I got music and I'm gonna use it!!

It's been a while since my last newsletter and here we are at the beginning of the new year already. This is a good sign showing that I was kinda busy AND all over the place which, in itself, is quite a combination of time-slurping factors. Yep 2009 was a Goodyear ...I know that, because I got more mileage out of it than usual ...with touring all over Southern Africa as well as shows in Algeria and the Seychelles. While at home-base in Pretoria, in the state of Gauteng, South Africa...I had kept myself involved in writing some music for a feature film called 'Long Street'.

A beautifully filmed human drama that was shot in Cape Town and premiered at the Durban Film Festival during July '09. Produced and directed by Reville Fox and Florian Schattauer, this is a stunning piece of work and it was a pleasurable challenge to have had the opportunity to write music for it. I also did a wonderfull collaborative album with the legendary Steve Newman, fiery fingered guitarist of TANANAS fame and the amazing percussionist, Ashish Joshi. The album titled 'IN THE CLOUDS' is all about storytelling with sounds from acoustic instruments such as, nylon flamenco guitar, oud, mbiratar, bouzouki, oudtar, soprano guitar, tabla, darbuka, zarb, bongos, santoor ...and lotsa toys. This album is available at any of our shows and on the internet from www.thatgig.com.

In between touring to promote the album, I busied myself with writing some material for the new GORDON'S SUITCASE album which should be released sometime in March '10. Now this is a hugely fresh electric Afro world music group which is making waves wherever they perform. Ofcourse, I have not ignored the VIVID AFRIKA group with McCoy Mrubata, nor my duo STRINGS&SKINS project with Ashish Joshi, both of which will have new albums out during the first half of the year.

Absolutely latest news is the brand new collaboration with Albert Meintjies (singer/guitarist of both Scicoustic and The Allen Wood Project). This exciting collaboration is a vocal duo format with two acoustic guitars, one steel string, one nylon. This album should be out in Feb '10...cool tunes...must have!

...and on the 'dance & lounge' front, there are two releases in the pipeline....one is a remix, by DJ Chresos and his team, of the STRINGS&SKINS 'Passages in Time' album. This is a stunning production from Chresos, beatmaster supreme. The next one is an Arabic dance and lounge production in collaboration with respected South African composer, Neil Solomon. Look out for these cos they'll be splattered with rhythmic beats and dripping with juicy moods!

I suppose i'm lucky to have all of this on my plate with 'spiritual facestuffing' happening almost every day. Only problem is, one can loose too much weight on this schedule, so i've come up with a special beer batter recipe....you batter that beer, by hand and mouth...then have another! ...simple yet effective...no battering ram necessary...those rams are wild and you'll end up with your batter all over the place!

Ramless beer batterers unite!
See ya in da pale moonlight
On da plane widda returnless flight
..Does dat sound right?...

We now know that true hedonism knows moderation. Which means that there is no time to waste on hangovers or, even worse, hangunders,.. cos that's just lost good times.... meet you in the feel good zone!
..and watch out ..I got music and i'm gonna use it!!
HEY HO SILVER