www.betika.co.uk
A film, that is! I've been writing and recording some music this week for a short currently being made by my friend Glenn Sadler. It's the sequel to "The Aldwych Hall Horror", a spoof paranormal / detective caper from two years ago, which I also did some music for. For "The Aldwych Hall Horror", I made some very creepy noises by playing an autoharp with a metal slide, which were used more as abstract sound-effects than music - this time round I've been a little more conservative and written an actual theme tune! I wrote it on a cheesy '80s Yamaha keyboard that I got a few weeks ago from a second hand shop, and it initially had a John Carpenter (Halloween / Assault on precinct 13) kind of feel to it, but it came up in conversation with Carolyn that Brad (her very close friend and accomplished bass-player from Brenda//) has a double bass and a cello, so I arranged it for those instruments, along with oboe and flute which Carolyn played. And what a difference it's made! My crappy little synth piece now sounds almost like the work of someone who knows what they're doing. I'll put an mp3 of it up here after the film has been premiered, I don't want to give too much away yet. Eventually, when I've done enough of these I'll put together a CD of film music, I'm still a way off though, only having only done two-and-a-half to date (not counting those rare occasions when I've whored myself out to The Man and done stuff for cash). The other film I did, "Watermelon", directed by Tim Clague has being doing the rounds of various film festivals this summer, I believe it made it's way as far as Cannes. I expect Tim will put it on his website in the fullness of time, I'll put a link to it up as soon as he does.
On a related note, the SK5's animated film "Utility Soul Shambles" got a screening in a cinema in Newcastle last week, which is quite exciting, the first time it's been viewed on such a large screen as far as I'm aware. I haven't heard back yet how it was recieved.
A couple of weeks till the next full Betika shows (9th / 10th Dec), but tomorrow will find Chris, Carolyn and I at The Green room, doing a set consisting entirely of songs that Caz sings, and next Sunday we'll be down at Le Bateau doing something similar, but with me doing a bit of singing too. I'm also going to be doing some singing the following weekend with Toupe, who have asked me to contribute backing vocals (as part of a group of singers) to a performance they're doing in a theatre which is being filmed for a DVD which will be their next release. I don't think I'm an obvious choice for even a backing singer, seeing as how I'm not really very good at singing in any of the commonly accepted ways, but Grant insisted that he really does want me to do it, and so I will. I'll tell you all about it afterwards.
time for me to get some zeds now,
nighty night
D
