Desiderata

This week has been mostly taken up with activates of a musical nature at SXSW. It’s the first SX I’ve been part of in 2 years. It was a little weird, but it felt really good to be playing shows again and seeing musician friends I haven’t been around in for-eva.

Austin peeps will know how crazy the shire gets during SX. Musical people play an insane number of showcases, hopping from venue to venue with barely enough time to get from one stage to the other. It’s nuts, but a lot of fun.

As mentioned in previous posts, the pandemic has taught me that less is most definitely more, so the fact that I was only playing a mere 4 shows this week was A-ok with me. For context, in 2019 I played 19 showcases with multiple artists. 2020 I had 14 lined up, but Covid made sure none of those took place (which, as it turned out, was a good thing for me, as 6 weeks prior to that I had a hysterectomy and *should* have been resting).

Speaking of going placidly amid the noise and haste; this week I wanted to share a very special poem with you. Desiderata by Max Ehrmann. This poem is important to me because a copy of it has hung in every house my parents have ever lived in. I know many of the lines off by heart and growing up, both my Mum and Dad would quote passages from it often.

Enjoy ❤ ❤ ❤

Go placidly amid the noise and the haste and remember what peace there may be in silence. As far as possible, without surrender, be on good terms with all persons.

Speak your truth quietly and clearly; and listen to others, even to the dull and the ignorant; they too have their story.

Avoid loud and aggressive persons; they are vexatious to the spirit. If you compare yourself with others, you may become vain or bitter, for always there will be greater and lesser persons than yourself.

Enjoy your achievements as well as your plans. Keep interested in your own career, however humble; it is a real possession in the changing fortunes of time.

Exercise caution in your business affairs, for the world is full of trickery. But let this not blind you to what virtue there is; many persons strive for high ideals, and everywhere life is full of heroism.

Be yourself. Especially do not feign affection. Neither be cynical about love; for in the face of all aridity and disenchantment, it is as perennial as the grass.

Take kindly the counsel of the years, gracefully surrendering the things of youth.

Nurture strength of spirit to shield you in sudden misfortune. But do not distress yourself with dark imaginings. Many fears are born of fatigue and loneliness.

Beyond a wholesome discipline, be gentle with yourself. You are a child of the universe no less than the trees and the stars; you have a right to be here.

And whether or not it is clear to you, no doubt the universe is unfolding as it should. Therefore be at peace with God, whatever you conceive Him to be. And whatever your labors and aspirations, in the noisy confusion of life, keep peace in your soul. With all its sham, drudgery and broken dreams, it is still a beautiful world. Be cheerful. Strive to be happy.

 

What is ‘Normal’?

I’ve got to be honest with you.

I’m struggling to get back to ‘normal’.

Everyone else seems to be slowly emerging from the pandemic hibernation and going back to normality with so much enthusiasm, but I’m not sure what that looks like for me anymore.

I mean, define normal.

normal – /ˈnôrməl/
the usual, average, or typical state or condition.

Well, yeah….but, like, Covid, and the pandemic, and stuff, and things.

When lockdown happened it was as if we pressed the pause button on life itself, then years later we hit play, with the expectation of picking up where we left off.

Yep, everything’s normal. Nothing weird here. We’re just going back to the life we had 2 years ago even though we’ve grown and changed and we’re all different, but we’re heading back there anyways and it’s all perfectly normal. 

U-huh.

Trouble is, I can’t go back to the life I had. I’m not the same person I used to be. I’ve changed, like a whole lot.

When lockdown happened, I (like many of my creative friends) totally and utterly freaked out. But once I stopped fighting it and embraced my situation, for the first time ever my personality type actually worked in my favor. I grew in a way I never thought was possible and finally felt 100% comfortable in my own skin.

In case you didn’t know, I’m a hard-core introvert. A lot of people have this misconception that introverts hate everyone and don’t want to interact with them. That simply isn’t true. I DO want to interact with everyone, just one at a time, and definitely not in a small room all at the same time with music blaring and lights and noise and stuff. THAT is far from normal.

One thing lockdown did helped me with was self-love.

I really like me. I enjoy being in my own company. I’m very content sitting alone for hours on end. I don’t need a phone or gadget. A book is always very welcome. Being immersed in nature is even better.

Before the pandemic, I apologised to people for essentially being, well, myself. I know I’m British and saying sorry is like a national tic for us, but I would apologise to people for every-single-bloody-thing.

I’m sorry I need quiet time every day.

I’m sorry that standing around at cocktail parties having surface level conversations with total strangers is not my thing.

I’m sorry that I’d much rather sit in a peaceful and tranquil place that do shots in a club.

I’m sorry I love reading and enjoy sharing some of the interesting stuff I’ve read.

I’m sorry I have a deep awareness of human suffering and think about it constantly. 

I’m sorry I know all the words to Vanilla Ice’s Ice Ice Baby and owned his album as a child (sorry not sorry).

I didn’t want to rock the boat, so more often than not I pretended to be something I wasn’t. I didn’t want to make people feel uncomfortable, and yet all this time it seemed perfectly acceptable to me that I be ill at ease. 

Like, wow the fecking fo?

But you know, lockdown forced me to be with myself and figure aaaallll this shit out. And now I’m perfectly happy saying; I like me. Just the way I am. I’ve spent far too long trying to fit in, and I don’t want to do that anymore.

So now that little revelation has happened, we move on to act II:

ACT II – Scene I
Integrating back into Society (aka, normality)

Every Sunday throughout the Pandemic, I was part of a church band playing music and doing live streams for the congregation, as we weren’t allowed to hold regular services. In a pretty large building, the crew was made up of 8 people.

We did this for an entire year. 12 months later, we had our first in-person service with 50 people in the audience.

Halfway through the gig, I got up from behind the drum kit and went outside. I had a total meltdown. The flood gates opened, and I could not stop crying. I felt utterly overwhelmed and didn’t know how to process what I was experiencing.

I mean, I’m a musician. I’ve been performing in front of audiences for the past 25 years.

I’m supposed to ENJOY this sort of thing! What on earth is going on?!

I don’t know if any of you guys have ever been on one of those elimination diets, the ones where you cut out sugar or wheat or whatever. Initially it makes you feel like crap, but after a while, you feel so much better.

Then months or even years later, someone offers you an extremely sugary cake. You take one bite, and it’s nothing like you remember.

It makes you feel yucky and weird.

And that’s what I’ve been experiencing going back to ‘normal’. All the elements that were eliminated from my life came hurtling towards me like a stampede of elephants and it was utterly overwhelming.

The thing is, I DO love performing. I LOVE being on-stage with my musician friends, which is why all of this is so difficult and confusing.

Things are getting easier, slowly. I am doing more, bit by bit. I’m learning that it’s ok to let go of the past and be in the present. I need to stop trying to go back to how things were, because life is completely different in a multitude of ways. Creatively everything is pretty darn awesome for me right now, it’s just all the regular stuff I’m finding difficult to process.

How about you? Have you found it difficult to get back to normal? Or was it easy-peesy-lemon-squeezy? And if you have any handy hints or tips they would be very much appreciated ❤ ❤ ❤

 

Me Too. Again.

I get hit on by dudes, a lot.

I do not make this statement to brag like I’m some super-hot chick. Quite the opposite. I don’t understand it at all, but outside of that, I find getting hit on by men uncomfortable and often very annoying.

I remember sharing a ride with a musician friend a couple of years ago and me telling him the exact same thing.

‘Ooooo, there, there’ he responded in a patronising tone, patting me gently on the shoulder, ‘how awful for you!’. He them slumped back in his seat and said ‘it’s *always* fun getting hit on. Something must be wrong with you’.

Is it fun though? 

I mean, here’s the thing. I’m gay, right?

That means I have to deal with unwanted attention from men who I don’t wish to interact with in that way, and there’s not an awful lot I can do about it.

If you’re a straight person, imagine if you will, venturing outside your home, doing menial tasks such as grocery or book shopping, and people of the same sex blatantly staring at you and then coming over to chat you up, and even when you make it crystal clear that you’re not interested, they still keep going, and when you eventually get mad and tell them to kindly bugger off, they make out like YOU’RE the a-hole! 😮 

Don’t get me wrong, there have been a couple of guys who have approached me and been incredibly sweet and kind, but most of the time, it’s really icky.

I know you’re probably reading this thinking:

‘Blimey, KM is a right man-hater!’.

How very dare you! I am no such thing.

FACT: Most of my friends are straight dudes.

I love hanging out with a group of guys, because we have so much in common 🙂 but my male friends accept me for who I am and know that nothing is ever going to happen between us, other than in-depth conversations about cars, or sports, or action movies, or video games, or probably a combination of all these things.

I was super proud of the fact that back when I lived in the UK I was invited to my friend’s Stag-do (Batchelor Party) before he got married. It really meant a lot to me ❤ We all went bowling, they drank a shit-ton of beer. I made sure no-one went off with anyone strange. We hit a club, danced to crappy music, got some fast food and went home. It was a fun night.

When it comes to strangers, like so many women, I have had more situations than I care to remember where I had incredibly uncomfortable interactions with guys.

I no longer use Lyft as I had 2 back-to-back incidents of male drivers who were total creepers and were acting in an inappropriate way. One guy spent the entire ride saying he’d like to be my new boyfriend and how we have time to hit a bar before my flight, the other tried to reach over and grab my leg.

Why didn’t you report this to Lyft? 

I did. You know what happened? A-b-s-o-l-u-t-e-l-y nothing. Except now I no longer feel safe being driven to wherever it is that I need to go, which is a bloody shame, as there are so many awesome Lyft drivers out there, one of which I wrote a blog post about.

The thing is, I want to make choices about what clothes to wear each day, but if I’m venturing out into the big wide world, I get very insecure that I will in fact draw *more* attention from the opposite sex with my clothing choice.

And btw, I’m not talking about dressing up like I’m about to go and work for a few hours down the clocktower (aka turning tricks). I’m just talking clothes that make me feel good. That’s all. Trousers, shirt, shoes, that sort of thing.

I was disappointed to learn recently that while wearing one of my trouser / shirt / shoes clothing combos that a simple, seemingly inoffensive interaction with a guy has cost me a regular gig that was going really well. I did absolutely nothing wrong except decline someone’s advances, something they clearly took offence to. More on that in a bit.

It reminded me of a situation that happened about 10 years ago, back when I was doing more of my ‘KM Singer-Songwriter’ thing. I was asked by a popular music magazine to do an interview, something I was super excited about.

My interviewer turned out to be the editor for the magazine. He seemed a little quirky but nice enough. We met up at a local cafe and chatted for around an hour. Towards the end of the interview, he told me that he had 2 free tickets for a concert to see one of my all-time favorite artists (someone we had talked about in my interview). He told me the second ticket was going spare and I was welcome to have it. I thanked him for the very kind gesture and said that would be amazing.

About a week later I had a solo gig. Shortly after arriving, I noticed Mr.Magazine-Dude was already in attendance, fancy DSLR camera at the ready. He greeted me with a big hug as I walked in, and during the gig took literally hundreds of photos of me playing.

Yeah. It was awkward and weird.

The more Magazine-Dude was interacting with me during my show, the more I realised that he was thinking of the free-ticket offering as some sort of date, which was not how I interpreted it at all.

The following day I sent him an email, which I had spent considerable time writing to make sure I was being courteous, polite and above all else, kind. I explained that as much as I appreciated the ticket offer, I would no longer be able to accept it.

I hit the send button.

The response I received a few hours later was staggering.

It consisted of paragraph after paragraph of angry ranting, calling me this and that (and the other).

I did what I usually do when someone decides to drop one of these delightful messages in my inbox.

I rang him up.

It’s amazing how much smaller people’s balls are when you’re talking to them on the end of a telephone vs a computer screen.

Even though I was upset by what I had just read, I explained in a calm and concise way that I did not appreciate his email and I had done absolutely nothing wrong.

He childishly responded with:

“Well, you need to be careful who you piss of in this business”.

I took it as an empty threat, coming from someone who was clearly pissed off, but unfortunately for me, that wasn’t the end of it. Mr.Magazine-Dude was involved in multiple events and a large festival I used to play in London every year, and he made sure I was never booked at any of these ever again.

Fast forward to present day and it seems that once again, a similar situation has happened to me.

For the past 8 months I’ve been playing regularly at a venue I liked a whole lot. The bar staff are awesome, I get on well with the manager, and as far as I knew, everything was fine.

The first time I played there, someone from upper management came to greet me and seemed very friendly and helpful. I mistook this for being, well, friendly and helpful.

Whenever I was playing, he was always around and made a point of interacting with me and saying nice things about my music.

Again, I mistook this for complements about my musicianship. Darn fool.

The last time I interacted with him, he said something to me that seemed a little off and made me think that perhaps he viewed me in a way that I wasn’t comfortable with.

The following day he randomly messaged me through my website, asking me a rather vague question about my shows. It felt very much as if he was fishing for a response, and as I would be playing at his gaff the following week and would see him in-person, I didn’t respond.

I went to play my show, and not only did he completely and utterly blank me for most of the evening, when I did interact with him, he acted like a stroppy child. I ignored it, but inside I was so irritated by his behavior.

The agency that books my gigs has told me numerous times that I was this venue’s favorite act, and along with booking me multiple times a month, they would always ask me to do special events before anyone else.

It’s been over 2 months since I’ve played there.

I checked in with my agent to ask why I hadn’t been booked there for a while when everything seemed to be going so well. Their response was:

They said they’re fully booked with artists and don’t have the slots available for you to come and play 

U-huh. Ok. And I sailed down the river Clyde on a banana boat this morning.

It sucks on so many levels. It sucks because I literally didn’t do anything wrong, and yet it’s now ME who has lost a regular gig.

*Sigh*

My thoughts are this.

It’s ok to be attracted to someone, but it’s a whole other thing to punish them for not wanting to interact with you in an intimate way, because I have every right to say NO, and in a work environment, I am a professional musician of 25 years and expect to be treated as such. Penis or no penis.

But that’s just my thoughts. What are yours? I’d love to hear what you think.

Btw, I came across this guy’s Video on Youtube advising girls how to stop getting hit on by guys, it’s absolutely hilarious. It includes gems like: 

If a guy offers to buy you a drink say, “Yes! I would love that! It will give us a chance to discuss our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ!”. 

Be Your Own Valentine

I don’t know about you, but I’ve learnt so much about myself over the past 24-months. I feel as though the Universe (without my consent btw) thrust me into a 2-year-long voyage of self-discovery, on a level unlike anything else I have ever experienced.

In that time, I’ve realised a great many things. But my main takeaway is this:

Bloody hell, I was SO hard on myself.

And I’m not just talking about pushing myself a bit too much. It was like having some beefy drill Sergeant living inside my head, yelling at me every time I messed up.

YOU LAZY MAGGOT! What the hell was that?? I’ll tell you what it was:

CRAP! T-O-T-A-L CRAP!

You call *that* playing music??

You wanna be a loser the rest of your life?

Huh???

QUIET!! I’m speaking!!

Now git down on the ground and gimmie 50. NOW!!

The irony of all of this is that when it comes to other people, I am the polar opposite. Kindness is at the centre of my being. I am kind and compassionate to everyone I come into contact with (including arseholes), and yet when I was dealing with myself, I wasn’t kind at all. Far from it in fact.

There were numerous times my body gave me very clear warning signs that it needed a break. I ignored them all and kept pushing. It made me feel tough. I felt a sense of pride when I was utterly exhausted at the end of the day and could barely stand up. LOOK HOW HARD I HAVE WORKED! (lol). I used to tell everyone with much delight how busy my schedule was, and how I used to work every single day without a day off, ever….as if that was a good thing.

I thought days off were for sissies. I believed whole-heartedly that the more you work the better your life will be. If you want to be successful you have to put in the hours and work, work, work, work. Which is true to a certain extent. But here’s the thing; there is zero point in working yourself to death if you don’t have the time or energy to enjoy the fruits of your labor because life has simply passed you by, or the stress from overworking caused you to get sick.

John Lennon famously said, ‘Life is what happens when you’re busy making other plans’.

After I had my hysterectomy in Jan 2020, I promised myself that I would listen to my body more and not push myself as much.

Recovery time for a hysterectomy is 6-8 weeks.

I was back to work on week 5.

I know. You don’t need to tell me. What a dumbass.

Thankfully for me, lockdown happened on week 7, which forced me back home, where I should have been all along.

Like so many of my musician friends in 2020, I had to sit back and watch gig after gig, tour after tour get cancelled until I found myself staring at an empty calendar. Every self-employed person’s worst nightmare.

I remember calling my Mum in a total panic.

‘What am I going to do?’ I cried. ‘I need to get back to gigging as soon as possible!’.

She listened and patiently waited for me to stop wallowing in my own self-pity, before replying with,

‘Instead of trying to get back what you had as quicky as possible, why not use this time to figure out exactly what it is you want to rush back to?’. 

*Cue mic drop*

In that moment I realised I was barreling towards one thing and one thing only:

Burn out.

Burn out is real.

I didn’t get a random tumor growing in my uterus for no reason at all. I got it because I simply refused to take my health seriously. And you know what? My body got to the point where it was like ‘OK KM. I let you take the reins. You’ve done a pretty shitty job. I told you nicely on numerous occasions that I needed a break and it’s obvious that you are completely incapable of listening, so, in the words of Rage Against the Machine, Imma gunna take the power back. Sit yo-self down. I’m taking over’.

I often get FaceBook memories pop up from a few years back, that read something along the lines of:

Played at X festival and then at midnight hopped on a plane and flew to X place. Played 3 shows and flew back to Austin. Got off the plane and played a show in the airport, afterwards I drove home and played a show that evening. The following day I ran a workshop and then played a show in the evening. Following morning finished workshop, afternoon played a show, evening played a show. 

And so on, and so on, and so on.

All of this was very normal for me. To be moving and rushing around every single moment of every day. I would love posting about how busy I was. But when I read these types of posts now, I kinda cringe, because I know I wasn’t making my needs a priority, which makes me very sad.

I’m a pretty simple sort. I don’t need very much in order to be content. I’m also very accommodating. But I have finally come to realise that every day I need KM Time, which includes:

Quiet time.

Alone time.

Time spent immersed in nature. 

These things are no longer negotiable. They are part of who I am, and they make me happy. It’s really that simple.

When I lived in Devon, having these things on a daily basis was very easy. But once I moved to the US, I stopped making them a priority.

There’s a wonderful Maya Angelou quote that feels so relevant to me right now:

So, this year for Valentine’s Day, I will be reminding myself that being kind and taking care of me is not only acceptable, but it’s essential. It is ok to stop once in a while. You’re not being selfish, you’re being kind, to YOU.

And since I have adopted this approach, my work life is considerably better. I’m happier. I’m a whole lot more productive. I have way more ME time. And quite honestly, life is too short to not be happy every single day. Trust me.

I always say that it is imperative that we be kind to everyone around us, but don’t forget to love yourself as well ❤ You matter!

Happy Valentine’s Day ❤ ❤ ❤

The Missing Pieces

This beautiful lady is my grandmother, Margaret Joan Robinson.

Brought up in north-east London, Margaret was a woman way ahead of her time. Forward-thinking, dynamic, driven and extremely business savvy. Even though she was only 5ft tall, she didn’t take any crap off of anyone.

At 22, she was a sergeant in the WRAF (Women’s Royal Air Force) and after leaving the Air Force, she and my grandad ran many successful businesses in and around Devon. My grandmother was an unstoppable force of nature and was driven to succeed in everything she did.

When I was 6 years old, my grandmother bought an old pianola (player piano). I remember the first time we went over to their place to see it. The moment my little fingers touched the keys I was in heaven.

From that day on, I wanted to visit as often as possible so I could sit in front of the piano and noodle. I’d spend hours writing my own tunes (most of which I’m sure were bloody awful) or trying to figure out songs I’d heard on the radio. My grandmother taught me how to play an old traditional piece of music which I still remember to this day.

This is one of only a handful of memories I have of my grandmother. She passed away when I was 11 and the events surrounding her death changed our family forever.

Margaret lost her life in 1992 after having unnecessary surgery from a doctor who was at the centre of the Bristol Heart Scandal (James Wisheart). Wisheart performed heart surgery on my grandmother and blamed the issues on ‘faulty equipment’. 10 years later it came to light that it was in fact his incompetence that took her life as well as causing brain damage to over 100 children. There have been multiple news stories about the incident as well as a one-off BBC dramatization.

Before my grandfather passed away in 2011, he and I started creating a family tree together. We found lots of interesting information about his side of the family, but absolutely nothing whatsoever about my grandmother. She was an intensely private person and didn’t share any information about her family, her life in London, her upbringing. Nothing. And whenever I tried searching for information myself it was always a fruitless exercise.

My grandfather’s side of the tree has a plethora of information with well over 100 people in it, a couple of whom I have met in person. My grandmother’s side is quite the opposite.

It contains her, her brother and mother, and literally no one else.

And that is exactly how it has stayed all this time, up until a month ago, when someone out of the blue contacted me, saying we were related through my grandmother.

I couldn’t quite believe it and really hoped this guy wasn’t barking up the wrong tree. I asked for more info and sure enough, we are related. Not only that, but he knows a ton of info about my grandmother’s side of the family.

And guess what?

😮 THEY ARE ALL MUSICIANS 😮

All this time, I believed I was the first one to take up an instrument and play professionally. But it turns out my great-Uncle played piano for a theatre in London and my grandmother’s parents played on cruise ships as well as in the pub they ran in London. Everyone in the family was musical and apparently they all played by ear extremely well, something I have always been really good at.

I got to see photographs and look into the eyes of people I didn’t even know existed, as well as hear first-hand accounts of what these people were like and their love of music.

I even got to see photographs of the pub where my grandmother grew up:

 

Once I had processed all of this incredible information, my memories of 6-year-old me playing piano in my grandparents’ house took on a whole new meaning. I had no idea that by simply being a musician, I was connecting to people in my family line who I knew absolutely nothing about. People who were just like me.

I have always felt like a lone wolf, doing my own thing that isn’t in any way connected to anyone else in my family. Now I can truly say that I come from a long line of musicians and I’m carrying on the family tradition ❤ ❤ ❤

Regrets?

When I first started out on my journey as a pro muso (*cough *cough years ago) someone shared a well known saying with me, which went something along the lines of as long as you have your art, nothing else matters. More than a handful of occasions in my lifetime I have looked back on this particular saying and thought to myself ‘what a total bunch of hippy-dippy crap‘. These were usually moments when I didn’t have enough money to pay for the petrol I had just put into my car, or when my debit card had been declined at the grocery store checkout, or when I got late fees because bills went out of my account and I didn’t have enough funds to cover them, yadda yadda yadda. At that time I thought whoever said those stupid words had zero idea what it was like to suffer for your art. It did really feel like a terrible curse and that living like any other normal-non-arty-human-being would’ve been SO much easier.

In a similar vein, I read an article years ago about an art teacher who greeted his students at their very first class with ‘some of you will have the misfortune of becoming artists‘. Depressing, but kinda true.

You may well be wondering where I’m going with all this.

Well, I got a question for ya.

Have you ever wondered what it would be like if, knowing what you know now, you were able to travel back in time and re-do your life again? Is there anything you’d do differently? What If you could go back and meet a much younger version of yourself? What would you say?

From time to time I do ponder this very question and the answer always comes back no, I wouldn’t change a thing. I’m happy and grateful I chose this path. Now that I’m older, I understand that the struggle itself is a gift. I’m a stronger, more resilient person because of it. Those words that I used to resent so much now make perfect sense. These days my life is considerably easier, but through all the awful hardship and embarrassing lack of funds, it was art that got me through. Music kept me on the straight and narrow and it really is a blessing to know without any doubt whatsoever who you are meant to be. Over the years people and places would change, but music was and will always be there when ever I need it. It’s a beautiful thing.

Just lately though, I have been thinking a lot about my life over the past 38 years. Recently I asked myself that same question – do I have any regrets? As mentioned earlier, my answer is usually no.

But this time I hesitated. Actually, there are a few things I would change, or if I was able to travel back in time and meet much younger Katie Marie I’d love to tell her a thing or two.

A couple of weeks ago I had a really interesting conversation with one of my students. She’s young. Just 14 years old, and like me at 14, she knows everything about everything. We got talking about how things have changed over the years with technology and music and I began a sentence with words I never thought I’d use –

When I was your age….

Oh Lordy. It’s official. I’m an old fart.

After our lesson I really thought a lot about those 5 words…when I was your age. I reflected on when I was a teenager. What I thought about, how I felt, how I acted. And because of this, my answer to the ‘would I change anything’ question has changed.

I think it’s pretty safe to assume that most people know I bat for the other team. Now, I don’t go about waving flags or making a big song and dance about it – because to be honest, in every day situations I don’t consider it to be of great importance. That being said, I am very open about it and would never dream of pretending to be something I’m not in order to make someone else feel more comfortable.

Quite frankly, that’s just dumb.

From an early age, my parents drummed into both me and my brother: Be Your True Authentic Selves. DO NOT follow the herd. They have always encouraged us to follow our hearts and do what ever makes us happy, without any expectations. Both my parents loved that I was super into music and have always supported me wanting to be a musician.

Along with being into creative stuff, from an early age I knew that I was different and I also had a very clear idea about what I liked and didn’t like. I loved music. I adored being close to trees and nature, to the point that as a 4 / 5 year old I would get up in the middle of a lesson and either head to the piano in another classroom or go outside and sit by some trees. I’d be invited by my class mates to birthday parties and all the other children would be obediently sat around playing games and interacting with each other.  ‘Where’s Katie?’ would be a question often asked by the adults, at which point they’d go looking for me and more often than not find me somewhere on my own, either looking at a book, sitting next to an animal of some description or (if there was one available) playing a musical instrument. I found groups of people drained my energy. I was happier in my own company surrounded by animals or inanimate objects. They were peaceful and calming to me.

My parents (thank God) never tried to change me and just accepted me the way I am. They didn’t ever say things like ‘you must interact and socialise with the other children more Katie’, quite the opposite, they encouraged me to be myself and made it very clear that being unique and different is most definitely a good thing. If I didn’t want to hang out with the other kids and wanted to talk to a cow in the next field, then so be it.

I had this loving, kind and extremely accepting energy from my parents – and yet the moment I turned into a teenager *everything* became complicated.

At 14 years old I did NOT think that being unique was a good thing at all. I was different and it was a total pain in the bottom.

I wanted to be like everyone else. But no matter how hard I tried (and I really did try) I just couldn’t do it. At school the teachers attempted to squeeze every ounce of individuality out of each and every child and push them into the same shaped hole as everyone else. All the other kids went along without a lot of resistance. They accepted being herded into the sheep pen and told that your life will be exactly the same as everyone else’s.

Those teachers taught me that when you get older you get married to someone of the opposite sex, have a fancy job (which isn’t necessarily something that makes you happy, but it does make a butt load of money and impress others), buy a house, have kids, watch them have children and then retire.

Which is totally fine, if that’s what floats your boat and makes you happy. The problem for me is that’s what every one *else* does. And in my school if you didn’t want the above and wanted something different, something outside of the realms of what was presented by those people – you were considered an outcast, a waste of space and someone destined to amount to very little.

I remember meeting with multiple ‘careers advisors’ and teachers who were supposed to help us decide what jobs we were going to work towards. When I told them I wanted to be a musician, each and every one of them replied straight away with ‘that’s NOT a profession, you have to pick something else’. ‘But that’s what I want to do with my life, isn’t it my choice?’ I would ask. After refusing to change my carear choice I ended up getting a detention for being disrespectful to my teachers.

I know, talk about things that make you go hmmmmm?

The problem that these people refused to acknowledge or recognise, was that I’m not meant to follow the herd, have a regular job and do regular people things. I’m an arty sort, something I’ve known my whole life. But my school teachers were hell-bent on spending their days slowly but surely trying to mould me into something I wasn’t.

There was also a very heavy assumption from both school and society in general that:

• I would *want* to get absolutely wasted on what ever liquor or substance I could get my hands on
• I’d *choose* to stay out late and hang out in crappy nightclubs listening to shitty music at an annoyingly loud volume while at the same time oogling at dirty-smelly boys
• And worse than both of those things put together – it was a given that I would be attracted these dirty-smelly dudes and want to sleep with them

So when none of the above was of interest to me at all I seriously thought something was wrong with me.

You have to remember – this was pre-internet and Google. Back then the only way to have questions answered was by writing a letter to the Agony Aunt column in Bliss Magazine and hoping they’d select your question. This was (of course) highly unlikely as hundreds of confused and needy girls would write letters to Bliss about boys and va-jay-jays every single week. Also, living in a small rural town in Devon, there wasn’t exactly an eclectic mix of people to hang out with and there was certainly no mention of there being any alternative ways of living. My heart knew what I wanted and needed, but day after day, month after month, year after year, I chose to ignore what it was telling me and did the complete opposite, just to fit in.

Laaaame-o.

I would tell myself, surely if I do all these things over and over at some point it will feel normal??

Rather unsurprisingly, it never did.

My heart repeatedly told me:

I love staying up late and working on new songs or learning covers by my favourite artists and bands.

I am most at peace when I am around animals and nature.  

Playing music makes me very happy.  

Drinking and doing drugs in public places makes me feel very uneasy.

I am not attracted to dudes. Not at all. And that’s totally ok.

It told me this over and over again. At first quietly, then the further I moved away from my true self it got louder and louder. I kept ignoring it. I kept telling myself that because I’m not like other people something was WRONG.

Which of course, is ridiculous. I know that now, decades later. But back then I wasn’t brave or kind enough to know that outside approval is most definitely not needed and that you should always follow your heart. It knows the way. Always.

So – to answer my original question, my only regret, the one and only thing I’d change, is that I wish I could’ve been kinder to me and been true to myself.

I would love to go back in time and meet me at 14 and say ‘you know what KM, it doesn’t feel right because it ISN’T right! And that’s totally ok. You aren’t meant to follow others. You are unique and that’s a gift! You were meant to march to a different drum beat – everyone’s in 4/4 and you’re marching to some kind of super hip 7/8 beat where the accent changes with each measure (*sorry, nerdy music talk)’

At the time, external validation was SO important. I needed ‘insert name of popular person here’ to like me and think I was cool. Why can’t I think I’m cool and that be enough? Because I was 14 and figuring shit out and stupid unimportant things like that matter to you at that age.

So that’s my story. What about you? Do you have any regrets? Anything you’d change if you could? What would you tell a younger version of you?

Thanks as always for reading this far ❤ You are a legend.

Battle of the Makeup People

A couple of blog posts back I wrote all about my new adventures into the magical and mystical world of makeup.

2 weeks have gone by and I’ve been extremely surprised by the way people reacted to that post.

Really surprised.

I’ve played probably 3 or 4 shows since then and before each gig I applied makeup. I followed the detailed instructions given to me by makeup Jedi Phoebe at the bareMinerals store in Austin (and quite frankly if I lose those instructions I’m screwed!).  After spending probably more time than necessary getting my face ready, I stepped out of the green room / bathroom / car with a face full of cosmetics.  I’m happy to report that no-one laughed at me and I didn’t make a complete tit out of myself.

Re-sult.

One thing that did happen at every single show, was a bunch of different people came up to me and shared their thoughts on this whole makeup malarkey – and more specifically, my original blog post.

There were a handful of in-betweeny people, but almost everyone I spoke to fitted very neatly into one of these two categories:

• Category 1 – Super Happy People 🙂 

Hurrah! Yay! KM is finally wearing makeup!

These folks were upbeat and encouraging about the whole thing, saying it was wonderful that I was starting to think more about the way I present myself on stage and that it’s important to take pride in your appearance.

• Category 2 – Mildly Offended People

Boo! Hiss! KM should NEVER wear makeup!!

These peeps were NOT impressed with it at all. They felt as though I wasn’t being true to who I am and that Katie Marie and Makeup are words that shouldn’t go together.  Over and over again I heard ‘you’re fine without makeup, so why wear it??‘.

This was all a big surprise to me – as to be honest, I thought my situation was pretty cut and dry.

I’m a girl.

Girls wear makeup.

Everyone thinks I should wear makeup.

I probably should. 

The end.

That’s not to say that I’m at all bothered by what people think – I’m really not.  I’m honestly ok not wearing makeup most of the time.  But just from a simple blog post I’ve learnt SO much about YOU.  I’ve discovered that there were a lot of people who in fact noticed that I don’t wear makeup and actually liked that about me.  I’ve also learned that there are a lot more makeup-phobic people out there than I realised.  But the main thing that struck me is that pro-makeup or against-makeup, everyone I spoke to genuinely cared about me and my approach towards this whole thing.  They were all supportive in their own way. ❤

One thing I do really want to make clear, is that this was a CHOICE I made.  I didn’t feel as though I needed to bow to peer-group-pressure or please others or that I’m not happy with how I look etc etc.  This is simply me presenting myself in a slightly different way.

Don’t get me wrong, I am NOT about to go through this whole bloody process outside of performing.  To plaster all that stuff on my face every single day seems annoying and rather time consuming to say the very least.

But for shows and photographs it’s kind of a necessity.  The stage lights tend to wash out your face, so that when you check out photos after a show it looks as though you don’t have a face or any features at all.

It’s weird.

With all that being said:

Whether you wear lots of makeup or none at all, you should ALWAYS do what ever makes YOU feel happy and comfortable.  If wearing a ton of makeup everyday makes you feel confident and able to face the world with a kickass attitude then good for you, that’s totally awesome.  By the same token, if wearing nothing at all or even just a smidgin every day is more your thing then that’s equally awesome.

The point is, I don’t ever want people to feel as though I’m trying to mask who I am, or changing into some fancy-super-fem-girly-girl.

I think we can safely assume that will never happen 😉

What ever you’re into, do it because it makes YOU feel happy.  What ever floats your boat is A-ok with me.  As with anything else in life, no one should be making you feel as though you should or shouldn’t do something.  Do it because it makes you feel empowered, happy, confident or anything else.  It’s all good.  There’s no right or wrong.

Thanks as always for reading this far, would love to know what you think.  Feel free to comment below with your thoughts 🙂

Self Help Books for Musicians

In between my musical activites I do a lot of reading.  I switch between fiction and non-fiction depending on my mood, but on the whole, I do tend to lean more in the direction of Educational and Self Help books. I’m a real learning junkie and love coming across a life changing read.

BUT – one thing you do realise very quickly when stepping into the world of Self Help books;

There is a TON of utter crap out there.

The Self Help section of any store is always filled with brightly coloured books of all shapes and sizes, all with snappy titles and a photo of the author printed on the back looking very smug indeed.  These happy, smiley people have jumped on the Self Help band wagon hoping to become the next Louise Hay or Wayne Dyer. Using lots of Self Help jargon to get your attention, each author brags about how, with their help, they can make YOUR life better.

In so many cases it becomes painfully clear quite early on that these people have no idea what the bloody hell they’re talking about and probably the worst thing that’s ever happened to them is their MacBook Air took 10 seconds longer to load than usual.

*sigh.

Thankfully, in between all the brightly coloured books screaming ‘pick me! pick me!’ are beautifully written works by genuine, authentic people who actually know their stuff.

And these are the books that have quite literally changed my life for the better, which is why I wanted to share them with you.

I do have some honourable mentions below my Top 5 list.  These are also well worth checking out.

Ok, so here goes – this is my Top 5 Self Help Books for Musical People ❤

#5 – THE ART OF PRACTISING A Guide to Making Music From the Heart by Madeline Bruser

I remember reading the title of this book for the first time and rather obnoxiously thinking ‘a book about rehearsing? How interesting can that be?‘.  But after seeing it over and over and over again in various places, I decided to give it a try.

This is SUCH a wonderful book. 

Madeline combines musicality, spirituality and practical tips for getting the most out of your practise time.

Almost every page in my copy has a maker in it because there is so much to learn from this beautifully written book.

Go check it out if you haven’t already, I promise you won’t be disappointed.

#4 – EMOTIONAL INTELLIGENCE 2.0 by Travis Bradberry & Jean Greaves

I know what you’re thinking.  This is a strange choice, but hear me out.

I am extremely introverted.  Extremely.  I used to be *terrible* at making conversation or meeting new people and HATED networking with a passion.

Thanks to this book I am now able to meet total strangers and converse with ease.  I *never* thought in my wildest dreams this would be possible for me. I had come to the conclusion that after X amount of years I wouldn’t be able to change that aspect of my personality. I was wrong.

For those of you that don’t know, EQ is Emotional Intelligence, which unlike IQ is much easier to change.  I normally don’t like books that have online features (such as go online and watch this video or unlock this feature etc etc, I bought a fecking book you bleedin eejot! I don’t want to be online) but in this instance it works EXTREMELY well.  You take their online test to find out what your current score is and the website figures out exactly what is making your score low and tells you how to raise it.  My score was 86, which is pretty high – but what let me down was my social skills.  There are specific chapters in the book that tell you how to improve in particular areas and I honestly can’t tell you how much this has helped me.

If you want to improve your networking / people skills, give this a try!

#3 – MORNING SIDEKICK JOURNAL by Habit Nest

Most of my musician friends have been making fun of me the past couple of months because I have been getting up at 7am almost every single morning without fail.

WHY? Why would you do that? I hear you cry.

Well, I was interested in creating more time in my day and thought I’d give this a try.

I was AMAZED at how much of a difference it made.

I sleep better. I have more energy through the day. I finally have some ME time. I get all my jobs done pretty much every day.  It’s truly awesome.

The Morning Sidekick Journal is part book, part journal.  You write in it every day and it holds you accountable for your daily actions, kind of like a personal coach.  It has tons of really inspiring success stories, tips on getting the most out of your mornings and so much more.  It’s been beautifully designed with great attention to detail which I very much appreciated.

The book lasts for a total of 66 days and I made it all the way through! I was actually very sad when it was over, but I’ve kept my morning routine going and I wouldn’t have been able to make that work without the help of this journal.  It really was life changing for me.

Since finishing this I have tried a couple of similar ones but they were all pretty awful (yep, you guessed it.  Jumping. Band Wagon).

I’m a full time musician and have managed to make this change work for me.

Go on, give it a try 🙂

#2 – YOU ARE A BADASS AT MAKING MONEY – Jen Sincero

I wanted to find a book specifically to help me with my hang ups surrounding money.  The Universe presented me with You Are a Badass at Making Money and I couldn’t have found a better book.  It TOTALLY changed my way of thinking and helped me work through all my energetic blocks surrounding moola.

Jen has a beautiful writing style.  Easy to read, relatable and extremely funny.  I’ve just finished reading her first book You Are a Badass which is also very good, but I thought this would be a good choice for creative types as let’s face it – most of us are pretty terrible with money.

Highly, HIGHLY, H-I-G-H-L-Y recommended.  An awesome, life changing read.

#1 – ZEN GUITAR by Philip Toshio Sudo

This book was published 20 years ago and amazingly I only came across recently.

Holy. Crap.

If you need to be brought back to centre and have gotten so caught up in the business side of things that you feel disconnected from your art – PLEASE read this book.  It’s another one where almost every page in my copy has a marker in it, because there are SO many things we ALL need to hear on an almost weekly (if not daily) basis.

Beautifully written with honesty and sincerity.  This applies to all musical people no matter what instrument you play.  Please go and get yourself a copy if you haven’t done so already.  It’s a wonderful book.

HONORARY MENTIONS: 

Even though these aren’t in my Top 5 list, they are all well worth checking out.

The Music Lesson – Victor Wooten
How Many People Does it Take to Make a Difference? – Dan Zadra
Year of Yes – Shonda Rhimes (I highly recommend getting the audiobook version.  It’s read by Shonda and her inflections and brilliant reading style add so much).
Two Minute Mornings – A Journal to Win Your Day Every Day – Neil Pasricha (there are a lot of these journals popping up, but this is a very simple and well put together journal that I take with me on the road, due to it being nice and small!).

So that’s my list.  What do you think? Do you agree with my selection? Have I missed anything? I’d love to know what you think and if you have any suggestions, please comment below and let me know!

If you’re based in Austin please go and buy all of these books (and more) from my favourite indie book store – Book People.

Peace Town.

In February of 2017 I decided to make some really big changes in my life.

Basically I got sick to death of being broke, feeling unfulfilled and as though I had zero control over my own destiny.

After a couple of intense meditation sessions the crux of my problem become extremely apparent, which was:

—> ME <— 

Without even realising it, I had been shutting myself off from any and all abundance / opportunities the Universe may have wanted to send in my direction.

How did I do that?

Well, a few steps were involved.

1. I built an impressive virtual ‘wall’ between me and all the good stuff
2. Once I had finished the ‘wall’ construction I grabbed a bottle of spray paint and graffitied quaint little sayings like ‘I’m an artist and I’m supposed to struggle’ and ‘I don’t deserve to be successful’.
3. I sat back and looked at these lines over and over again, day in day out.
4. I wondered why on earth life wasn’t really working out for me the way I wanted it to.

Yes I know what you’re thinking as I’m thinking it too, bloody idiot.

Piece by piece I began deconstructing this wall (which wasn’t easy) and started working on shifting my way of thinking. To help me with this, I wrote out positive and uplifting affirmations about abundance on 4 small pieces of paper.  Some were quotes I’d seen, others just came to me during a meditation session.  I kept all of them with me and 4 times a day I’d say each affirmation 3 times each.

I did this for about 3 weeks solid and it was almost as if the dam burst and all that good stuff I mentioned earlier came flooding towards me.

The Universe was like ‘f-I-n-a-l-l-y!! It took you long enough to realise I’m trying to bloody well help you here!!’.

Not long after that – one of my fav people Rebecca Loebe asked me to play drums for her album launch party at the Saxon Pub.

This made me extremely happy 🙂

The night of the launch party I got to meet Jimmy LaFave who was in the audience and from hearing me with Becca asked if I would play drums on a new album he wanted to record (Peace Town).

Today, almost a year later, I was finally able to hold the finished product in my hands.  It was so cool to hear everything mixed together and relive all the fun from that studio session. It was a truly magical experience that I’ll never forget.  Grateful, humbled, proud and so much more.

(After Jimmy passed away I wrote this blog post)

So many cool things have happened in 2017 and so far 2018 is totally kicking ass.  Everyone is so incredibly kind to me and I appreciate each and every chance I get to make music with awesome people.

A ba-zillion thank yous Universe…I’m ready for the good stuff now 😉

 

Adventures in Norway.

If you read my previous blog, you’ll know that I had the most amazing experience exploring beautiful Eidfjord in Norway.

I honestly didn’t think it could get any better….and then there was Geiranger.

Holy. Crap.

The cruise ship left Eidfjord and traveled all through the night to get to Geiranger.  The following morning I woke up to find our vessel parked right slap-bang between a gaggle of HUGE snow capped fjords.

So…just to give you some idea of the view from my cabin window – you know those pictures they always use to advertise the ‘magical’ Norwegian fjords? They’re always on a perfectly still sunny day, with the clearest looking water you’ve ever seen in your life, capturing spectacular wildlife and waterfalls dotted here and there….

Well, it looked a bit like that. No, it looked EXACTLY like that….only way better.  It was like total eye candy for the soul….and it was REAL, totally real.  AND right outside my little window!

Once I saw what was out there I grabbed my camera and headed out to explore.

I didn’t have any kind of game plan. I just walked where ever felt right…which in that moment was a road off to the left that followed the water along a mild incline and up towards a steep hill.

Having lived in Austin, TX for the past 4.5 years my steep hill climbing skills are much weaker than they used to be when I lived in hilly Devon, England 😉 But luckily there were PLENTY of sights to ‘oooo’ and ‘ahhh’ at long before the rather scary looking incline.  I was stopping literally every 5 mins, convinced each time that I’d seen the best views to take photos of.

 

 

 

 

 

 

It was a truly magical experience that I’ll never forget ❤

Thank you so much Geiranger, you’re awesome – but I’m sure you already know it.

The next two locations on our journey were Alesund and Bregen.

I’m slightly ashamed to say I decided to have a ‘hang out on the cruise ship’ day in Alesund and I was prevented from seeing Bregen due to inclement weather.

It was raining, a lot.

Just a heads up for anyone who doesn’t already know – I’m originally from the UK…so my opinion of what a lot of rain is may well be very different from yours.

In Austin, TX if it rains people act like acid is falling from the sky and they’re going to die.  At the very least, they wont go anywhere.  Plans are changed, people refuse to go out.

If they adopted that approach in England, they literally wouldn’t go anywhere. Ever.  It rains more often than not.  And by ‘rains’ I don’t mean for like 10mins here and there – I mean HEAVY rain for sometimes weeks at a time.

So when the cruise ship said the rain was making it unsafe for people to venture out, I stuck my head out and thought…

‘Pah.  Really? I’ve taken my dog for a walk in worse than this’. 😉

But after standing there for a few moments watching the freezing cold sideways rain drench absolutely everything it came into contact with, the newly born Texan in me (who has gotten very used to almost 300 days of sunshine a year) thought….

‘ya know – getting wet and soggy isn’t actually that appealing, let’s go back inside and grab a drink or something’…

…to which of course the British part of me responded in total disgust with ‘Coward! You’re scared of a few drops of rain?! You can STILL have TONS of fun *even* in the pouring rain!!’.

Sorry Brit, it actually sucks being cold and wet….unless there’s a toasty fire, a cup of tea and a tray of chocolate digestives waiting for me….then it’s not so bad.

And due to the yucky weather we ended up leaving Bregen early as we were due to hit a nasty storm.  They announced to the whole ship that we’d be hitting 10ft high swells and if we had any anti-nausea medication now would be the perfect time to take it.

Oh great. Hold on tight peeps, we’re about to hit Hurl Central.

The captain said he thought the rough seas would only last a couple of hours.

A few hours turned into 8….and they were 8 very loooooong hours.

This is a short clip of how it all started – when it got really rough I couldn’t stay upright (in this video I struggled to hold the camera up we were rocking around so much!).

Thankfully by the following morning everything had calmed down and we could continue our journey back to Rotterdam in a much more civilised fashion 😉

And after a 48 hour boat ride, a 9 hour flight, followed by a 2 hour flight, finishing with a 45min car ride….I was back at home in lovely Austin. It felt like I’d been gone forever….it was only 14 days.

What a super cool experience that I’ll never forget.

Thank YOU as always for reading this far.  Can’t wait to see where life takes me next….

Oh! And I couldn’t finish this post without showing you an animal made out of towels.  Ari my amazing room cleaning dude made me a different animal every single day.

Yes, he was a legend and a genius.