night, really can't wait. You'll be able to pick up a CD copy of my album for £4, before the official release. I'll be playing you all some songs from the album, plus some new material I've been working on. All the supports are awesome, entry is FREE, and you can get my album early :) You can't beat that for value! So don't miss out on this one!

New album, 'Perfectly Fine', out December 10th 2010

So, I'm not doing very well at this blogging thing. I doubt I'll ever manage to regularly update it as I haven't really got the time. so here's a quick update for you:
My new album Perfectly Fine will be released on December 10th 2010, via my website, www.marcreeves.co.uk, cdbaby.com, iTunes, Amazon MP3 (here), and all other major music download retailers. It contains 15 tracks that have been recorded, mixed & mastered entirely by myself at my home studio over the course of a year. I hope you enjoy it :)

All the best,
Marc.

PS. The acoustic guitar has been finished for some time now, and I have been playing it lots. Turned out to be the right move re-spraying it, as it looks pretty nice, and still plays and sounds rather good. It's by no means a Martin or Taylor, but it's a very playable guitar which sounds very nice. In combination with my new LR Baggs M1 Active pickup I bought recently, it's a great guitar to gig with, which makes such a difference after gigging for so long with a rubbish guitar!

Acoustic guitar respray project

Okay, so once upon a time, my mother gave to me her acoustic guitar. It was a lovely sounding guitar that I wanted to play live, rather than the piece of rubbish I have been using! Problem was, this lovely acoustic guitar was all pink and sparkly. Okay, in itself there's nothing wrong there, but it's not how a true gangsta like me rolls! Something had to be done, or otherwise my manliness and street cred were at stake!
So, long story short, I decided to sand it down and re-spray it blue (well actually a warm red was my first idea.)
I forgot to take pictures at the start, and before I started spraying it blue, so I do apologise, but above are some pictures from when it was about half done. It's almost done now :) Just got to do another coat tomorrow, and then add the finisher, finishing coat thingy stuff. Hopefully the weathers okay, so I can get it done by tomorrow, or thereabouts.
I will post pictures when the guitar is done, and seeing as I have just invested (cough *ebay* cough) in a digital video camera, I will have to film some videos of me playing some stuff on it. I hope the tone is not destroyed :S
Anyway,
ta ta for now,
Marc.

New album 'Perfectly Fine' progress, out Dec 2010??

Well, for those of you that don't know, I'm working on a new album entitled 'Perfectly Fine'. It's a poppy, folky, slightly rocky, mellow album. It will feature around 14 tracks, maybe slightly more, maybe slightly less. I have written and recorded 20 in total.
It's all in the final stages of being mixed and mastered right now, with around 10 tracks already done. Once it's all mixed and mastered there will be plenty of referencing to do (after all the mix stage referencing I've done!) And yes, it's all been recorded, mixed & mastered by myself (hence why I have been going crazy the last few months!) I would not recommend this approach unless like me you are very interested in sound engineering and mixing. It is an endless struggle, although it is immensely rewarding.
Then after that I'll be shooting some photos for the album artwork with my good friend Simon Feerick (also the drummer for local Alt. Rock band Adarna, which, on a side note, if you ever see them on the bill for a gig, go check them out, they're great.) The artwork will then be printed and the Cd's will be pressed, as well as a digital release through iTunes and amazon MP3.
I'm shooting for a December 2010 release, but at this stage it's hard to tell if it will be before then or after that. I will keep you all posted anyway. I will be doing a mini UK tour if funding allows, and I will be holding an album launch party in Nottingham (no venue confirmed yet, I have several in mind.) At the launch party I would also like to showcase some of my favourite singer-songwriters of the midlands, although there are so many that I love!
Anyway, I'm rambling again, only meant to do a very brief update! I have a 18 songs to learn for a wedding I will be playing at with Mood Indigo (featuring Steve Pinnock, also one of the owners of Nottinghams' Central Music Venue and Bar!)
Off I go :P
All the best,
Marc.

2010 Update, video shoot and more :)

Well, it's been a long time since I last updated this blog (August 2009! :O), so I thought I should do a quick update on how my career is going etc.
I had planned to become a frequent blogger, and use this as my kind of central news hub or whatever you want to call it, but really I'm much more active on facebook nowadays :P Kinda funny since I used to hate it so much, but it's a really useful tool for musicians to network with.
Anyway, recently I had a video shoot for Nottinghams Evening Post. They do a monthly feature called This is Live on their website and in their paper on local musicians, and I managed to get myself a spot on there!
I did a live acoustic version of my song Shadows (which will be on my new album 'Perfectly Fine', more on that in a bit), and then had a short interview for the video. I also had some pictures taken, and will have a printed interview for the paper.
I will update this post when the video is up on youtube and the This is Live site :D Apparently it will take around two weeks for it to be done :)
It was quite a weird experience to say the least, seeing as I've never done anything like that before. I'm not sure how the performance will turn out, as I didn't feel totally comfortable, so I think I forced my voice a bit :S I think it went alright though, I'll let you be the judge!
One thing that annoys the hell out of me is that my nerves always seem to manifest themselves with DMS (Dry Mouth Syndrome), and so when I was doing the interview I had a horrible dry mouth, which always makes me feel self conscious! I'm still proud of myself for doing it though, and hope you all enjoy it when it's out, feel free to let me know what you think I did well/could have done better.
Also, I had a gig at The Bodega Social in Nottingham the other night, as part of their new Creative Notts sessions. It's a free live acoustic show, as part of Oxjam. The first one took place outside in the beer garden, and had a great atmosphere, and some amazing acts, including the fantastic Boat to Row as headliners. You can find some youtube videos online of their performance. I may link to some on here too.
Unfortunately for the show I was involved in things had to be moved inside, due to potentially bad weather and other reasons. It still didn't hamper the mood though, there was an awesome vibe going on and some great acts, in particular I was very impressed with Cecille Grey. Local Math/Prog/Metal/Hard to define rockers Ocean Bottom Nightmare pulled off a great acoustic set, which was a considerable feat considering their genre. Liam o Kane provided some Ska/Reggae infused acoustic tunes, all lead by his fantastic voice! The guy can really sing!
My set went pretty well I think, although my rather terrible acoustic was annoying me to no end! I have a great sounding Freshman acoustic, which was given to me by my mother. I don't use it live though as it is pink and sparkly (haha)! I was thinking of buying a new acoustic live to replace the crappy one I'm currently using (some budget Stagg that I won back at college), but then I thought why not re-do the paint job on the Freshman?
So that is what I'm attempting to do! I have sanded down the first layer of the finish, and am going to re-spray it. I think maybe a dark glossy red or something. Any suggestions would be appreciated :D
Anyway, I'll probably post some pics of the guitar when it's done, but for now, I'm out!
Thanks for reading (if you got this far :P)
Marc.
www.marcreeves.co.uk