Day 139

Tuesday May 9, 2023

Not really Tuesday, more a few extra thoughts on what I wrote in yesterday’s entry.

That musical bits and pieces and practice I mentioned. A bit part of this is a few demo recordings of upcoming songs which we have planned for the second album. I think we should say it now. We kinda have the next album written too. And albums beyond that. We’re essentially adding new songs all the time so this is going to be a fluid situation of course, but yeah, albums one and two could be pretty much done writing wise if we needed them both right now. I think we’ve said this next bit before, but no harm saying it again if we have. Whatever new songs we have coming up, we plan on keeping the track list as it is for the debut album. Which means we have songs that we consider better than what’s on there which we’re not putting on. We don’t see this as arrogant or complacent, more an assertion that we really want the album that we wrote to exist. We bumped off Run and Smile Is Going Round when Make Me Shine and then The Cat came along, but now that’s done, we really can’t imagine it without any of the other songs. 

Day 154

Wednesday May 24, 2023

Maja got back last night and massively surprises me first thing this morning when she says, I’d really like to do an open mic tonight. Oh. OK. We have a look and All About Eve in Camden is on. Cool. Let’s go and have another bite at that.

As soon as we walk in we meet someone who remembers us from Coppercats, our first London show once we decided we were really going to get going. His name is Martin, also a songwriter, and he becomes our hang out buddy for the evening.

Our big takeaway from tonight is that we need to shake off a bit of rust. As we look down our song list, we realise we don’t feel confident about totally remembering quite a lot of them. We’re badly in need of a few refresher rehearsals with our last show, and indeed our last time playing together at all having been over three weeks ago. 

And not only that. When our turn does come and we have our three decided, something just doesn’t quite feel right. Maybe we’re concentrating a bit too much because the full on energy isn’t quite there. We get a nice reaction, but not huge, and I think it’s telling that we return to our seats feeling completely relaxed and all in our stride, whereas in some performances we’ve been breathing heavily after just one song, and at times ready to drop after three. Yeah. I think we’ve unintentionally phoned it in tonight. But there aren’t too many performers and everyone gets another go round. Not only that, but we can do two songs rather than the one which is customary in a second go around. Well, this time it smashes out and we feel back with so much rust having been shaken off in that first performance. We feel much more connected with the material, with our own performances, and just with each other in a stage environment. The feeling is totally different and the audience reaction is much more what we’ve become accustomed to. Yep. Having the bonus of an extra bite has really made all the difference. If we hadn’t, I believe we may have headed home feeling a little flat, but reassuring ourselves that we had all our previous form to fall back on in terms of confidence. But getting that second chance has made all the difference and totally transforms the feeling we have as we make our way home.

Day 155

Thursday May 25, 2023

We’ve been in London five months now and have decided it’s time to move to Camden Town, the total musical centre of London and the adopted and actual home of so many legendary acts. The Clash, Madness, The Libertines. And of course Britpop, during which time it must have felt like the very centre of the universe. Oasis lived there. And of course Amy Winehouse. She worked in Camden Market before she was famous and there are tributes to her all over Camden Town. Paintings on walls and in shops, bars and cafes, as well as a statue in Stables Market.

The idea of moving around now came from Maja a few days ago when she asked what I would think of it. Totally yes if you’re OK with it. Of course she is otherwise it wouldn’t have come up. She also says she’s really felt the Camden vibe whenever we’ve visited. Yep. I have that too. Especially as I lived just down the road from it in Kentish Town for six years and went there regularly, most notably to The Blues Kitchen. And of course Maja lived in Ktown too for that short period just before we made the move to Ireland. So she has seen Camden before, just not like it is now with Maja’s Lockdown London a semi-distant memory.

The idea of moving to Shoreditch from Ireland back in December was really more for Maja to be close to whatever office she ended up in; it was on the cards for that office to be Soho or Shoreditch. We weren’t even entertaining the idea of living right in among Soho, so Shoreditch it was.

Maja:

I love Shoreditch and I’ve really settled in nicely with my job and the office. I’ve got to know everyone in the office, but to be honest, the music scene in Camden is a better place to be for us and we always really knew that. I would also prefer to have Camden as my own area, where I know my coworkers aren’t walking past my apartment every day. I like my job, but I also like having my own space. So all in all, I think this will just be better for both of us. And hopefully, with me working from home, we might just get more time together to work on music. Which is what really matters in the end.

Mark:

For when Maja does want, or need, to be in the office, Camden to Shoreditch is a very easy commute. A single tube journey on the Northern line of around 10 minutes. The office is around five minutes’ walk from Old Street tube – Old Street being Shoreditch’s destination – so the total time of commute will come down to how far away we end up being from Camden Town tube.

So yeah. Tentative conversations of a possible move have now begun. 

Day 162

Thursday June 1, 2023

We’ve not really been all guns blazing on looking at apartments, it’s more been an idea and a bit of a gentle look around online. Today we go and see our first possible place in Camden after making the call yesterday.

Day 163

Friday June 2, 2023

Oh. Oh. Oh. We’ve got that apartment. We can’t believe it. One call, one viewing and it’s done. We’re moving to Camden Town. To a beautiful one bedroom apartment with a living room that can double as our studio. And the place is even better connected for public transport than Shoreditch – we kinda already knew that part. I also know the area very well, having lived in neighbouring Kentish Town for the previous six years I was in London. With that, I was in Camden Town’s music venues all the time, not to mention the fact that it is home to The Blues Kitchen, my spiritual London music home. All this is very well chronicled in Mark’s Diaries. We’re yet to return to The Blues Kitchen since arriving back in London, but then I’ve hardly been to any other jam sessions either. It’s just that we’re aiming at the original scene now, so we’ve been looking more at open mics and hustling our own gigs rather than being on the jam scene. But I do really have to get myself, and ourselves, there sometime soon though. But back to what matters right now. It’s on. We’re moving to Camden Town. Wow. The place will be available to us from July 8 which is now our official move-in day. We have a plan.

For people not so familiar with London geography, Camden nestles right on the cusp between central London and north to north west London. As such, its postcode area is NW1 (northwest); it’s zone two, but the next station for many tube trains coming through is Euston which is in zone one and about a 15 minute walk away from our new place. Also, while Shoreditch is central London, being right on the edge of the financial district, it’s also over in east London. This means that we now actually have a shorter walk to many central London areas such as Soho, Covent Garden, Trafalgar Square and the like. So we really are maintaining our centrality. Although, as my great friend and regular Diaryworld visitor Paul put it quite brilliantly when I mentioned this idea to him, Camden Town really is our central London. And yes, it very much is. Other areas of London have their own musical brilliance and a great quantity and quality of venues, but yeah, Camden really is it for original acts. Well, where it sits now post Covid and with so many venues closing and having been closed down, I’m not entirely sure. But it is still the very famous Camden. The starting point for so many great bands through the decades. And then in the mid 90s, for many types of music fan, it really was the actual very centre of the universe as it became the home of Britpop. I’d better stop before I go off on a whole history tour of the place, but yeah. That’s where The Diaries are soon going to be calling home. If there’s anywhere else in the world we belong more right now, I really don’t know where it could be.

OK. Let’s do that tour of the place with this quite brilliant video which I think had a previous airing in that previously mentioned Mark’s Diaries. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0v4NqK8lFWg

Seeing as I’ve just stolen this video wholesale, I’ll tell you it comes from the channel of Joolz Guides – London History Walks. Don’t know him, never met him. I’ll let you know if that ever changes, at which time I’ll also tell him about this little posting.

Oh, and on that video above are pubs we now consider as our soon-to-be locals; The Good Mixer (7:35) and The Devonshire Arms (13:06). The Blues Kitchen isn’t in here, but maybe the channel just didn’t have a cool enough historical story for it. Anyway, that place is on Camden High Street, pretty much equidistant from The World’s End and Koko (9:55). And I should also add that Camden has so many more music venues and bars amenable to music than are shown in this video which, as its channel suggests, is about history and not just a venue round-up. 

Day 171

Saturday June 10, 2023

A bit of a recap is due now I think beginning with two things that you hopefully already know. After our first spate of gigs which finished at the end of April, Maja went away. Then the day after she got back we played All About Eve on May 24. Shortly after that Maja got a bit sick. Nothing major, but enough to curtail any thoughts of getting on stage and smashing into our high energy performances. That lasted a week or so. Then, just as she was starting to come around, I went down with the same thing. Again, nothing major, but no, not up for running around London and performing. As this past week wound down to Friday, I began returning to fullness and now we think we’re starting to be able to get ready to take things on again. With that in mind, we’ve decided that if the weather is good tomorrow, we’re going to take ourselves out to a park and do some outdoor rehearsal. We have done a few light sessions in the mild frustration that has been the past few weeks so we’ve at least reconnected with a lot of elements of what we have songwise. We now feel that one good concentrated session could shake the dust off of what’s left, and we could then maybe even start moving into some new song territory; we do have a few new ones written and waiting to be worked on to be made gig ready. If we can motor through the rest of the rust tomorrow, we might just start to make some dents on the next stages.

Day 172

Sunday June 11, 2023

Oh what a rehearsal that turns out to be. Totally transcends the concept of rehearsal. No, it doesn’t turn into a show in the park, although we do get applauses occasionally from people walking – or biking, or rollerblading – past. Most of this comes in our warm up when we play a song or two we’re more familiar with just to get ourselves going, and to get them crossed them off the list early. But after that we just get really into it in a very concentrated way and in the most amazing setting right in between two waterways. Barges lined up behind us on the Hertford Union Canal and, across the pedestrian roadway running through the park in front of us, a lovely little walkway bridge going over a small lake to one of the tiny islands. All of this in glorious sunshine and accompanied by a quite wonderful chicken Afghan takeout from one of the street food stalls among an enormous row of offerings as we entered the park. Yes. This is how to rehearse. Inspired by our surroundings, and keen to make the most of the fact that we’ve made the effort to get out here in the first place, we do indeed achieve our main objective of shaking off all of our rust and pulling all of our songs back into place. And then even more as we manage to put in some solid work on a new one coming up, one we’ve had on our to do list for way over a year. Yeah, some of these things can linger in the background for a while, then other times they can explode into life and completion from out of nowhere.

Day 176

Thursday June 15, 2023

Now we’re feeling ready to play again, we know Mike is doing his Acoustify thing tonight in Bishops in Fulham which we played a few weeks ago. Short notice but Maja wanted to wait till this morning to see if she thought her voice would be up for it. Yep. Good to go if Mike can fit us on. I give him a call and he says the bill’s all fixed but if we’re happy about going first, we’re on. Yep. Absolutely fine and thankyou very much. Not too much to report but it’s just great to get back on it. A shame none of the locals from last time are around tonight, but just really cool to keep that scoreboard ticking with another three songs blasted out live.

Day 178

Saturday June 17, 2023

We’ve had the car parked out in zone four for free street parking. The last time we went to check on it, take it for a drive and repark somewhere else the battery had run down. Today we take a new battery, get that fitted and then it’s off for a drive to work it in. For that we decide to go and visit St Albans, an old significant Roman town. Our destination is Verulamium Park where we have a wander and take in the site of the old Roman city. There’s not a great deal left to see but it is really cool to stand in the shadows of history and to be able to see and touch ancient stones which were part of imposing buildings almost 2000 years ago with the first known mention of the city dating back to AD62. A chunk of the old city wall is still standing and the foundations of the original entrance for goods are still there still in perfect shape corresponding to the walls they once held up. A wonderful parkwalk around a beautiful lake and history duly taken in. Home time, car reparked and mission accomplished. 

Day 179

Sunday June 18, 2023

The plan for today is two open mics. One early to mid afternoon in Camden, then another right next to Piccadilly Circus in the West End sometime around 9. What we’re going to do in between them we’re not entirely sure.

The first one is in The Green Note on Parkway, just a little up from the Dublin Castle towards Regents Park. I know I’m getting all a little micro London geography now, but I think it’s worth noting especially when talking about places of such musical history like Camden and the West End. The Green Note itself is historical enough. With music seven nights a week, it opened almost 20 years ago and I believe its open mic night has been going for 15 years. At least deep into double figures. At first I think it’s a bit mad that I’ve never heard of it or noticed it, not least because I’ve been to Dublin Castle many times and walked up Parkway a lot more. But then I realise yet again that for the six years I was around here previously when living in Kentish Town, I wasn’t pursuing the original scene much at all so it makes perfect sense that this place stayed beneath my radar.

We arrive to find a pretty cool and chilled coffee-house vibe with songwriters generally leaning towards slightly older guys.  I think the word would be troubadours. Certainly of the more experienced end and yes, we are treated to an afternoon of songs of joyful depth. There’s a decent stage and sound system and a guest host in Barry who’s actually quite funny while also being modestly understated. He makes everyone feel at ease and he puts us on at around five or six on the list. As we settle in and look around, it seems almost everyone is here to play and so it proves. It’s not far off the kind of vibe we saw in Dublin with the Songwriter Collective with songwriters essentially gathering to play for each other in a public yet private environment. This proves to be one of the most consistently high standards we’ve seen at a songwriter event and it’s a real joy to be in the audience for. Then when it’s our turn, I think it’s also fair to say the energy level raises a few notches as we prowl around the middle of the floor and smash out our two songs. One of them is Talk About The Weather which contains the line, ‘Yeah but we’re alright/Under the skylight.’ A wonderful moment to arrive at in here, performing as we are under a large rectangular skylight with the sun shining down on us. 

We’ve made a few friends at the front table just by the stage, and as we return they are looking up at us with their mouths just totally open in some kind of shock. Performance done and it’s time for carrot cake. I did say it was a coffee shop vibe didn’t I? Yep. It’s fantastic and highly recommended. A wonderful way to round off part one of the day. Although as a few more performers come and do their thing, it’s still not quite over as there’s a cool, chilled hang afterwards. Not massively long, but yeah. A little bit of mingling and general socialising. Until we’re the last people left, so really time to leave. 

Now to prepare for evening and we go to the Doner Kebab place opposite The Blues Kitchen. During food time Maja begins to fade a little and we’re wondering if we’re going to make it to the next thing. We know we’ll be living round here soon enough, so that means we’ll have a lovely pit-stop place to go, take a nap, and get out again if we want to do that. But not today. We’re considering calling it and going home and taking out little triumph when I suddenly see a familiar face walking right by the window and preparing to cross the road. Yep. It’s my old workmate Joe from The Lord Palmerston. Pandemic and all that, I haven’t seen him since early 2020. Oh, it feels mad just typing in that year. I’m up and out of the place and he’s massively surprised to see me suddenly appear in the middle of Camden High Street. He says he’s on his way to The Spread Eagle to meet some friends, right across the road from The Dublin Castle. So we instantly invite ourselves along. Right The Spread Eagle. Part of the same group that owns The Palmerston. And as we settle in there, I learn that my old boss Moni from The Palmerston was the boss in here until not too long ago. And my good friend Eraldo, also from The Palmerston, is now a chef in here. OK. Backtrack a little. On our way to The Green Note earlier on, we heard a call from across the street. Sounded like my name. So we looked across, then up. And there was Eraldo hanging out of the window above The Spread Eagle. He was in mid Sunday lunch rush or something, so of course couldn’t hang out too much. But we had a little shouty hello and we were on our way. Green Note done, and now here we are.

I ask permission of the bar staff and then me and Maja go upstairs and into the kitchen and have a wonderful reunion with Eraldo, who also knew Maja from before Ireland. He’s leaving here soon, in a week or so. We really have only just caught him. Brilliant. This really has all picked us up and risen our energy levels. A bit more fun downstairs then it’s goodbyes and we’re off again. Sunday part two. Or is it part three now? Yeah. Probably that.

It’s straight to the centre of the West End we go now. To Leicester Square tube. Through Leicester Square itself, through Piccadilly Circus, and then onto Haymarket Street. There, we find the magical venue Wonderville where a monthly open stage event is having its debut night. And a wonder it really is. It feels as though we’re intruding on a jazz rehearsal as we walk through the small but high ceilinged bar and through into the main venue. A large, ball room type space filled with round tables. And, at the far end, a really decent sized and very bright and colourful stage. We hear it all before we see it. Swinging jazz band and two singers already totally in performance mode even though there’s no-one there. But there is now, as we walk in and they wave at us  enthusiastically from the stage. Maja immediately hits performance mode and waves back. The song finishes and they declare soundcheck over for now and the two singers leave the stage and walk toward us as we walk towards them, the four of us meeting in the middle with huge welcoming hugs. And this is how we meet Phil and Di for their first ever open mic in here. The announcement we read from them is one of the best descriptions of an open mic I’ve ever seen so we just had to come and check it out. I’m going to drop it right here in full.

Step into the spotlight at the West End’s newest and most thrilling cabaret venue! It’s time to showcase your talent at this exhilarating open mic night. Whether you’re a singer, an instrumentalist, or a trio that can captivate with jazz, cabaret, musical theatre, pop, rock, or even opera, all performers of all genres and levels of experience are welcome. If you’re eager to participate with a high-energy and fun-filled performance (lengthy ballads are discouraged), signups begin at 7:30 p.m., so don’t be late! All you need to bring is any sheet music in the correct key, with a copy for piano and bass, and the band will do the rest! Gather your friends, family, and fellow music enthusiasts for a night of incredible performances!

High energy. Tick.

Fun filled. Tick.

No lengthy ballads. Tick. Alright, maybe we do have one or two slowies but we don’t have to play them. Besides, we really are mostly all about the high energy.

It should be said now that Phil and Di are true professional performers with a wealth of musical West End experience. Veterans of their own sold out shows, as, we will discover, are many of the people who turn up to perform tonight. For now we know none of this and just enjoy the moment as we take it all in and tell Phil and Di what we’re all about. They love the sound of it and ask if we’re OK with opening tonight’s show. Oh yes, we are. Which is how we come to be the first act to play the inaugral Di and Phil’s Open Mic Party at Wonderville.

Until then we sit back and enjoy watching them and their band continue with soundcheck and warming up. Over the next 10 or 20 minutes the room starts to fill up with audience members and more performers until there’s a decent presence in the room and we very much no longer have it all to ourselves. Then it begins and we’re called to the stage. Now, for the first time, we find ourselves about to perform in the West End in front of an audience made up of experienced West End performers. Like Di and Phil, there are people in here who have put on their own sold out shows. We are in front of some serious heavyweight professionals. This is also by far the biggest stage we’ve ever stood on and by a long way the most colourful and expressive. 

Phil introduces us and Maja has a little hello with the audience telling them we’ve decided to change our songs around a bit. We had one idea of what we were going to play, but then Di and Phil starting talking about the nasty rain that may have put one or two people off from coming here tonight. That’s OK though. It means we’re left with the hard core. With that, Maja announces our first song. Talk About The Weather. Halfway through, with everyone out front bouncing along, we start to move through the gears as we wander off the stage and in among them, staying there for the break where we manage to get everyone clapping along to the mid section. Oh yes. They’re up for it. After this, we think we have to bring out I Like You (Better When You’re Naked). For which we largely return to the classy stage. And it’s really great to see once again that some spontaneous rhythmic clapping pops up in the middle of it as our short set really catches. And yes, it really has caught tonight. The reaction as we finish is enormous. Then a really cool and new bonus for us as Di and Phil tell us to stay where we are. They’re going to come up and do a little interview, a fantastic feature which continues with every act performing tonight. And it really works. Nothing in depth of course. Just a little bit about us writing our Diaries as we also attempt to answer their question as to how we met in just a few words. But the really stand out moment here is when Phil looks at us, holds his breath for a beat, then says, ‘You guys have invented a genre.’ A stand out moment here? Wow. That’s a stand out moment for The Diaries full stop. A seasoned West End performer and all round music lover is announcing to an audience of his peers that The Diaries have invented a genre. This is ours. Yep. We’ll take that. Wow.

Well, we were on first. So now we can relax and just enjoy the show. Everyone else is a solo singer, accompanied by the house band, fantastically playing along spontaeously to supplied sheet music or charts. And it’s all mostly big show tunes. Ladies and gentlemen, I can tell you it’s every bit as huge and entertaining as you would think it could be. With a wonderful bonus moment when one of the female performers takes on an Abba song and invites everyone on stage to sing with her. So now we’re also part of a chorus line. 

When it’s all over, we mingle around and Di and Phil very graciously tell us we’re part of the family now and to please come again. I did have doubts that our frenetic rockpop may have been a little out of place among the showtunes. But hey, someone did Abba. So pop’s OK. And so too, apparently round these parts, are we.

And here’s the video of our performance at Wonderville, where you can also find links to Di and Phil.