Bit of a strange time for New Year's, I know, but this band has passed a milestone of sorts. A few days more than a year ago, Mike Luno Band performed our first Vancouver gig - at the Railway Club, in fact. So - what kind of year has it been?
Last October was certainly an inspiring start. I'd just got our band website up and running; Trevor, our new bassist, worked hard and successfully to get up to speed on our rather bass-demanding tunes, and seemed eager to keep going; our performance at Railway Club was fun, well-received and well-played; The 'Get Inside' CD appeared ready to master (little did I know I'd have to re-mix everything before mastering); I was finding my way around my new town fairly easily, and hearing of lots of live-music venues.
Since then, there have been a few little victories: 'Get Inside' is finished, manufactured and making its way to iTunes as I write this; we had a good photo shoot with Alphonso Arnold and made videos of a few of our tunes; we've entered contests, applied for grants, gigged around town, invented a cover-tune version of ourselves (i.e.: the Juxtaposers), attained presence on Facebook, Twitter, Reverbnation, CDBaby, SonicBids and more; determined that I shall never gig in cargo shorts and sandals for as long as I live; developed more new music, had performances to be proud of and performances from which to learn; I've learned to blog, I made new friends, renewed old friendships, formed a mailing list, paid good money to have a friend professionally body-painted for a video, learned Illustrator, GIMP, T-Racks, and a few pointers in networking-promotion. I also got our contact postcard into the hands of Gene Simmons, for better or worse.
Naturally, if I had my way, I'd be making a comfortable living writing, recording and performing music with my band by now, which is a goal I haven't quiiiite achieved yet - but so long as there's a visible route forward, there's cause for optimism. This time in a year from now, I'd hope to have had CD release parties and a handful of press, a new album of material, new videos, new pics and the inspiration to continue. Not such a tall order, really...and it's not good for creative types to get TOO comfortable, after all...
Last October was certainly an inspiring start. I'd just got our band website up and running; Trevor, our new bassist, worked hard and successfully to get up to speed on our rather bass-demanding tunes, and seemed eager to keep going; our performance at Railway Club was fun, well-received and well-played; The 'Get Inside' CD appeared ready to master (little did I know I'd have to re-mix everything before mastering); I was finding my way around my new town fairly easily, and hearing of lots of live-music venues.
Since then, there have been a few little victories: 'Get Inside' is finished, manufactured and making its way to iTunes as I write this; we had a good photo shoot with Alphonso Arnold and made videos of a few of our tunes; we've entered contests, applied for grants, gigged around town, invented a cover-tune version of ourselves (i.e.: the Juxtaposers), attained presence on Facebook, Twitter, Reverbnation, CDBaby, SonicBids and more; determined that I shall never gig in cargo shorts and sandals for as long as I live; developed more new music, had performances to be proud of and performances from which to learn; I've learned to blog, I made new friends, renewed old friendships, formed a mailing list, paid good money to have a friend professionally body-painted for a video, learned Illustrator, GIMP, T-Racks, and a few pointers in networking-promotion. I also got our contact postcard into the hands of Gene Simmons, for better or worse.
Naturally, if I had my way, I'd be making a comfortable living writing, recording and performing music with my band by now, which is a goal I haven't quiiiite achieved yet - but so long as there's a visible route forward, there's cause for optimism. This time in a year from now, I'd hope to have had CD release parties and a handful of press, a new album of material, new videos, new pics and the inspiration to continue. Not such a tall order, really...and it's not good for creative types to get TOO comfortable, after all...