Matthew's 2022 Roundup

 

Wow it would appear that I haven't actually done a roundup for a while, 2021 for some reason got missed out. Oh well. 

2022 was always going to be an interesting year, It was the year to bring me a new decade, and having to admit that I might be properly middle age. It also meant that my band All Living Fear was also a whopping 30 years old. More on that later. 

The Locos in Exeter Jan 2022

I had been beavering on with my electronics work and my YouTube channel. One of my videos went viral in the end of 2021 and a few others got a lot of traffic, this gave me a massive boost of views and subscribers and it wouldn't be long that my channel became a proper thing, that has started generating a little bit of an income, so I am very grateful to all of my subscribers there. If you are not on my youtube Click here .

The first gig I played was with Russell Sinclair in Exeter, this was the first of 47 gig that I played with them this year. I had fully intended on working on my solo music, I wanted to make 2 albums and do a tour, sadly none of this happened.  however that is a goal for this year. The spring mostly involved thinking about the upcoming Mike Westbrook shows. 2 Nights sold out at Ronnie Scotts and then the Cheltenham Jazz Festival. These rehearsals were really good fun and when the full band got together the magic was still all there. 

No I didn't fly it, but it was good to see my buddy!

 I also got to do some catching up with various friends that I had not seen since before lockdown. 2022 did feel like the first 'Normal' year to be honest. the Risks of concerts being cancelled was thankfully going away. Talking of concerts I did see some amazing gigs, one of the best was the last 2 shows from Genesis. This was the first time that I had ever seen them and to be front row for one of the shows was a special moment that I will never forget.            

Genesis in London

Then we get to the Westbrook gigs in London. The last time that we were here we played a mixed bag of westbrook classics. This time we played his classic album 'On Dukes Birthday' this was one of the first Westbrook albums I ever heard as it was a fave of my dads plus it was the album that got me to go and see Westbrook in 2012 and then subsequently joining the band. 

Ronnie Scotts Night 2

After these shows I was back in London to my favourite venue The Royal Albert hall to see Nick Mason again. it was a great show, and I saw them again in Plymouth a few days later. I also got to see Eric Clapton at the albert Hall, Gary Numan in Plymouth. 

I had been plodding on gigging once a week with the locos and making youtube videos. By April my youtube channel was earning money, so I spent more time on youtube and less time on music. It also came to me that it was probably going to be a thing that I will in future be doing a lot more electronics. not just for myself and youtube, but also as a career, I do enjoy building things and fixing things. The problem was that I didn't have anywhere to do it. 

Well the idea came that I needed some premises. So I bought a shed. a very nice one 10 foot by 6 foot. in hindsight I should have got one a bit bigger. buy anyway its made work a lot easier to do. and I have taken on a few commissions. I also built a lot of pedals, I built my own guitar and I also built a clone of a Marshall 50w Plexi amplifier. This was something that I had always wanted to do. 

The Shed!

My Dear friend Arthur Brown had his 80th Birthday show in London. This was a great gig with the band in fine form. Its amazing to thing that people like Arthur, Paul McCartney and the like are very much top of there game. 

Arthur Brown in London

Anyhow finally for the first time properly in 3 years I finally got to play a solo gig. I have always loved Moreton Music day and It was great to be back there. I did a warm up show earlier in the week in Plymouth and I was finally ready to play live again. I really enjoyed it and I had missed it very much. I did one other solo show later in the year supporting Tony Wright from the band Terrorvision. This was even better performance wise and great to be back playing in a proper venue again doing my own stuff. 

Moreton Music day

It soon came up to my Birthday time and I had a very special series of things happening. one of them was I did an interview for the Word in your ear podcast. Not David Hepworth and Mark Ellen were the former editors of Smash Hits and presenters of Whistle Test.

I have been a Patrion subscriber  for a while as one of the perks was to do a video interview. It was great to tell my story to 2 people whom I respect a great deal. 

All Living Fear Leeds

Then we had the 30th anniversary of All Living Fear. finally after all these year from when we were suppose to play we got to do a 30th anniversary show. The gig was fantastic and we were all so very pleased. We did a few more shows and the last one in leeds, we had some of the best audience reaction that we have ever had as a band. Total success all the way.  I then went to Italy with Mike Westbrook not as a musician but as a film maker, I have documented
 everything westbrook has done post covid, this will make a brilliant film once all edited. 

All Living Fear in Plymouth

 These are just some of the highlights of 2022. There was so much going on so many great gigs that I went to and so many great gigs that I played. 

Rossini Theatre Lugo Italy

Turns out this year I played more gigs than any other year of my life! 

The vast Majority were with Russell Sinclair & The Smokin' Locos :-

17 Band Gigs + 30 Blues Jam House Band gigs

3 All Living Fear gig

3 Mike Westbrook Gigs 

1 Kate Westbrook Gig

3 Solo Gigs

That's 57 gigs in total. 

I also did something that I haven't done since I was 14. I did some DJing. There is a great local 80s band called Betamax. and for 3 of the bands shows I have been the DJ playing music in the gaps, its gone down really well with full dancefloors every time. I look forward to doing a few more 80s DJ sets in 2023. 

So all in all not a bad year, more to come soon!