Getting out and about at 'Open mic' nights.

I have recently been doing open mic sessions at the Chemic Tavern in Leeds on Thursdays.   I have been getting together a number of old and new songs and practising them with acoustic guitar and harmonica with vocal. Some of the songs I've been doing are “Strangers Outside My Door”, “Jackdaw Alien”, “Sunrise”, “Green Fields Of England”, “Behind Every Face” and “You Take It All”. There are some new ones too in the shape of “The Burning Tree” and “All That Matters”.

I have also been working up some electric ones with backing drums – I have been practising “The Case Of The Missing Brain”, “Monster Face” and three more new ones, which are “Vampire Exposed”, “Mask” and “I Must Be Out Of My Mind”.

This is all a bit different for me. I have not been getting any gigs doing anything else, so I thought I'll try my hand at open mic nights around Leeds. Noise and experimental music does not really go down well with open mic crowds, so it has to be the songs. Eventually I'll work out some way of incorporating the two together, but for now I'm getting some experience doing the songs straight.

I have been working at writing a lot of new stuff as well as re-working older ideas.

There will be a new Shemboid album out sometime soon – when I eventually get the art work done and finally decide on the tracks. I'll let you know when it's ready.

See you soon,

Shem

New Sights and Sounds

Hi I'm back from the outer reaches of goodness knows where and here with you all again.
Sorry I haven't posted for ages.....Ooops!
 
I have been working on new music for a new Shemboid album called "Following The Illusion", soon to be available via Bandcamp.
As a preview to this I have created a 14-minute mix of some of the sounds that will appear on the album.
It can be heard here.....
https://www.soundcloud.com/shemboid
The mix is called "Following The Mix-Up"

There are also some new paintings, a series called "Out In The Woods" - some of which are here -

Alan Sharples - Out In The Woods #1 - 2014 - acrylic on paper

Alan Sharples - Out In The Woods #3 - 2014 - acrylic on paper

Alan Sharples - Out In The Woods #4 - 2014 - acrylic on paper

Monoprints # 2

This may be my last blog post of 2013 as I'm going to be very busy before and during Christmas.
I've done some more monoprints and there is a selection below.
I've been doing a fair bit of writing of poems and songs recently.  Also working on a new Shemboid album but that won't be finished till well into the new year. 
It was an idea to do a Rev Rev gig in Chester again just before Christmas, but that is not going to happen now - it's such a busy time of year and getting all my stuff there and storing it somewhere out of the way is always very difficult, there isn't much room for it - so best forget it for now.
 Okay, I'll keep it brief so I wish you all the best for the festive season and I'll see you sometime soon.
Here are the prints,
love,
Shem x

Alan Sharples - Monoprint 17 - 2013

Alan Sharples - Monoprint 18 - 2013

Alan Sharples - Monoprint 30 - 2013

Alan Sharples - Monoprint 25 - 2013

Alan Sharples - Monoprint 27 - 2013

Alan Sharples - Monoprint 26 - 2013

Alan Sharples - Monoprint 21 - 2013

Monoprints #1

I've been doing some monoprints recently.  They are only small (about A4 size).

If anyone's interested in any let me know, they won't cost the earth (around £30)

They are all unique pieces and signed.  Here is a small selection, hope you like them....

Alan Sharples - Monoprint 09 - acrylic on white card

Alan Sharples - Monoprint 04 - acrylic on white card

Alan Sharples - Monoprint 15 - acrylic on white card

Alan Sharples - Monoprint 03 - acrylic on white card

Alan Sharples - Monoprint 05 - acrylic on white card

Alan Sharples - Monoprint 13 - acrylic on white card

Paul Klee exhibition and some new work of my own.

I recently went down to London to see the Paul Klee exhibition at Tate Modern.  The pictures on show were fantastic and there were absolutely loads of them!  I hadn't realized before I went that he actually painted on a small scale.  Most of the pictures were no bigger than A3 size.  There were a few bigger ones, but not that many.  It was very inspiring and to see them for real meant you could get an idea of how he worked.  It took us something like two and a half hours to get round them all, and it was quite intense because you had to get very close to most of them to really see them properly (due to their small size).

I felt very inspired to do some painting as soon as I could when I got back to Leeds,  so I have been working on some new pictures of my own this last couple of weeks.  I haven't got many finished ones yet, so I will not show you the unfinished ones. Here's a finished one...

Also there are a few quite interesting pictures I did on my phone....

and finally a happy accident.........

Thanks for tuning in.......see you soon,

Shem

Recent Rev Rev gig.

There's a new Rev Rev tab you can check out now.

We did a gig at the Golden Eagle in Chester on 4th October.
Here is a review by Dan Schott;

http://thedanschott.wordpress.com/2013/10/09/rev-rev-the-alternative-alternative-4th-october-2013/

There's some rough video footage included too.

The recording I made of the gig sounds very good.  Some good psych jam elements. 
We're going to release a live album sometime next year.  We already have some good tracks and this last recording has plenty of fine ones.  They get better every time.
The recording sounds a hell of a lot better than the video footage linked above, I hasten to add.

It always takes us a few songs to get warmed up, but when we get going, the going's good.  We did two sets on the night.  The second set is always better than the first.
We don't actually rehearse very much because I live in Leeds and the rest of the band live in Chester.

I'll keep you posted on further developments.

Daniel Schott's Blog

Daniel Schott seemed to like the new Shemboid album "In The Clouds" and asked me to write something for his blog, which I did.  I may have made omissions or mistakes, but I had a go and the result is now online at

http://schottslist.wordpress.com/2014/12/01/in-the-clouds-by-shemboid-in-his-own-words-alan-sharples/

Give it a go.  There is some crazy video footage of Vibracathedral Orchestra embedded on the page too.
Thanks to Dan for his interest and giving me the opportunity to write for him.