Britain's got talent...

Now timing is everything in looping. Sadly that appears to be the case beyond the pedal. Britain's got talent were in town scouting for talent for their new series. The timing for me wasn't great. I wasn't yet entirely discharged from hospital. Although, I was allowed considerable lengths of time off the ward. 

On one such occasion I was sat at the bar in my favourite quirky pub, enjoying some Jamaican cuisine when a reporter with a camera ordered a pint next to me. The landlord was explaining that he was sure some people would turn up for the photo shoot. The venue I was in had advertised in the local press that Britain's got talent were coming to town and if they wanted an opportunity to audition they should attend that day and reserve a spot. The local press had sent around a journalist to get some snaps of performers to make a story of it. 

There I was. The landlord had seen me attempting to live loop a couple of nights previously and encouraged me to take part. Furthermore, I should go and get in the shot with the other candidates. I think he asked me out of concern that nobody would turn up for the photo shoot. 

TIMING IS EVERYTHING!

I was hardly confident at getting up in front of a few customers, never mind auditioning to go on national TV professing to be Britain's most talented person. I wasn't going to have any part of it. The timing was wrong and I wasn't ready yet. I couldn't help being tempted to photo bomb the picture in the local press though. Even if I didn't take part... so I jumped in with the rest of the guys.

A quirky looking crowd to say the least!

 The seed was planted in my mind, maybe I could get a couple of decent tracks together in time for the audition. I never expected to get anywhere in the competition. But if I learned anything from my days playing in bands, it's that live performing is far more valuable than practising in a room by yourself. You need to expose yourself to the pressures and complications of live performing to become competent. A real audience teach you far more than you realise too. I wrestled with the idea for a week and before I knew it, the day was upon me and I'd not found time to practice a note.

I turned up to the venue at 9pm, an hour after the auditions had begun. The place was rammed. I'd brought my RC-505 in a bag with my mic. Half heartedly convincing myself I could pull some amazing performance out of the hat. Everyone had turned up to see the auditions, including many acts that wanted to try and get a last minute slot. There was a small man on stage singing... This guy was the male equivalent of Susan Boyle. You'd never guess by looking at him but he had a vocal range men don't tend to have. His choice of song was far more classical than you'd expect too. 

The acts were diverse and amongst them were some gems. To be honest, I put my loopstation out the way, grabbed a pint and settled down to watch. I didn't think much about getting up, I probably had decided not to bother any more. That was until a friend of mine got up. He had decided to do stand up comedy. I don't think he even had a joke planned but he got up.

His act was called 'Things you've always wanted to ask a black man but shouldn't'. I think the audience participation part was the low point, when of course people started asking things you shouldn't ask a black man (or anyone for that matter in civilised discussion). The act finished after a thorough discussion about penis length. I was on my 5th pint of real ale by this point and tipsy. My friend came off stage and asked if I was getting up. 

''If I can then you can!''

He was right, if he had the balls to get up and have a crack at stand up comedy with no previous experience and probably very little planning. Surely I could at least have a crack at looping. Either way, I was drunk enough not to care so much any more and I'm pretty sure the audience were too.

I pulled a table round the back of the stage and began to set up my loopstation whilst the next act before me played on. Then it hit me.. what was I actually going to play... my mind was blank... then I looked into the crowd and saw the huge camera lens pointing at the stage. A huge HD camera poised ready to capture me making a fool of myself...

Too late, the act before me finished and the audience applauded. Time to drag this table on stage and fumble about getting plugged in. It proved to be easier than expected. A simple task of handing the sound guy the ouput lead and flicking on the power. I introduced myself, explained the loopstation and began...

I began with the hi-hats... so far so good, looped in time, no feed-back. I added a couple of bass drum beats, a snare, a rim shot. Now for some reggae synth sounds, layer them up and create a harmony. So far so good. Just as easy as any other time I've improvised and played about. Now I want a nice fat bass line. I use the guitar-bass track effect. Anyone who's used the RC-505 will know, the guitar-bass effect is NICE! It suddenly fills your track out with a fat, full convincingly real bass line. As long as you sing or hum in tune with this effect you can't go wrong. It achieves more than the desired effect. I hear noises of excitement from the crowd. People who were chatting turn their heads and take notice. The bass line demands attention. The group of audience members to stage right shout compliments to me over the music and start dancing. That's all well and good but a performance without lyrics is pretty empty. It's just music... I need to perform... so what lyrics can I think of?

I don't know why it came to me but I knew the lyrics to a silly little song by Syd Barrett of the band pink Floyd. The song was "Effervescing Elephant". As far as I can tell Syd was off his face when he wrote and recorded this track. I heard the original undubbed version once and at the end of the track there's an eerie silence, before you eventually hear Syd asking if the producers are alright. You can imagine their confused faces trying to comprehend what they've just heard. This was supposed to be the next big hit... have a listen and you'll see what I mean.

Regardless, the lyrics came to mind at the time of needing lyrics and so they were used. They work really nicely in a reggae track with a fat bass line. I'm also sure I left my audience less confused than Syd's.

Now I had some confidence I finished with a house track I'd being jamming around with previously. The talent scout began dancing and so did the camera girl. That was good enough for me. I figure if i've made people dance, I've done the job. After leaving the stage the talent scout ran after me asking for my details in case they wanted to get back in contact. I had the most unnerving time for a while after, that they may actually get back in touch and I'd have to put some serious work into making a real act fast. Luckily for me they haven't. 

This being said, I realised then and there that I needed to build up an act. Whether I decided to do covers of songs or create my own originals, I needed to know the structure of the song, be confident of the key, know the lyrics and be certain that I could re-create the song on any stage. 

Time to put some hours in.

Like I said in the beginning of this post, timing IS everything. If this Britain's got talent opportunity had come later, who knows, I may have had an act ready and maybe got through a round or two in the competition. But nether the less this experience encouraged me to put in the ground work required. Like I said, live experience is worth way more than practising in your bedroom.