08-06-09 – Soundtrack to the Apocalypse / Dear Simon…

Okedy kokedy!

This week entailed:

- The YAWA EP Launch Gig! (7/10)
- Putting a bunch of YAWA songs + clips from the EP online
- Making the YAWA Store
- Making the YAWA Website
- Getting up in the club one time
- Ordered my Download ticket!
- Making the beat for Alice Deejay – Better off Alone
- Almost securing my first advertising deal on boyinaband!
- Sending off a letter that could change everything
- Hanging out at Kierans =D
- Getting Metal with Eamon (Guitar Hero Metallica = exhausting!)
- The weekly LOLcat search.

Everybody say Woo-ooah! (Woo-ooah!) Everybody say YAWA’s EP is on sale just over there! (*confused looks*)

This was the last gig we’ll ever play at the little civic – It’s closing down now. This is the venue where I encountered Kieran for the first time, the venue where Zak came to watch YAWA before joining the band, the venue where Jamie supported us in his old band NIP years back. The venue I saw one of my first gigs ever with a band called “Days of Grace”. The venue Interabang played last before everyone went to different sides of the country/globe.

Suffice to say it means a lot to me.

So I’m glad it was a good gig.

Though it didn’t start off too promisingly – when the first band played, it didn’t look too full. Out from animals (It was ace to see them again) taking the stage next played to a slightly more promising crowd, but when we took to the stage there was a good crowd there. I am sure at least half of the crowd knew the words to most of our songs.

Before we went on, I was imagining a 5/10 gig, but when we started, everyone was really feeling it. Everyone was singing along. Everyone raved, hip hopped and rocked out when I told them to. Good times. I also managed to plug the EP between every song, which was fun – even during Supernova in one of the preverses, which I was particularly proud of.

We played through the whole EP as our set – playing 25200 Degrees live for the first time. I was unsure how it’d work as a live track, as I feel like it’s a more poppy, mainstream track, but as soon as it kicked in I really felt it. It’s got a frickin’ cool bounciness to it which I only noticed live. Plus it’s one of the few songs where you can understand the word’s I’m saying without the need for a lyrics sheet I’m thinking I’ll write more of those.

We sold a bunch of merch, putting a chunk back into the gap in my wallet (I subsidised the purchasing of the merch) which is novel! The worst part about being a musician in an unsigned band is having to worry about money, closely followed by having to worry about undedicated band members – though that generally comes down to money too. Or girlfriends. But yeah, I digress.

Though the gig was not all about music and money – It was about mates too! The usual awesome YAWA supporters came; Vikki, Carnie, Rachie, Lou, Emmie… (There’s a lot of “-ie” suffixes going on there) who also brought their homeslices, who seemed to really enjoy it! Some of them bought the EP, others have joined to the forum which is getting a bit more active since the gig My homeslices Ogre, Claire and Kirstie represented – I like having good friends. Also, all the girlfriends of the YAWA members were there, including Eamon’s missus all the way from Scotland! And I brought my…uh… sister.

Counted down to Apocalypse

So now there are clips of all the tracks from the EP online, and 4 of the full songs are up. I figured that we’d already shown people the old versions of those songs, so may as well put the new ones up instead. It’s difficult deciding whether to hold some songs back so more people will buy the EP to hear unreleased material, but I figured releasing teasers was the best way to go about advertising it – if people want to hear the full songs, they’ll buy the EP.

I’d love to get to the point where I could just release music for free and get money from gigging and merch. Maybe some sort of hardcore subscriber fanbase where people pay a yearly fee to get everything earlier, with a bunch of merch along with it or something… One day.

Anyway, head over to the YAWA myspace and give the tracks a listen if you haven’t already. Now I’ve had a chance to sit back and listen to the songs without worrying about mixing them, I think my favourite is Space and Time. I love the energy of it. It’s so pacey… and so exhausting live! It’s constantly intense vocals. It’s as bad as Navigator, without the dancey break to catch my breath >< Fun though!

YAWA Store – I like the Clubland font.

http://www.youandwhatarmy.co.uk/yawastore.php – I whipped this up on the morning of June 5th just before we started practicing for the gig. You can buy the EP and some T-shirts here, in promo packs. It’s pretty sweet I am addicted to the Clubland font that’s at the top. You may notice it popping up in a lot of the digital art I do.

YAWA site – I still like the Clubland font.

http://www.youandwhatarmy.co.uk/ – My parents suggested that I put the lyrics online after the EP release since we couldn’t get them in the booklet, so I did just that. Another site I put together in a few hours just to do the job until I can make something a little more fancy (Though I actually kinda like the simplicity of the design at the moment.)

And the Clubland font is at the top again. It’s so pretty.

Speaking of Da club…

A special guest has ventured into the club again! Suffice to say that as soon as Scratch returns to da club, KOC will be releasing a new track. It’s kinda gay. And also kinda Scottish. See if you can guess who is the guest rapper!

DOWNLOOOOOOOOAD!1111111

Last time I went to a festival was download in 2004 – Linkin Park and Metallica headline. I saw Slipknot for the first time there and that’s what made me stop thinking of them as mindless screaming and start appreciating heavier music. 5 years later I’ll be returning to the hallowed grounds of Donnington to watch Limp Bizkit. There are some other bands too, but it’s mainly for the Durstmeister that I’m going – I need to see them a) for the lol and b) before they break up again.

I believe I’m heading out on Wednesday – it’s gonna be a loooong extended weekend!

Commission.finished;

Check it out:

That’s all my commissions done, I’ve had a lot of positive feedback about this one which is ace I like that the day after posting a video it’s generally got around 15-20 5 star ratings from my subscribers. Even though I don’t want to do tutorials for the rest of my life, it’s still cool to know I’m helping people out and they appreciate it!

Primeloops!

I e-mailed this company, primeloops.com – a site I’d seen before and remembered ’cause it looked nice. They sell samples, so I approached them with a proposal for an advertising deal. Now I’m in the process of securing monthly exclusive advertising with them! I’ve put the ads up, now all they need to do is… uh… pay me. This has the potential to be the start of me not having to get a 9-5 job!

Which is ace

Dear Simon.

For those of you who don’t know, I was on TV a few years ago with YAWA – one of the judges, Simon Gavin, called us ludicrously brilliant. He also happens to be high up in A&M records. Feel free to remenisce with me:

I sent off a letter to him, with YAWA’s shiny new EP and another CD with a few choice tracks. If you want to read it, I’ve uploaded it for you. Click them to open them up to read properly

I attempted to go for a concise, humorous, assertive, interesting message. He must get a zillion unsolicited press packs through. So I tried to make this one stand out.

My mom was really helpful here – she found the address, got some nice, heavy paper to print the letter on, got some CD stickers for the other accompanying CD and printed the addresses out for the envelope so it would all look as professional as possible. I am frickin’ lucky to have such awesome parents.

I sent it special delivery today, so it should arrive at the A&M offices before 1pm tomorrow. I don’t even know if Simon will read it, but even if he doesn’t, I have done absolutely everything I can think of to give a good impression, so I won’t be wondering “Well what if I did this…”. I’ve tried my best with my best shot. It’d be ace if it worked out.

O HAI KIERAN

I made the trek up to Kettering for some Kieran time this week, we watched the Simpsons Movie (I hadn’t seen it before, it’s a lot better than I expected), ate chinese food (shock horror), walked his dog, did the dishes… come to think of it, I ended up doing most of the housework. I’m pretty sure I’m his cleaner now as opposed to his friend. How did that happen?

I think I’m going up tomorrow as well. Better wash my rubber gloves and dusting cloth.

OOOH YEYEAAAH!

Since Eamon got his shortty down from Scotland, Siobhan (for that is her name) and Mr. E both came down to mine for some Guitar Hero Metallica. Siobhan seriously is the female equivalent of Eamon, she’s really into her metal but can also enjoy bubblegum pop, enjoys guitar hero, spends hours and hours on internet forums and is genuinely a good person. It’s ace that two people so similar found each other, plus it means Kieran and I can repeatedly comment the pictures that they are both in on Facebook with “AWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWW” until it really starts to irritate everyone that has commented previously.

Anyway, GH Metallica is great fun. In my youth I had a few months where I was really into Metallica (Not really sure why!) so I know quite a few of their songs. The drums can be mental. It’s a great workout. It makes me miss my dance mat days though, I want to get back into that in a big way. I also want to try out DJ hero which came out recently. And I want beatmania, since that’s an awesome game… but I think it was only released outside of England. Gay.

Next Week on Dave’s Blog

I’ll be spending the vast majority of the week at Download Festival! Looks like I better queue up a few boyinaband posts. It’ll do me some good to get away from the internet for a few days – I tend to obsess over it when I’m at home. I’d probably get a lot more done if I only had internet access for a few hours a day. Though I’d feel asphyxiated at the same time. I love the internet. Anyway, the list:

- Download Festival (LIMP BIZKIT!!! Slipknot! Pendulum! Hollywood Undead!)
- Kieran’s at some point
- Getting my hopes up about hearing back from Simon Gavin
- Blogging some more on biab

Y’know, it’s mostly going to be a week of having fun instead of working. I think after the week of preparing for the EP launch and making those websites and commissions etc it’ll be nice to not have to think about anything like that. Though generally whenever I have a break, it just makes me think about that stuff even more. Maybe it’ll give me some motivation!

AND THE BLOGLY QUESTION: If YAWA could collaborate to make a song with one person or band, who would you pick?