Morning Everyone,
Happy Thursday,
Well I officially now have an album out and on sale. WOOOOOOOOOOOOHOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!!
When i hear from people who have bought it and are listening to it and telling me which tracks are their favourites and what they can't stop listening to it has seriously made this whole manic year of extremely hard work completely worth it, and for that I cannot thank you enough for your support!
So the week begun last Thursday. I was off the show for the remainder of the week because of my cornflake (if that doesn't make sense to you then read last week's BLOG) so I went to see my friend Ashleigh (who sings the duet with me on the album) so that we could catch up and also rehearse the song for the album launch. It was great to spend some time with Ash, we don't get to see each other often enough - which is kinda the same with all my mates. After we enjoyed the afternoon together I went to have a singing lesson with my teacher Jonathan. it has been quite a while since I had a lesson and I absolutely loved it. He's such a good teacher and every time I leave his room I feel I can do so much more vocally than I could before.
A lot of people ask 'why do you have singing lessons when you are playing a lead in the West End?", as if to suggest that I don't need them, which is very complimentary, but for me personally, the reason I have lessons is not to get better necessarily, it's more so that I can keep on top form - your vocal chords are muscles so you have to train them as an athlete has to train their body. It's also good to challenge your voice with different styles of singing, from classical to rock, you need to be so versatile in this industry so I like to keep on top of it all and be on top form as much I can.
After that, I headed home to make dinner for myself and a friend who was coming over to visit.
Friday morning I had a meeting in central London and I then had to do some work on my laptop before having a meeting with the production team of my TV show and my manager and our amazing choreographer Ashley Wallen. It was great to finally chat to Ashley about how everything is going to look visually. We have some great ideas and I can't wait to get in the studio this coming Monday for the first rehearsal with the 8 amazing dancers. Woohoo. Less than 4 weeks until my T.V show. Craziness!!!
I then had another meeting at 5.30pm which went really well, before meeting a mate for dinner at that cool restaurant I've mentioned in a blog a few weeks ago, Inamo (with the interactive tables), and then we went to watch Rock Of Ages. I'd only seen it a few weeks back but my good friend Nathan was playing Lonny which is the role he understudies so I thought I'd make the most of having time during the evening to see him do it, and folks he did a cracking job, he really did. As for Oli Tompsett (my good mate who plays Drew, and has also written 2 album tracks for me) is insane. We have mutual love and respect for each other but my god that boy is a massive inspiration to me, always has been since I first worked with him and always will be. What a voice. Rock Of Ages is so much fun - go see it.
Headed home after that to get a good sleep. Saturday was weird not being at work whilst feeling absolutely fine. I woke early to watch the Wales vs France rugby match. Well what a bad decision that ref made eh? I can't write too much about it as it angers me - I wanted to hunt him down and kiss him aggressively so that he caught my skin infection and then say "take that, you stupid, bad decision making, short shorts wearing, red card giving idiot!" Me no likey him!!! It was a great game though (apart from the result) very exciting!
I spent the rest of the day learning material for a meeting I had on Monday and doing a few last minute organisation things for my album launch the next day. Then in the evening I enjoyed a good movie and some really nice Sushi at my mates house. Lovely chill out night before Sunday hit!
So Sunday arrived and it was the day of my official ALBUM LAUNCH PARTY. For those of you reading this who were at the party, I can't thank you enough for sharing such a special occasion and event with me and I hope you enjoyed it as much as I did.
I arrived at midday to do a few bits and pieces for an hour before it started at 1pm, including a sound check with a not very co-operative sound guy, who was more interested in his over sized pizza than what it was sounding like, but luckily Ashleigh was there to rehearse the duet so she was monitoring everything sound wise. I really wanted to make sure that the launch of the album was not all about me singing the songs and more about a celebration. I wanted it to be a big party within which I happen to just whack out a few of the tracks. And I was thrilled with the atmosphere there. It was very laid back, VERY positive because everyone was in a really 'up' and feel good mood. The venue is a great private bowling suite and so to have about 160 people there to have a good time and launch my album with me was perfect. By 2.30 all the ticket holders and most of my guests had arrived, just in time for me to perform the 5 songs in my set. I sang The Journey home, Until Then, Brand New You (acoustic version) Adre'n Ol and the duet with my great friend, my pear, Ashleigh Gray.
It was the first time that I'd performed some of those songs live and it was great to do it in front of such a fab crowd of supportive people.
After the singing we begun the 'ultimate bowling challenge'. I basically had allocated 5 well known team captains to pick 4 names each out of a hat full of fans names. We then went head to head to get as high a score as an individual team as possible which would then be counted up by the receptionist and the highest over all score out of all the teams was revealed. It was so much fun. Louise Dearman had already admitted to me that she is not a very good bowler when she agreed to be a captain so it was fun to see her and her team using the fighting talk and then rolling the ball down the lane in various comedy ways. Oliver Tompsett attempted to do one blind folded. ha. It was like a messed up version of the scene from Grease 2 "let's bowl, let's bowl, let's Rock and Roll" we all really enjoyed ti and it was such a laugh. I was very proud of the four ladies on my team! Team Mevans rocked!!!
I announced the teams results as the following according to the score sheet from the receptionist.
1st place: Team Mevans - My team
2nd place: The Bowlercoasters - Oliver Tompsett's team
3rd place: Aaron Renfree's team
4th place: Ashleigh Gray's team
5th place: Big Shiny Balls - Louise Dearman's team.
So we won, woohoo, and we actually won by about 50 points ha. Oli Tompsett got a higher individual score than me though, but that's ok because he has a rubbish voice……noooooooot! Love that boy!
I had arranged for a massive 3ft carrot cake to be made especially for me for the launch for all my guests and so after the bowling I cut the cake and gave everyone a glass of bubbly to celebrate me having an album out. The cake was amazing, and I am still actually trying to finish it off as it's in a tupperware box in my kitchen. Getting fatter with every evening I come home from work this week and have a slab of carrot cake with a cup of tea!
Whilst everyone was enjoying their cake and fizz I had to do some chatting on camera for my TV documentary as they'd come down to film the whole event and after that the launch finished with me doing an official signing of the CD's and new posters the label have had made (which I love, they're really glossy and lovely) and then it was all done. The venue had to practically boot us out as we were sorting all our belongings out to leave. What a great day. Thanks once again to all of you who came.
I then took my family to have some food before they needed to head home to Wales. They had really enjoyed themselves. I was so happy that they could be there. Love them so much. After we all enjoyed a steak they headed home in the car and I spoke to them when they were 30 minutes from finishing the 4 hour journey and they said they had been listening to my album on repeat the whole way home. That made me smile.
So Monday was the official release date of my album and from that moment on I have literally been bombarded with tweets and messages and such from wonderful people saying how much they're enjoying my album. I can't tell you what an amazing feeling that is. One of the girls in Wicked said to me, "how do you feel, you have an album?!!" and I said "Well I've actually had an album for months, it's just now people can finally listen to it" - I am a happy boy!
What I really love is that everyone who is getting in touch is saying what their favourite track is and it's great because everyone seems to like a different song. Hope that means there's a nice variety to it which is what I was really trying to achieve when making the song choice decisions.
So anyway, I had a meeting on Monday which went well and then I headed to have a little nap in my dressing room as I had a real adrenaline come down and felt exhausted. So tried to pick myself back up energy wise by heading to the gym before work.
I was delighted to be back at the show on Monday night. I had missed being there. It was lovely on Monday night actually because David Suchet was in the building doing some filming for an ITV TV programme he's working on and needed to come to my dressing room to chat and take some photographs etc. he is a wonderful man, what a true gentleman. He came down to meet everyone else after the warm up and gave a short little speech which was very inspirational and it geared me up for a good Monday night show.
After the show I was exhausted so headed home to get a good sleep (after some carrot cake of course).
I woke Tuesday morning early to head down to Twickenham by 10am to pre-record a radio interview for 'GAYDAR RADIO' which I believe will go out this Saturday morning. It was a lovely little chat all about the album and everything else I'm up to. The presenters Debbie & Neil are cool! They really appreciated me giving them some carrot cake - (I was just trying to get rid of it to eliminate me returning to my former fat teenage self by devouring it all myself).
After that I headed to Dress Circle - The Showbiz Shop in Covent Garden, to sign a big batch of CD's for them to sell there - It was nice to see my album on the shelves in there having shopped there for about 9 years now.
I then met a mate for a quick lunch before heading to watch The Three Muskateers in the cinema with my mate Haley. It's a really great film. Thoroughly enjoyed it and can't wait to see the next one.
I then headed to work to do the show and afterwards stayed at a mates house for a catch up!
It has gone so cold all of a sudden hasn't it. I arrived the theatre for the matinee on Wednesday (yesterday) and the company manager was asking us who wanted a portable heater in their dressing rooms. It only seems two minutes since we had all the windows and doors wide open and fans blaring cool air around because we were sweating in the sweltering heat. It has sunk in this week that I am coming to the end of my time in Wicked. The beginning of this contract was really cold and wet weather in February and now that we have passed through the seasons and are back to this sort of weather it means that it's almost time to move on. It's actually only 7 weeks I'll have left there after this week. Time has flown and I have had a great run there. I love it and shall miss it, but I'm also VERY excited about what's to come.
So that's about it really. Nothing else eventful happened yesterday other than one thing I don't want to write about but all I'm going to say is, life is too short folks. Live every day as if it's your last and treasure the people around you and make the most of being able to love them and talk to them because nothing and no-one lasts forever.
Keep positive and love your lives "Cos I'm alive, I'm alive, I'm alive Cos we're alive" (Michael Bruce)
Thanks for reading,
SH-BOOM!!!
Mark
