Not so Much of a Happy Bunny

Happy Easter folks!

I'm still powering through a horrible cough this week, but thankfully as you're reading this online I don't have to apologise for my constant coughing fits (which has been a problem on stage this week...)

I kicked it all off this week at the Maze (after a whole weekend in bed).  I was playing for their Notts in a Nutshell night and as the solo act I was first to take the stage!  It was my first time playing at the Maze, which is kind of one of those places you have to play at least once if you're based in Nottingham.  Unfortunately, I wasn't up to my best standards what with the poorliness but managed to pull two newbies out of the bag to a very receptive crowd.  Before I headed home (via the Golden Fleece open mic, of course) I caught a set by a band called HotBox.  I was really impressed by these young guys, they've got a really cool sound and although the covers they played were all songs I already love, their original stuff was what sold me...  I'm looking forward to hearing more!

I was back on bed rest/dissertation duties for the next couple of days after being informed that I am 'banished' from my hometown until I finish it... I was really gutted this week that I have had to cancel two gigs due to being unwell, I'm not a happy bunny (Easter joke, get it!?).  So I'd just like to apologise to Monk in Matlock and Verve in Leeds for having to pull out of things this week, I really hate cancelling gigs but this week has just been a total write off.  I did however manage to finish a song, stay tuned...

I did manage to squeeze one more gig out of the week on Saturday in West Bridgford.  Despite being still very ill, it was a really fun experience.  It was just me playing covers all night and it was kind of nice to take a break from my songs for the evening and pay tribute to some of my faves!  Also, the crowd were amazing!

So, it's back to bed for me... I'm feeling a little better today but still not 100%, hopefully I'll have made a full recovery by Tuesday for my gig at Rescue Rooms (message me via Facebook for tickets).  I'm sure the new season of Game of Thrones will help with this... :)

Enjoy the chocolate!

Love y'all 

Anwyn :) x

LINKS

Facebook: www.facebook.com/anwynwilliamsmusic

YouTube: www.youtube.com/anwynwilliams

Twitter: www.twitter.com/anwyn_williams

R&R: Rock n' Roll vs Rest and Recuperation

Hello everybody!

I was back to my busy-bee ways at the start of this week, following a very fun St Patrick's day at the Salutation Inn with music from Satnam's Tash, I was back to my own music on Monday with an NA Music gig at Jam Cafe in Nottingham.  I opened the night (powering through this disgusting cold I have...) and shared the bill with The Retrospectives, Wolf Club and Proper English Gentlemen.  I was very impressed by all the acts that played, in particular The Retrospectives, who played a more stripped back set than usual and completely smashed it!

I ended Monday night at the Fleece (who's surprised?!) and later back at my lovely friend Nikola Neumanova's flat for some all night jamming with our wonderful musical friends Michael Stott, Agnes Bella and Yasmin Issaka.  It was pretty much a perfect night in...

Tuesday was a back-on-the-road day; I had another NA Music gig, this time at the Basement in York for the first time since the tour which was rather exciting!  I love York, it's such a beautiful place and my second time at the Basement was great, with other support sets from the young and talented Harley Daniels and Shannon Cole.  Headlining was Toby Burras, otherwise known as Unfinished Drawings.  With a super smooth voice and really unique guitar playing he really blew the crowd away, I especially liked his cheeky little cover of Kelis' Milkshake... that was impressive!

I was on Music Society presidential duties by Wednesday as myself, Agnes Bella, Matt Gold, Max Hammond and Michael Stott played at The Point, Nottingham Trent's student's union bar in Clifton,  for their Real Ale and Cider Festival.  It was a really enjoyable evening and we're definitely hoping to do more work with NTSU and hopefully put on some more live shows over in Clifton, so watch this space!

Since Wednesday I've spent a lot of quality time with my bed trying to shake this cold/cough that wants to ruin my life (also because who needs this much snow in England in March?)... But at least that's meant I've had a fair amount of time to do bits and pieces on my dissertation, at last.  I opted to take this approach... yes, it's a bit Carrie Mathison from Homeland, but I am probably going to go slightly crazy before I get this beast of a project handed in so it seems pretty justified.

Just quickly, resting in bed tends to have a fair bit of social media attached to it these days, so here's something I came across that you should check out.  If you like The Smiths, a rare demo of them in their early years appeared on YouTube this week... give it a listen, the sound quality is pretty poor but it's cool, and it's a little bit of musical history!  Find out more on NME.com.

Have a nice Sunday everyone!

Love y'all

Anwyn :) x

PS - 2 new songs completed this week and at least 2 almost there... stay tuned!

LINKS

Facebook: www.facebook.com/anwynwilliamsmusic

YouTube: www.youtube.com/anwynwilliams

Twitter: www.twitter.com/anwyn_williams

Music Appreciation Week

Happy St Patrick's day everyone! 

This week has been much more musical than last with lots of gigs attended/planned and new music listened to!  I've had a bit of poorly throat and a cough this week so instead of breaking myself any further I decided to have my own music appreciation week and check out what everyone else has been doing lately...

As I mentioned last week I headed down to the Golden Fleece on Sunday evening to catch the lovely Michael Stott play a fantastic set.  It was a really enjoyable evening, and I was lucky enough to also see a talented young duo called In The Teepees, as well as managing to catch some songs by the brilliant Ande Hunter (of Hunting Helen) before the snow set in and I had to brave the walk home!

A little bit of creative insomnia had me writing a brand new song when I returned home after the gig.  I debuted it the next day and it seemed to go down quite well.  It's much softer than the other new stuff I've been writing recently so when I eventually get a recording I will be looking forward to some feedback! 

We changed it up a little this Monday, once every month the NTU Music Society hosts an acoustic night alongside the Nottingham Trent Students Union at Spanky van Dykes.  This month we had some truly amazing acts from our society on the bill; Michael Stott was still on top form from the night before, one of our freshers, Yasmin Issaka played Spanky's for the first time, Will Wilson who consistently puts on a great show at almost every Acoustic Night we've run joined us again and we had a new addition in the form of an incredibly talented duo called Midnight and the Blue.

Despite all the fun over at Spanky's I couldn't resist the pull of the Golden Fleece open mic night as usual and headed down there afterwards to do a couple of songs to a really happy crowd!  I love the Fleece...

This Wednesday was an Orange Wednesday for me, I went to the cinema to finally see Oz: The Great and Powerful.  After watching the now infamous Radio 1 interview multiple times I was very excited to see Mila Kunis enjoying 'being ugly for once'.  I think she pulled it off pretty well!  I'd heard the film had been given some bad reviews but I quite enjoyed it...  However, following a friend of mine lecturing me on the history of inventions/science regarding Thomas Edison and Nikola Tesla  (with a little help from The Oatmeal and Epic Rap Battles of History), Oz's obsession with how awesome Edison was seemed wrong!  Click on the comic link and see why, poor Tesla... On a side note, science and history should always be taught like that!

After a long day at uni on Thursday I once again joined forces with Calum Hems for a bit of a jam.  We kind of perfected The Castle and the Kingdom and then got straight to work on my new one... and I'm so excited about the banjo part he pretty much made up on the spot for it - what a talented guy!  We then ventured down to Jam Cafe to watch the fantastic Lester J Allen play an incredible set, I really recommend checking him out, he's very talented and such a nice guy as well!

Finally I'd just like to mention a few music related things that have made me super happy this week, because it's always nice to be happy!  Firstly, this track by track review of Laura Marling's new album which is coming out on the 27th May has me very excited, the taster track, Where Can I Go? is gorgeous and I really cannot wait to hear the rest!  Those of you who know me will understand this as you'll already know how much I love Laura... she's even in my dissertation!  Secondly, I finally managed to track down a song I've been trying to find for about 3 weeks...  Turns out it's Young Blood Blues by an amazing little New Orleans band called Hurray for the Riff Raff, seriously check them out!  They even have a cover of River by Joni Mitchell (the other subject of my dissertation) on their YouTube!  And to top it all off, this week I managed to obtain tickets to see Lucy Rose in Sheffield as well as successfully booking (thanks to my wonderful father) tickets for the Mumford & Sons, Ben Howard, The Vaccines and Edward Sharpe and the Magnetic Zeroes concert in Dublin which I am incredibly, incredibly excited about!  I'm a huge fan of all these artists and had already been discussing going to Dublin over the Summer so as soon as I saw the Phoenix Park gig advertised I was determined to get tickets!  Next stop, booking flights to Ireland... that seems like an appropriate way to end this St Patrick's Day blog, now to go have some Irish inspired fun!

Don't get too drunk everyone...

Love y'all

Anwyn :) x

LINKS

Facebook: www.facebook.com/anwynwilliamsmusic
YouTube: www.youtube.com/anwynwilliams
Twitter: www.twitter.com/anwyn_williams

The Week Off

Hola!

This entry is probably going to be boring and short because this week has been my week off music!  After 2 weeks going pretty much non-stop I took a little time to rest...

Of course, the week started off as usual at the Golden Fleece open mic night where I accompanied my lovely talented friend Lucy Yates for 3 songs, as well as doing a little set of my own.

The rest of the week was much more about drama than music for me, which is very unusual... but it's good to be out of you comfort zone every now and then.  I was asked to help some friends out with a filming project so was faced with the awkward experience of acting, which is obviously not my favourite performing art!  That said, it's all been pretty fun and I actually quite enjoyed myself... definitely looking forward to seeing the final thing!

What with my acting career on the rise (...or not) I really appreciated going to see the NTU Drama Society put on a production of Fame on Friday night at the Nottingham Arts Theatre.  It was a great night out watching some amazing talents who have put a lot of hard work in to making the show a huge success.  

So, short and sweet this week... hopefully I'll have more to talk about next week, starting with my set at Spanky Van Dykes Acoustic Night tomorrow!  But tonight I'm rounding it all off back at the Golden Fleece to watch the brilliant Michael Stott perform.

Love y'all!

Anwyn x

PS - Happy Mother's Day to my mum :)

LINKS

Facebook: www.facebook.com/anwynwilliamsmusic
YouTube: www.youtube.com/anwynwilliams
Twitter: www.twitter.com/anwyn_williams

The Never-Ending Tour

Hello everybody!

It's been over a week since the NA Music Acoustic Tour ended and left me heartbroken, but at least I can still revel in nostalgia with the brilliant tour video that Beth filmed and edited together (is there no end to this girl's talents!?), check it out here! 

I also had a rather lovely article written about my Guitar Bar set for Nottingham Trent's Platform Magazine which is available to read on their website if you follow this link...  Thank you to Will Wilson for writing and publishing those kind words.

Now onto this week's adventures... after the tour, I had a nice relaxing weekend back in my hometown of Leamington Spa and managed to make it back to Nottingham on Monday just in time to hit the Golden Fleece open mic night.  I was lucky enough to be joined by Calum Hems on banjo again for our version of White Blank Page and The Castle and the Kingdom.  

And in true rock star fashion, by Tuesday I was back on the road again for a gig in Derby with Steve Faulkner, 5 Strings and my good friend Marc Reeves for Sausage and Folk at the Graduate.  I was joined there by local percussionist Sam Turner for an impromptu collaboration on my set! 

On Wednesday I played a set at The Stop Bar in Nottingham which was a lovely venue, then ventured out for a friend's birthday afterwards.  Following a BIG lack of sleep, I gave myself a well-deserved night off from my gigs on Thursday and instead went to see Slash play at the Capital FM Arena!  The gig was brilliant, when you can close a show with songs as big as Welcome to the Jungle and Paradise City you pretty much know you're a legend... 

By Thursday, after sufficient rest, I was back to gigging - starting with the featured artist slot at Lee Rosy's open mic night.  It was a really nice evening hosted by Marc Reeves in the basement of Lee Rosy's Tea House.  There was a brilliant atmosphere and I was once again accompanied by Calum (on electric guitar this time!).  

I ended this week of what seems to be a never-ending tour with two gigs on Saturday night at Loft Bar and Guitar Bar, both in Nottingham.  I thoroughly enjoyed the set at Loft Bar, especially with it being my first time playing there and was immensely excited to follow up with my support slot for Mariana Bell later in the evening.  We both played to a small, intimate crowd, unplugged and acoustic (here's a video of Shine).  The audience at the venue were incredibly attentive and we ended the night with a private after hours jam... All in all, just a beautiful night!  

After another very busy week I'm definitely looking forward to having a bit of time off.  Otherwise known as time to focus on that dissertation I'm writing..... 

Love y'all

Anwyn :) x

LINKS

Facebook: www.facebook.com/anwynwilliamsmusic
YouTube: www.youtube.com/anwynwilliams
Twitter: www.twitter.com/anwyn_williams