"Live On Stage" Showcase
Feature
You will have noticed my considerable respect for & excitement concerning the Live On Stage project if you've been reading my article over the months.
In fact I mentioned project members Mugshot as far back as my round up of 2022's Godiva Festival before knowing much about the bigger picture.
The astonishing & inexorable rise of Project Overload both on record (they released their debut album ‘New Beginnings' this year) and live & subsequently their appearance on the Main Stage at Godiva Festival 2024, with fellow project members Loophole up there the next day, has accelerated the need to focus upon what's going on.
My thanks therefore to the project team for inviting to me to their Summer Showcase at Coventry's HMV Empire and for the input from some of their members plus participating musicians to help me paint an accurate picture for you.
Organised by Coventry Music Hub & taking place at The Tin, its mission is to allow "..young musicians to form rock bands, develop song writing skills, learn about the music industry and take part in live performances" and as such involves artists aged from 11 to 18.
The team of mentors/tutors consists of Mark Patton from the Music Hub who leads the first year of the two year course, his colleague Alex Stott, second year leader Mason Le Long, Nina McLean-Ellmann and Michelle Bailey-Le Long who work with both year groups and Steve Weir who works with the second year.
As Mark told me: "by supporting our young bands to step on stage and learn of the other areas in the music industry, we hope they will always remember their journey with Coventry Music and The Tin Music & Arts, continuing to raise the profile of Coventry city's live music scene. "
Mason & Michelle will be known to many of you already: the former as a producer of so many artists we've covered as well as his own work with Batsch & !nvisible Hand and Michelle not only as a member of bands such as Deathsex Bloodbath, Duck Thieves and Sister Panic but for her work as a film maker. It is primarily through these two generous people that this article has been able to be written.
Nina (whom again you may know for her sound technician work at The Tin and elsewhere) was in the aforementioned Mugshot and later Permanent Daylight & hence is a Live On Stage contemporary of Project Overload: one of the great features of the project is the underlying philosophy of "there's no such thing as being too young" and to see someone evolve directly from being a student to a tutor (she teaches aspects of sound) is very exciting. No wonder the project prepares thirteen year old musicians to get ready to win "Godiva Calling".
Those of you who are aware of my career in education will probably appreciate my profound interest in what the project is doing. To help musicians at a critical time when personal musical skills are probably developing nicely and help them to develop what they are doing in a way which emphasises their own unique creative voice is crucial.
At this point, there are too many Svengali types looking for fresh talent to mould: at their least egregious these tend to try & persuade young musicians to copy the work of successful models: at worst it leads to various forms of exploitation. After we lost Gemma Leahy Waddell, one of the things I focused on was her hard work in these areas offering completely the opposite sort of mentoring philosophy, so it's great to hear of others operating similarly.
Confidence building must lie at the heart of this process: taking the form of both that approach to writing your own material saying what you want to say, whatever others may be whispering in your ear but also the physical form to get up on big stage & play naturally. I've written how Project Overload owned the Godiva Main Stage, but it's illuminating when the parent of one of the members of Loophole mentioned to me the "nerves of steel" he perceived in them: and I totally agree. Promoting this must be a priority at Live On Stage judging by what I see.
And I saw a great deal in one evening: the featured bands were Loophole, Electric Blue, Creative Sounds, Luminae, New Obsession, Rosewood, What About Eric? and Lucent.
All were skilful at what they did (some were jaw-droppingly so) but it was the attitudes which impressed even more. That confidence was there for starters: and I'd emphasise that within the broad characteristics of the project, there was much diversity. Several bands were up there with Project Overload and Loophole in terms of readiness to play anywhere. But this is a two year course & some were on year one, others year two & the age ranges were from eleven to eighteen so you'll catch me writing about them individually in some sort of sequence over the next few years as they play more in public & record, but unless the usual pressures of keeping bands together operate unhelpfully, I see no reason why you'll not experience them all.
There was also an overwhelming sense of community with bands supporting each other (far from always the case in the wider world of course), delighting in each other's music & having such positive relationships with the course team.
I took the opportunity to try & chat with some key players during the evening, though some were just too busy and I wanted to taste all of them (unfortunately the speed of sets and rapid (and highly skilled) changeovers meant that I only heard a couple from my interview room backstage) so as to try and capture the essence of Live On Stage.
The ideal starting point with a bridge back to previous articles would be starting with Loophole & I was delighted that Lucas, George, Nancy & George spared me the time literally just before they had to go on stage (and I mean that: they walked straight onto stage as we finished. The calmness & serenity of how they did that was eye opening: I'd never normally have attempted an interview with a band just before stage time).
Since this is the first time I've focused on the band rather than describe their performance, I thought it best to begin with examining how they saw their music. Lucas led on this one: "I think our band is mostly indie rock pop sort of based and I think for me especially, the bands and artists which take my interest and we incorporate into our music are Declan Mckenna, Jamie T, The Arctic Monkeys: they're all great bands and artists that I feel are really helpful in the creation of our music". George (the drum playing one) agreed: "a lot of the musicians that we listen to personally influence the different types of music that we play".
Loophole have actually evolved out of a previous band which included Lucas, Nancy, guitarist George and a drummer, Georgia, who left to be replaced by George on drums as part of the Live On Stage project "I think we're all really thankful for that, that we got this opportunity".
In terms of the Loophole journey to date, Lucas feels "I think it's got off to a really good start, playing at Godiva Main Stage the other weekend: we've been playing lots of gigs, HMV Empire tonight, many gigs at the Canal Basin, at The Tin, which is a really nice, homely environment, it's a really nice venue and I think what we're hoping to do is record more songs, write more songs and play at bigger venues, just try & expand our growth. I really enjoyed Godiva: it's such a big experience in our band career so far. To play such a big stage so early on, it's almost like a fever dream: it doesn't seem real. I think we're just so thankful that we had that opportunity and we took it & played really well to our audience and made a really good day of it."
Nancy expanded upon this: "I think Godiva was a really good opportunity for all of us and I think it definitely helped getting us more exposure on social media and meeting the other bands backstage was a bit of an achievement".
George (guitar) added "we played really well with minimal mistakes. We were backstage watching Beverley Knight and that was really good. There was also Oh My God! It's The Church. I quite liked them. They were good".
I asked them if six months previously they'd have anticipated playing such a stage, the answer came "absolutely not". While having dreamed of it, they seem to have considered themselves not on a level of bands who did play it: an assessment they've now hopefully fully revised.
In terms of next steps, building on this achievement, they are very grounded: they are, as Lucas says, "trying to play some gigs, get exposure & to write more songs & to release them. This band I think is really good at expressing ourselves which is a really good way to write music. The best part is just having fun with friends."
I asked the band for tips for you to check out: they suggested both Batsch & Duck Thieves and from the project, Luminae (and when I heard the latter later, I understood why).
They finished with Lucas telling me "how lucky we are to be given all of these opportunities by the Live On Stage project because without it, none of this would have happened. We're just really grateful & hoping to make more music".
Personally, I doubt that many of even the most experienced and skilled of musicians would necessarily be keen to or possess the right skillsets to work with young musicians, so I wanted to explore with Michelle & Mason more of the values side of what brought them into the project.
Ironically, the story's origins are far more prosaic than ideological: Mason putting their involvement down to a consequence of all his previous work at The Tin, causing them to "fall into it" with his venue & band experience being key factors into be invited to participate. "And suddenly, all of a sudden I was managing it." Michelle then spoke about their values "it is about developing skills of developing know-how of the local music scene and nationally as well, but the most important thing is about seeing the confidence grow in the kids. Confidence building is one of the core values of the project I would say. We definitely give them the space to develop their own creativity and to develop songs: it really is student-led practice. Another core value of the Live On Stage project is to give the young adult the empowerment and encouragement to find their creative voice. Just to see the evolution of the kids: when they do their first gigs, they are really shy, really nervous and then by the time they leave the project, they're rock stars, they're owning that stage and it makes us really proud."
Mason expanded on that point "it really is so rewarding when you watch them on the Main Stage at Godiva or here at The Empire after a year of work: I mean not only the bands we've been working with for two years but the ones we've worked with for one year & seeing their evolution from September until now is pretty amazing. They are all at different stages, there is a lot of variation in where they are at in terms of their progress as a band but they are all making that progress and that's the bit that's really rewarding to see."
Michelle continued: "what's great is to see the first watch the second years on stage and learn from them and celebrate them: it's a nice community of kids. What do we get out of it? We get to be really proud of these young musicians: the next generation in Coventry but also the next generation of the people at The Tin, like Nina who was in one of the first original bands and now she's teaching sound on it. To see Nina become a colleague, a collaborator, someone that we are proud of but is also completely an equal and has such a great input and a way with the kids .. the kids love her: Nina's the favourite, which is fine!"
As noted, Nina has the unique status of having been a project member and has moved onto a tutoring role which gives her perspectives I was eager to tap into…. "It's really amazing to be honest. It was such an important project to me that to be able to support from the other side, it feels like a really important thing for me to be able to do. It happened fairly quickly after I was out of the project and I think that was partially because I'd been so involved for so many years" (Nina did work experience at the Tin thanks to being part of Live On Stage).
Responding to what Mason & Michelle had told me (above) about how this circumstance made her relationship with project members different to that of the other tutors, she said: "often when you speak to people like Mason & Michelle when you're on the project, you don't really realise that their experience of music is still current: I don't mean that in a negative way. As someone who's been through the new stuff & the new drama of being in a band is important as well I think: there are times when you don't get on necessarily when in a band, particularly one which was put together by other people".
And on the palpable sense of mutual support that I was picking up: "the support that over the years I've received & the support that I'm hoping to give is just immense. Mason & Michelle were always there for Mugshot & Permanent Daylight, showing their support in every way they can".
She talked also of how she still played herself (in fact she later guested on bass with Lucent) but was so busy with her sound tech work to be part of a band currently: in fact I hadn't expected her to be at the gig but she'd come back from working at a festival, slept until 4 and made it to the showcase.
I wanted to catch up with Project Overload too for several reasons: their stupendous rise & rise over the past months and also how that relates to their experiences on the course. Luckily, I got to speak with Lucas as he was there playing with Loophole & later on with Tom & Callum who were present in the audience. Chatting first about the big gigs they've just played: "I think we're all still trying to take it in: obviously it's a really big feat, that we managed to get onto the Godiva Main Stage on the Saturday, playing to just under a thousand people, which is definitely one of our biggest gigs and we're hoping to keep that going, maybe go somewhere else outside of Coventry. We've got a gig in Birmingham which is coming up in September and a festival we're looking forwards to". They were also processing playing on the same stage as people like Sam Ryder with millions of followers: "surreal: it shows how far we've come".
In terms of new material, apparently they have plenty ready for recording a new album in 2025 (no danger of "second album syndrome") so although I told them I loved "Wildfire" which they played as part of their Godiva set & can be found on social media, such are the riches available that the most I got from them was that it …"might be a good shout for a single as I think it's one of our strongest songs". They are really excited to bring some of this previously unheard material into their set.
Inevitably with a group on such a trajectory there were plans which I can't yet share with you but will knock your socks off when they come to fruition.
With regards to how Live On Stage helped them get here, they told me about the tutorial support & guidance they'd received from Alex, Mark & Mason, drilling down into specifics like stage presence, what it's like to be in a band, how to interact as a band: but crucially not dictating how to play.
What is clear from their trajectory is that having nurtured young musicians over the duration of their time with the project, once they start moving, they fly. My advice to you is to keep your ears & eyes alert for the bands I saw. Already there is a sense of privilege for me to have caught Project Overload & Loophole so early in what can be distinguished careers: others such as Luminae, What About Eric? or Lucent are already on my "to do" list for their no doubt imminent recordings and future live reviews: the others are on the road too. Keep on watching this space.
If you know anyone who'd like to enrol for 2024-25, please direct them to this page:
https://www.coventrymusichub.co.uk/directory-record/9/live-on-stage
I asked the alumni of the project to whom I spoke what they'd say to anyone thinking of joining: "take your shot, take your opportunity: they provide lots of opportunities: they offer lots of gigs, lots of support, lots of help to get into a music career. It's a really good start for years 6, 7 & 8 in expressing themselves in music" (Project Overload).
"Just do it. When you start out, you can be nervous and that's sort of the point. The project is there to help those nervous first starters to get to a place where they're much less nervous and support them through that into being in a full band. There is expected stage fright: we work through that as part of it: that's why it's so important" (Nina McLean-Ellmann).
