I keep neglecting this page by accident, but now Nine Below Zero's 'Don't Point Your Finger' anniversary tour has come to an end, I'm going to start from August 2021, when my life finally gained a purpose again.
Wickham Festival was our first gig back. An outdoors one, co-headlining the night with Spike Edney from Queen (one of my all time inspirations), and as my first big show in 18 months the nerves were kicking in. I wore my best velvet suit and polished my finest Chelsea boots, but by sod's law, it began raining as soon as we loaded in and I sunk in the mud amongst my attire.
However, after Toyah Wilcox came up to me to comment on the juxtaposition with delight and encouragement, I felt qualified to break the conventions of fashion. We smashed the set and went straight to the dry cleaners.
We then went on to complete 32 dates in between then and January, in venues from the intimate to the prestigious, all around England and Scotland. Positive vibes and negative tests galore.
Aside from the spiritual thrill of the Cavern Club, my personal highlight was at London's iconic 100 Club. It seriously felt like I was back in the 70s - absolutely THRIVING.
There were rumours that Paul Weller bought me a beer that night. That rumour is false. He bought me a Coca Cola, as I was driving home later on.
During this leg there were talks of Nine Below Zero going to Sweden, Austria and Germany for three weeks in March, but after the last two years of carrots being dangled in front of me only to be snatched away at the last minute, I was apprehensive until I stepped off the hovercraft at Copenhagen Airport. And blimey, it was an honour and a pleasure. I had the absolute time of my life. Sweden is the most beautiful country ever. Germany is absolutely full of spirit and joy. And the hills are alive in Austria.
As an added bonus, the musical forces of inspiration struck me in Hamburg, where loads of tunes for my upcoming album I'd been struggling with for YEARS suddenly wrote themselves in a matter of hours. Now my debut album is just a couple of phone calls to guest musicians away from being actually completed. I've already got enough completed for two and a half EP's but my heart is set on an album unless someone can convince me otherwise haha!
So what's next in the meantime?
The Aim's upcoming album, The Master Reset, is in its final stages. It's been an absolute honour to produce this. And especially poignant with the loss of our beloved guitarist, Jamie Tongue, and producing and playing on his posthumous songs is both emotionally tough and therapeutic.
I have enormously lovely memories of the sessions with him, the jokes we shared (flatten and merge!), the songs he brought to us, and him bringing some of my ideas to life. I miss him a lot and almost don't want to finish this album as when I'm exploring the multi's it feels like he's still here.
There's currently talks of The Aim releasing a single or two from the album very soon - I'll keep you all posted.
Thanks for all the love and support over the last few months. I promise I'll make this a regular thing! I've got lots more news to share with you all (including some huge local shows on my larry) but this post is overwhelmingly long enough 🤣 Now I'm going to catch up on my inbox x