Hiya Charlie, thanks for joining us in the virtual RGM lounge today. Grab a brew and take a seat.
What made you decide that music is a thing for you?
I never saw myself as someone who would earn a living by sitting at a desk in an office. Working within the arts is something I have always wanted to do…although admittedly I haven’t been able to avoid working at a desk.
Introduce us to you all and your musical history.
My name is Charlie, I’m an electronic artist from Southampton. My sound sits within Melodic House/Melodic Tech. What I’ll sound like next week though, who knows. An earlier career of mine was playing and touring in bands as a drummer- I still play locally, but my head space at this moment in time is very much in a producer artist mindset.
What’s the live music scene like in Southampton right now? Anyone we should be looking out for (bar you, of course)?
Southampton is one of those cities that continues to grow musically every year. There are some amazing jazz and pop musicians that come out of Southampton, but for house music, I would keep an eye out for the producer Yellow Six who is doing some amazing things at the minute.
I’ve seen a lot of people struggling for support recently online. What’s your view on the industry?
If I had to sum it up, we have all become fixated on the numbers from social media and Spotify streams, likes, shares, comments etc which has become a metric for our own self-worth. More work needs to be done which focuses on better sustainability for grass roots artists and independent venues, and there also needs to be a consumer culture shift if artists are to be paid fairly.
Where do you feel you currently sit within the music industry?
I see myself being able to push eventually to being a full-time artist, but for now I’m happy with what I do and the people I meet. My focus is about creating things that I enjoy listening to without the pressure of what ‘the industry’ is doing.
Do you ever worry about people taking things the wrong way or cancel culture?
I’m not political in my music and I’m likely to keep it that way, I wouldn’t consider myself outspoken so I don’t tend to worry about cancel culture. It does exist though, and I feel that social media only fans the flames.
Do you sign up to any conspiracy theories? If not, why not?
I don’t at the moment, why do you have any worth checking out?
What was your best experience on stage?
I tried crowd surfing once, it was so much fun, though quite hard to navigate yourself back to stage.
What was your worst experience on stage?
I was working as a stage technician on a theatre production once. I was supposed to bring the iron curtain in during the interval, but I was dazzled by some stage lights. I ended up pulling the wrong lever and I pulled the drencher instead. It opened up the heavens! We spent the rest of the show during black outs with towel, and mops and buckets and anything that we could find to try and dry the stage. I can’t believe I still had a job at the end of it.
Tell us something about you that you think people would be surprised about.
I’m become green fingered in the last few years. There’s something about being outside in the Summer and having a project to get on with. One project I’m proud of has been brewing my own cider from one of the apple trees, it’s back breaking work, but the cider this year has been particularly good.
What are the next steps you plan to take to reach the next level?
The next goal is to try and recreate some of my tracks live and get some gig dates in the diary. I’ll be exploring different setups to see what works and what doesn’t, so you’ll have to find me on Tik Tok to see how these experiments are going.
I hear you have new music. What can you tell us about it?
My new track ‘Just For Fun’ is coming out in a few weeks 31st January. It’s a fun track that doesn’t take itself too seriously and has a bit of a Summer vibe to it.
What was the recording process like?
It’s all sample based like a lot of my music. The process was pretty quick where the main idea and arrangement was done in a few days. It took quite a few revisions in the mix before I was happy with it, and I felt I had to let it go before it became overworked. I wish all my tracks sort of ‘sneezed’ out like this one did.
What was the biggest learning curve in writing the new tune?
There was a moment where I felt the track could have gone in a different direction, and I feared (like a lot of music I have written) I would have two ideas for songs that went to the graveyard disk.
Would you change anything now it’s finished?
There are always things I would do differently to my songs, It’s really hard to let go of the music, so now I’m trying to be more focused on finishing music and moving forwards.
Is there anything else you would like to share with the world?
I’m always looking for collaborations so if there are players out there who enjoy what I do then make sure you get in touch.
FOLLOW HIM HERE // PRE SAVE HERE
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