Here are the gigs I’m doing for the week ending Sunday June 3rd, 2011.
Make sure you mark these in your diary…
Hope to see you there,
Corey 
Here are the gigs I’m doing for the week ending Sunday June 26th, 2011
Make sure you mark these in your diary…
Wed 22 – Open Mic @ The Dan (8pm-12am)
Sun 26 – The Duck Inn (4pm – 8pm)
Hope to see you there,
Corey
Today I’m going into Chapel Lane Studios to pick up my 8GB flash-drive with Stig Lindell’s keyboard parts on it all mixed and lined up ready to be taken back to Anthony Stewart at Red Brick Music to be integrated into his system.
Today is also the day that Darren Zaza goes back into the studio and overdubs his electric guitar parts to “We Can’t Be Together Anymore.” Last Wednesday he completed his guitar parts to “Jigsaw.”
I can’t wait to hear what he has done with both songs as I haven’t been able to get to the studio due to prior recording commitments.
Lately I’ve had more and more people ask me when the CD is going to be finished.
I’m hoping that by the start of the new financial year (July 1st, 2011) I will have a finished CD in my hands and ready to be launched onto an unsuspecting public but, as with all good goals though, it’s best to not set them in concrete.
I’ll keep you posted as always.
Peace,
Corey
One of my primary songwriting goals of 2011 is to never be afraid of words again.
Ideally, what this means for me is that by conquering my fear of words or, more accurately, the fear of my words (and therefore me, as a person) being judged by others, I will be able to increase my songwriting output by finishing all of my half completed songwriting ideas because at the moment a distinct lack of lyrical material is what is standing in the way of me completing my current batch of songwriting ideas.
I have no real idea how I came to the conclusion that writing lyrics is not one of my strong points but that is how I was seeing myself as a musician first and a lyricist (a very distant) second.
I know that the above statement is not true however, I have said it to myself so many times now that my subconscious believes it. It’s like I’m fulfilling some sort of prophesy about my (lack of) songwriting process.
The biggest problem I have with my with lyric writing process is that I self censor far too early in the piece. I need to give myself the permission to put down on paper whatever comes to me, to write what is inside of me no matter whether I consider it crap or not and no matter how bad it might look on paper.
For some reason I’ve succumbed to the belief that I have nothing of value to say to the world through my lyrics. What a way to sabotage my songwriting and my creativity as a whole.
Yes, I’m pretty good at that.
Even though words have the power to change things and therefore, need to be treated with the respect they deserve, they can’t hurt me and my so called fear of them should not silence me.
The best thing I can do is to roll up my sleeves and just write. I know that by doing this I will conquer my fear of words.
One song at a time…
Peace,
Corey
Today is the last day of January which means tomorrow, being the first day of February is the start of FAWM 2011.
For those who don’t know, FAWM stands for February Album Writing Month and the deal is, to write an albums worth of material in the month of February, which is set at 14 songs in 28 days. You can find out more about this brilliant songwriting concept by going to www.fawm.org.
On the FAWM website it describes the concept in this way:
“This is the club. Each February, FAWM.ORG forges a collaborative community where thousands of musicians of all walks and skill levels write an album’s worth of material in the shortest month of the year. That’s roughly one tune every other day. “Fawmers” are a mix of music professionals, students, homemakers, and folks who work dayjobs but rock nightclubs.”
In theory, the idea of FAWM being the kick-up-the-arse to my songwriting process holds true but in reality it hasn’t been that way which is my fault totally but this year I’m hoping that my songwriting output for FAWM 2011 will be much better than in previous years.
Later on in the year the guys at FAWM also run something called 50/90 (50 Songs In 90 Days) which will run from July to October 2011 but I’ll cross that bridge when the time comes.
I must keep telling myself that FAWM is not a contest and no-one gets judged, it’s a concept which is designed to test my songwriting process.
Am I ready to tackle inspiration, the muse head-on?
I’m going to give it a go this year, are you? Let me know if you do too.
Peace,
Corey
Last night I was interviewed on Radio Adelaide 101.5FM by the team at SongCatcher, a radio show which focusses on songwriters, their inspirations and general songwriting news.
I had the pleasure of playing two of my songs live, the first being “Back Of My Mind” with the second song being “Seeing Stars.”
To hear the entire SongCatcher interview click on the play link below
SongCatcher Interview January 17th, 2011 (1hr)
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I have also isolated both songs from the interview and have featured them below.
Back Of My Mind (Live)
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Seeing Stars (Live)
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I’m really, really proud with how both songs turned out. Let me know what you think.
Peace,
Corey
I’ll be appearing tonight on the SongCatcher songwriting program on Radio Adelaide (101.5 on the FM dial) with Clayton Werner and Claire Thackeray.
Wooo Hooo!
I’ll be playing a couple of tunes live, talking about my song “Billboard Angel” which appears on the latest SCALA CD “A Guided Tour” plus, the SongCatcher crew will be playing a couple of songs from other artists that have influenced me over the years.
So tune into Radio Adelaide between 9 and 10pm to hear the program or, you can listen to the SongCatcher program online.
You’ll be glad you did…
Peace,
Corey
Next Wednesday I start recording my CD again after a 7 week absence primarily due to my recent illness.
I’ve got to admit though, I’m feeling a little bit nervous about getting back into the studio.
I mean, just thinking about it makes the little voice in my head come up with all sorts of excuses not to record and throw in some good old fashioned self doubting negativity for good measure.
Such as…
Oh, it just goes on and on and on. How much of it I take notice of depends on how I’m feeling on any particular day but thankfully today, the little voice is talking bullshit so I’m feeling okay.
I’ve actually worked out that I’m past the halfway point in the recording process so I’m starting to think about what I’m going to do about getting my CD out into the wider world and how I’m going to sell it.
Just like every other songwriter before me, I’ve now got to answer the age old question for myself…
“I’ve recorded a CD. Now what do I do?”
As having a CD marketing, distribution and selling strategy is essential in ensuring that not too many boxes of my CD’s will live under my bed, I’ll be spending some time working on that and sharing with you what I come up with on this blog.
At least doing it this way I’ll have something in writing
Peace,
Corey
Now that I’m fully back in the land of the living and feeling much better than I have in a long time, I thought that today would be a good day to reaffirm my musical goals.
And it’s this…
“To sustain a career as a full time songwriter/musician/blogger using the internet as my primary tool of promotion, networking and marketing.”
This doesn’t mean that the more traditional face to face stuff does not get neglected by the way. I actually love the cut and thrust of getting out there and networking, securing my own gigs and using the power of word of mouth advertising to create a community around me, my music and other projects that I’m involved in (such as the Open Mic Network).
Now, how am I going to achieve this? Well, I’ll do it by:
Simplifying my life I know I’ve written about this before on my blog but I do have the tendency to over-complicate and over-think aspects of my life and work which paralyses me through having too much choice.
I’ve started on the road to simplicity by finally deciding that this site is the main focus for all of my musical endeavours. In light of this I’ve just recently deleted my Orangutang Music website and redirected the URL to this site. My other blogs Songwriting Zen and Corey Stewart Songwriting Tips will follow the same fate once I export all of the valuable content elsewhere.
I will be having a closer look at ways in which I can streamline my online presence in the near future and it’s my intention to blog about it.
Focusing on my activity As well as over-complicating and over-thinking aspects of my life I also fall into the habit of doing far too many things at once under the guise of needing to “diversify my income.” The old jack-of-all-trades-master-of-none thing gets really boring after a while when you realise that you don’t get anything achieved by adopting this business model.
I know I can do a lot of things but I need to be mindful of what I’m really doing every time I decide to take on another job here, another role there.
Which leads on nicely to the last point…
Internalising my efforts I admit it, I’m a people pleaser. In the past I’ve done anything for anyone because I wanted to be seen as the “nice guy” in any situation and would do whatever I could to protect that stance, even at the cost to myself.
Well, there will be no more of that. Helping others is fine as long as it doesn’t get in the way of my own stuff.
I mean for starters I am my own web development, online marketing and music business consulting client and will work with myself as such. I’ll take on my own advice and will walk the walk that results from talking the talk (and some of you out there know how much I love to talk about the music business).
If I have time spare to work with anyone else in the same capacity I’ll do so and I’m always open to those opportunities but, at the same time, if I don’t, I won’t, simple as that.
I hope you’ll understand that if you’re the one doing the asking.
My live shows (mainly my covers gigs) and the Open Mic Network sustain me financially and give me the freedom to work on my other stuff during the day and that includes working on my health as well.
It’s my hope that I can achieve some sort of balance in my life so I can be the best person I can be for myself and for everyone else around me.
I’ve had my break and now it’s time for me to get back into it but this time I’ll be working smarter, not necessarily harder.
Peace,
Corey
Mountain Top is the second song I played at the SCALA Open Mic Network Showcase last Thursday night (October 28th) that was put to video by Rob Childs of SCALA. This song is a few years old and I wrote soon after my band “FunkStar” broke up in 2001.
Mountain Top
©2001 C.Stewart
All the lessons that I’m learning
Are all lessons of the self?
A wise man once said “If you don’t love who you are
How the hell can you love anybody else”
I’m on a mountain top baby
Looking down on all I see
I’m on a mountain top baby
360 degrees
Some days I feel quite angry
And some day I feel quite sad
I can’t believe what has happened
To the best times a guy ever had
Chorus
It’s not a waste of time
Coz these times will come back again
But it’s up to me this time
And that means it’s gonna be right
If you believe that other people
Are for your happiness and how you’re perceived
Then when they let you down at the end of the day
There’s nothing left for you to believe
I’m on a mountain top baby
Looking down on all I see
I’m on a mountain top baby
360 degrees
I’m on a mountain top baby
With the sunlight over me
I’m on a mountain top baby
360 degrees
It’s always good to look at any situation from the perspective of being on top of a mountain, looking down on it all which is something I’ve been experiencing vividly of late.
This song tries to encapsulate that feeling.
Peace,
Corey