Thursday, August 25, 2016

My Kirkton Park Saga

To say I am disappointed is an understatement, no I am devastated and I doubt that friends realise the affect it is having on me.

What am I blabbering on about? good question my fine reader and one I will now gladly answer.

I have always been proud of the fact, that I did my best to always be helpful to my fellow man. Be it a close friend or the man or woman selling the homeless newspaper. A little bit of kindness goes a long way to making the world in which you live a pleasant place to be.
I have always supported the Arts if someone's band was playing or needed support, I helped....if someone was an artist I supported them or an actor, I would go to see their show. It all sounds like I am trying to portray myself as the good guy, no that is not what I mean. I genuinely support people following their dreams, I am disappointed others don't think the same way.

I have never had much cash, not my hobby to save, especially if I had some money and I even got a sniff of a store selling musical instruments, I was lost to the savings cause. Ask the Rebel Jesus, we went to guitar fair once, where a store was having a closing down sale. Bas said he wanted to have a look and see if he could get a guitar. I reluctantly agreed, I knew the outcome.
Unfortunately, he didn't find anything he liked....I came home with 3 guitars. See what I mean?

Well, when I was living in Alkmaar, I helped friends and family financially from some savings I had, it wasn't a lot what I had, but I gave what I could. My mother always said you can't take it with you. She was a wise woman, also a witch who could see dead people, but that's another story.
I also gave friends some furniture and other items from my house, as I was moving to France and Mrs. Freak had everything, it was not a problem and I was honestly happy I could help someone.
Mrs. Freak also spent quite a bit buying items for friends who saved things, but what the fuck, she has a good job, she can afford it.....my dear reader, you would be surprised how many people genuinely think this but I do not want to drag Mrs. Freak in this, this is my problem, not hers.

I have been living in France now for over a year and I have at that time had NO income, be it from unemployment or playing shows. All I have is from the sales of my music. It is not a lot to write home about and I know I could never survive on it. I am truly lucky that Mrs. Freak wants to and can support and finance and feed me.

Now comes the clue to this story and beef I have with so-called friends.
I asked people, very close to me, to help out by buying the songs and even helping me by promoting my stuff, you never know, I might get me a few sales from it. Every little bit helps.
But every single one of the persons, whom I have helped in the past and they call themselves true friends, turned their backs on me and totally ignored my asking of them, even when they knew I was totally broke and had not much chance of getting a good income. Their egos and selfishness were too big to even help a friend.
I know, before people start, I have a massive ego, but never ever would I turn my back on a friend in need, I would give them the shirt off my back as we stood in the snow, if I had to.
If I post a cute photo on my personal Facebook page, it is met with many many likes, but the second I mention the sale of a song or ads for my music...whooosh!!!!...they disappear and totally ignore the post, instead of helping out and re-posting it.
I realise now that no-one cares about how me and the misses are getting on, but that is NOT what this blog is about.

I should stay calm and not think anything of it, Mrs. Freak says: you stand above them, don't let them bring you down....another wise woman, like from my mother, only this one is NOT a witch...lol
But, this fake friendship...the "It doesn't benefit me, so why should I help" attitude pisses me right off and my only wish was I knew then what I know now.
The moral of the story is my friends, it is not about the money, like I said, I doubt I will be rich from my CD sales, it is the fact and the principles you can ignore someone who asked, nearly begged (Mrs. Freak thankfully stopped me) for help and you just carry on as if you don't see or hear it.

My brother told me a story of how my father had promised to watch him play football at Kirkton Park. He played the game and no sign of my father and when he asked my Dad why he didn't watch his game. My father said I did watch you, from the bedroom window.
Well, my friends, this is my Kirkton Park and it really sucks and it makes me angry. Not at them because they won't help, but at myself for believing they were true friends and would help

I was never a one for sending Christmas cards, but I tell you if I did, there would be a hell of a lot of names scratched off that list.

What will people make of this blog.....probably the same as the Facebook page, stick their heads in the sand and pretend they hear nothing until it goes away. That's okay, I have said my piece and for me, it is finished.
Alkmaar will always be special to me, but every day my connection with the city is growing less and the friends are more distant from me because now I see a lot of people in their true light and not behind their masks.

My beautiful friends, who have helped me, my band who always support me, I salute you and thank you from the bottom of my heart, but now I am done, I do not want to waste any more energy or time on those negative selfish people....let's have a party

ZEEKtheFREAK  Cabannes 25/08/2016

Thursday, April 14, 2016

FROM SLEEP INTO A FILM

It's very strange how the creative mind works. You can get an idea or an inspiration while working or chilling or even in your sleep. That is what happened to me one Saturday morning.

I had been working so hard for almost 2 months trying to get the new single 'Blow a fuse' finished. I have never spent so much time on a song, but I wanted to get this song just right. I was having problems with the songline, it just wasn't hitting the happy spot in my creative nerves. I have a mini-disc full of different ways for me to sing it, but I must admit I was struggling. I even had to put the release date back by a month as I was nowhere near finished

Then one morning during the walk with our boxer dog, Bruce, something came to me. Luckily, I was in the middle of a field and that I had my mobile with me, as I have a recording app on it. So singing in a field is cool, but when you find a songline after weeks of disappointment it is a brilliant feeling. So with my beautiful Aingeal off to her work and the pee monster all crapped out and lying in the warm Provence sun, I recorded the vocals on a Thursday morning in a few hours. All I had to do was the final mixdown.....but I wanted a break from recording. So I set about making advertisements for the release of the single.
I made a few cool ones just to annoy so-called friends (but, that is another story and blog) I laughed as they all had my strange sense of humour, but there no response from anyone, so that is enough proof, it has hit a nerve, ha ha ha.
Anyway, I went to bed Friday evening feeling good with how the campaign was going, Mrs. Freak came up with a few good ideas and also kept me in check with my posting to much...thank God she is around. I know I slept great, but around 4 in the morning I awoke very sharply and was wide awake within seconds, something had come to me in a dream, I had this marketing idea I just had to make a promotional film for the single, it only took me seconds to come up with old lady thing, as I have been playing around with the idea of changing from Psycho Rock to Pensioner Rock (well, I ain't fecking 20 anymore).
I scribbled down a few notes and went back to sleep.

In the morning, I set about writing a scenario, not much was needed as it was to be a short film to let the people get just a taste of the new song.

Then after the usual house chores and food, we set about getting the wardrobe ready, that is where my Aingeal comes in.
Mrs. Freak was in top form and proving that our humour and life's are on the same wavelength, because nearly everything she brought out for me to look at, was perfect. My wardrobe was ready,

It was sunny but windy and we thought about delaying the filming until the Sunday as less wind was expected, but we decided to get it done as knowing my luck it would be raining on that particular Sunday.

We got everything set up, camera on a mike stand and then I went into wardrobe. There was no need for makeup as it was not the plan for me to have my face in the picture a lot.

And so to the shoot, we decided at the end of the drive, by the passing road would be a perfect location and after a try-out run...we filmed what you see on the promo film....of course, it has been speeded up to make the film shorter, but you get the idea.
The passing car was a bonus, it was totally not planned and it's passing could not have been better. And I wonder if anyone notices Granny kicking the dog, ha ha ha

Filming finished and so it was onto finishing the final mix of the song. I had to have a small portion to put with the film to get the public interested.

With the song now ready, it was back on the computer to edit everything, now the internet here in Cabannes isn't great at the best of times, but when I was editing it was perfect, my only problem was when trying to upload the finished promo film, it is advised to leave the USB stick with the film in the computer. FFS ha ha ha what an idiot. So with that sorted, the final film was uploaded to the internet and YouTube.

It was a fun journey, moments of losing our cool at each other, but Mrs Freak (Agatha Stoneheart) and I honestly make a great team, she has the same sense of humour and without that Aingeal, I would never have got this or the single finished and to such a high quality.

I hope people enjoy the song and the Promo video, I am now working on the actual video for the song....gonna be funny and yes Granny is involved.

ZEEKtheFREAK Cabannes 14/04/2016


Thursday, April 7, 2016

FROM BRAIN CELL TO EARLOBE

Finally, I can say with my hand on my heart and without fear of contradiction that the single 'Blow a Fuse' is nearly finished, ha ha ha.

Yes Groovy people, it has been some journey.  I have never ever spent so much time working on track, Christ, I had the track from writing to recorded, mixed and out in an afternoon. With ZEEK & GIZ, we did a whole tape recording in one afternoon. Gone are these days, with the technology, the sounds and equipment are more advanced. I did, however, record this track on my old trustworthy Roland VS840 zip disc, as I know I have a whole studio on my computer and the next CD will probably be recorded on that, but I needed to get this done quickly....now we all know how that has gone FFS.

From the idea to getting this far, must be 2 and a half months and to think I want 10 tracks on the 'Gullible travels' CD...what was the date I wanted to bring it out, I think we can scrap that idea.

I struggled with original songline, the music has been done for about a month and after about 20 different ideas, the final idea came to me when I was out walking Bruce. Luckily nowadays on your mobile, you can record, so I did it in the middle of a field at the back of our house and I think I had it totally thought through in less than 10 minutes. I knew there was a reason why it just didn;t feel right. I didn't want to sound like another singer or band. I am so happy I followed my intuition, I knew it would eventually come to me.

The lyrics were also changed drastically, thanks to the changing songline and what started with a line about gay porn ended up more about how religions are dying and fading away. Yes, my mother would turn in her grave if she hadn't been cremated. Always Blasphemy.

My Sol helped me Immensely, being my energy and also my critic and thanks to her comments, I am happy to release the first new song in almost 6 years. Good grief how time flies, but things are looking good in Camp Freak and after the final mix down tomorrow, I will start work on the next song and also the first Fools Funnybone, yes the website is ready, so on to that, but that will be in the next blog. Thanks for reading, hope you are all well.
Peace and Love
ZEEKtheFREAK

www.zeekthefreak.com

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