Getting My Musical Feet Wet Across The Pond

So its taken me a little while to getting round to writing this blog post, about a month, however the excitement and buzz from playing my first gig's in USA and Canada still lingers in me, and as ever to do it with an incredible artist such as Nakhane is a dream come true.

So here's how the schedule looked, it was only short but quite intense:

New York (Day Off)

Afropunk New York SHOW

Travel day to Toronto

Toronto SHOW

Travel to Rouyn-Noranda

FME Festival SHOW

Travel To Montreal

Montreal SHOW

Day Off and Flight home :(

We were really lucky with how the schedule worked out that we managed to get some down time in New York and Toronto and Montreal, despite the long journey days (several hours in a van/plane) we all made the most of being across the water. In a total of 8 days I managed to walk half of New York City,

eat stunning street food in Toronto,

seize the fresh air of Rouyn Noranda

and climb to the top of the mount in Montreal.

Actually I'm just going to take a moment to thank my good friend Alessandro Melchior (the sound engineer), for joining me/guiding us in these adventures. As I've already mentioned its amazing to get to see the world doing the things you love, with an artist that you love then add to that exploring the world with a great friend....honestly it doesn't get any better. I genuinely think without him I would of done a lot less, as I'm the kind of person who craves company I'm not a lone ranger, never have been and never will.

Anyway, needless to say, as you can hopefully see from my pictures above and on my instagram (@keiradamson) we had a pretty awesome time, and I'm seriously still caught of guard sometimes with what I'm achieving in my working life. I just keep ticking things off the bucket list! :)

Next stop Australia??!! (At this rate I'm gonna need to start adding more things to my list).

Deserted Island + Beautiful Sunshine = Happy Days

When you have to take two taxis, two flights and a boat to get to a festival you know your in for a treat. Needless to say Sinsal Festival in San Simon, Galicia Spain was certainly no disappointment.

Most often when you arrive at a festival, to play, you find yourself thrown into a mix of adrenaline fuelled stage hands and stressed out stage managers, which in turn rubs off on you (if your not careful). Don't get me wrong though its totally understandable as that is one hell of a job. However when you get the chance to play at an amazingly slick chilled out festival such as Sinsal, boy do you know notice the difference. First of all, you find yourself immediately put at ease, everyone knows there job and more importantly knows "your" job. It may sound weird but when you get to a soundcheck the last thing you wanna be stressing out about is having to explain to the guy by the side of stage why you are there and what gear you are carrying, only to have the same conversation with the guys on stage (insert eye roll). At small chilled out festivals like Sinsal, this sort of stuff just doesn't happen, not because they don't care but the teams aren't over stretched or over run, on the two days we played there was a total of 5 acts on our stage and honestly the impact on everyones mood and performance is astounding!!

So whats the point behind this post, well I'm gonna be honest I'm not totally sure. Maybe I just wanted to selfishly let you guys know I had the best time haha, or maybe its that bigger well known festivals have something to learn from the smaller ones. Maybe as a performer the big ones are overrated? Don't know about that!

So I guess my main point, if there is one, is that you should definitely as a musician and as a music fan open yourself up to both. The small ones have a charm and sense of relaxation that was perfectly summed up over this previous weekend, whilst the large ones have a BUZZ of excitement and anticipation that can't be bottled up, both are equally entertaining and some people may prefer one to the other all I'm saying is we should never undersell the little guys with potentially unknown acts in obscure locations, because who knows it may just be the best experience of a festival you will ever have?! All I can say is that I loved it, as a break in the Nakhane touring schedule of the past few months flying in and out of some big festivals, Sinsal was a welcome change from the norm, and certainly a festival I would go back to in a heartbeat.

P.S I also found a new hip band from Amsterdam called Jungle By Night, those guys were killer I would highly recommend checking them out, there live show was electric energy fuelled Jungle Fever haha.

My First - Later With Jools....

I can't remember a time when I didn't want to be on this show. I've literally dreamed about it for the past.....gosh I don't know.....probably since the moment I could play music I wanted to be on it!! In the UK its THE show to perform on and I have literally seen all my favourite artists and drummers play on there and deep down always hoped I would too. So when the opportunity finally came along to play the show with Nakhane, I was needless to say quite literally ecstatic.

I remember walking onto the set was one of the most surreal moments in my life, I turned up by myself and just walked into the main space with the giant foam blocks and wire constructions hanging down with my jaw dropped and my eyes popping. I honestly felt like a kid again. I just couldn't stop imagining all the amazing people that had been there before me and I felt overwhelmed. It was in that moment that I became super grateful that we were allowed to be on set a day early to setup and soundcheck. Because honestly if it had happened on the same day as the show I probably would of been caught on screen looking like this...

Thankfully I held my cool and even managed to handle having dinner with the incredible Nile Rodgers, who arguably is one of the most incredible and influential producers of the past century having worked with everyone from David Bowie to Pharrell Williams, he talked to us about what he's doing now and how Riccochet by David Bowie was originally a 6/8 Afrikan vibe which he had to reign in.

Needless to say that this chance meeting with a hero of mine along with what was probably one of the most adrenaline fuelled performances of my life is the reason why I will never forget that day.

Big thanks to Nakhane and his management for making it all work. Cheers guys, you made a lil boys dream come true :).