I have always loved music, ever since I can remember. In fact one of the earliest memories I have, is me and my siblings, doing a little show for our parents. The shake your bum dance. We sang and danced, sticking out our behinds. Funny it must have been, I remember my Dad laughing his head off. We loved doing that show, we felt so proud of ourselves.
As I got older I began an obsession with remixing. We didn't have the gadgets and hi tech stuff of today. We only had a cassette recorder. We would have 2 of them and make crazy mixes, dubbing and dubbing over the dubs. Chaka Khan, breakdance soundtrack, Herbie Hancock. Fabulous. Years went by and still I had this thing for music, but now it was me that was writing the lyrics. I remember talking to a girl who was a singer and who had a bit of a hit in England. I brought her a stack of my Lyrics and she offered me £200 for a few songs.... Immediately I said "yes", but she gave me a really good telling off. Told me the songs are worth a lot more than £200. Royalties, publishing rights, licence agreements. I hadn't got a clue, but a few years later I was so much more well informed. I read the book, "this business of music". A true bible for anyone interested in the music biz. Very very good indeed.
I never did manage to sell any songs, but I had a dream of being a very successful song writer. I met a couple of guys into the Stockholm music scene. Cool dudes, with their own studio. I was bitten, I loved all that atmosphere
all that, "buzz and excitement". The keyboards, the guitars, the microphones, all the mixing equipment, the smell of it all, it was brilliant. I would regularly, grab a guitar and start singing into a microphone.I couldn't play the guitar back then, I was just "posing" with it.
The two guys wanted some lyrics to a piece of music and wanted to know if I would help them. I did, I did, and I wanted their help with making music for my lyrics. They never came through for me. I wrote various lyrics for them, but they didn't help me with my songs.
In the end, I borrowed a friends Yamaha guitar and started to teach myself, strumming along. to the songs I had written. It opened up a whole new world for me.....again !!
I found it so very easy to write a song. In fact, when I was 18 or 19 I would write a song whilst still in bed, before I got up. My typewriter on the floor, hammering away at it.
Melodies also came very easily. The chords came together and before I knew it I was making my own music. I wrote hundreds of songs, some I am proud of, some, less proud, but in some way or other, I found I was happy for what I had made.
I even started sending off my songs, by this stage I had a Shure sm 58 microphone and a Behringer mixer and a beautiful sounding Takamine guitar.As well as a Yamaha keyboard and a Boss Dr drum machine, which I thought was brilliant and very clever.
I began singing.....again. To be perfectly honest I never considered myself a singer, but others thought I wasn't too bad. I sang and sang, practised different techniques and found my voice. I was not a success with my songs though. EMI turned me down, as well as numerous others, but they did give me encouragement to send more to them.
Over the years, things happened with my life and they stalled my music dreams, family came along, so then there was no time, except for the party karaoke or occasional guitar jam . I still play my guitar, though just not as often as I would like to. I suppose deep down, my dream of making it BIG as a songwriter is still there, just laying dormant waiting to be awoken again, can someone wake it for me? or do I need to set my alarm clock myself?
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