Day 27

Thursday March 18, 2021

Mark:

We tend not to talk about Sarah related stuff in the apartment, good or bad. Today while we’re out and about, we agree that while we love the touring idea, we’re not just going to look at upping and leaving as soon as we can. We’ve been given this opportunity of our own apartment based on Sarah needing someone in it and to take off anytime in the next few weeks would be a bit of a betrayal of that. And besides, should the visa situation be sorted, it would be no hardship to stay here in London for a while. I kinda had the same thoughts when I first came to London with that office job Paul had got for me while I was still living in Madrid. The boss there really came through, giving me the job on Paul’s say so and on the strength of a one minute phone conversation with me. Although I was itching to dive into London’s music scene and really start my journey there, I decided to commit to that job for at least six months, maybe even a year, and maybe gently work myself into music at the same time. As it happened of course, it all fell apart after just two weeks which blew all my good will apart. As a friend said at the time, when the hurricane was still at its fiercest, that was the best thing that could have happened to me as it left me free to follow my London path. I had already begun to harbour such thoughts myself and did my best to agree, but damn it was hard to do so.

Maja:

So if I’m going to stay in London, I need a visa. And our lovely friend Sarah is very well connected so she decides to help me have a look at that. First things first, she asks me to write up a CV so she can send that to her lawyer friend so he can have a look on how to make this happen. I do and she has a look and she’s mighty impressed. She discovers now that I’m an engineer and not some kind of damsel in distress that she had imagined. She still sends it off to see if I could get a visa in some kind of way, but the reality is like this, I could get a visa. A working visa. 

So why don’t I just do that then? Honest answer, I am not ready to do that. I am going through a divorce and that has put tremendous pressure on me, so I don’t feel like I could do that right now. 

I might do that later, but also, if you take that route you get stuck in the same job with a lot of terms, and I might want to reduce the amount of time I work to get more time doing the things I value in life such as doing music. And with a working visa I would get stuck in the same squirrel wheel everyone is in, and I am right now dying to get out of. 

I might want to take a freelancing job for some money, or work half time or something else, but I don’t want to commit to working full time right now. I just can’t commit to that.

So for now, I continue to look for a situation to coexist with Mark. And Sarah, with her newfound knowledge of me not being a damsel in distress as she previously thought, is starting to change her attitude about me… 

Mark:

Sarah’s met a guy around the local area called Dee. She had him round the apartment a few days ago for a bit of a social and really liked his vibe and where he seemed to be going musically. He’s into production and rap and she thinks he could be a good fit for us, whatever ‘us’ means. So we settle on a rough rehearsal time – all times are rough around here, and around 6pm, all four of us are in the main room and ready to see what kinds of sounds we can make. Me and Maja have been rehearsing a little by this point and have worked out something of a system for jamming and this is our first chance to try it out. It works quite well and there really is something of a special vibe with the two of us playing together. Bass is all about feel, and that’s exactly what we’re talking about here. We settle on something simple with Maja playing single, steady root notes and me playing grooves and solos over them. Well, I’ve never had such a feeling playing over such a simple beat. All the emotion is in those single notes and I’m able to feed of that and produce some really great feeling grooves that have Dee moving all over the place and singing and rapping like it’s the most effortless thing in the world. This feeds back into what we’re doing and we hit a new level, which Dee takes up to move himself even more and so the cycle goes. As it builds and builds, Sarah starts to sing as well, so we have the two of them really going for it as me and Maja keep things burning here, with Maja holding the full bottom rhythm as I play off the two singers while keeping the groove going for them at the same time. As this continues, as the dual basses pump and rumble, the dancing starts and we feel the start of something really special coming together. We jam through a few more bits and pieces for twenty minutes or so and then stop to collect our thoughts. Sarah has seen enough. ‘This is serious,’ she declares. ‘The power and vibe of the four personalities in this room is just huge. This is on. We all look at each other and agree. Myself, Maja and Sarah already feel like we have a massive collective personality, like we could take on anything and Dee has just come and fitted right into that, while adding a whole new dimension of positivity. Apart from anything else, he loves the vibes and positivity given off by me and Maja, loves the whole feel of the two of us playing bass, and, as a particular fan of bass, really likes the way I play individually. There’s so much more that can be tried as well. This really looks set. ‘Guys, we’re doing this,’ says Sarah. Twice a week, maybe three times a week, in here for two hours at a time, no messing about. Yeah?’ We all look at each other and smile. Yes, it’s on. This is happening. On top of everything else, Maja is now in a band. But there’s more. A member of an international chart topping band has expressed an interest in joining us. But not just that. This is someone from one of Maja’s favourite bands. Sarah tells us about this, but warns us that if it happens, this person might well try to take it over as their project. We look at each other again. No. This is ours. Don’t care who it is, no thanks. Maja leads the charge on this. So now, not only is she in her first London band, she’s now also turned down the opportunity of working with someone from one of her favourite bands. This is all getting a bit surreal.