24 September 2005: Is a band a band if it's not playing music? I think I know the sound of one hand clapping and a tree falling in the forest....

Howdy anybody reading this. I sing in a band called Greyn in Belgium and a while back I had a blog about Greyn in which I kept track of all the gigs we were doing and photos we had made and details that I wanted to keep as a sort of journal. Why online? I don't know why to be honest. This is the world today I guess and I am not a very private person I suppose and any singer of a rock band likes an audience for sure and and and... There are many reasons and no reason at all.
I just like to write and go on and on about nothing and everything. Like I am doing now.

So I sing in this band Greyn but the odd thing is I have hardly sung at all lately. Feels like months. My band just doesn't rehearse a lot these days for lots of different reasons and I miss it badly. It's my favorite hobby and I hate to be without it. And it makes me wonder if a band is a band when it's not making or playing music.

The thing with a lot of bands and people in bands is that can't just be in one band, they feel the need to explore all sorts of opportunities and be in lots of bands. A lot of musicians are multi-instrument-users. Makes perfect sense that if a person can play drums, bass and guitar, for example, that they want to do one with one band and play the other instruments in other bands.

For the first time, I am finding that I too want to challenge myself that way and look for other opportunities and other bands to sing and perform with. I just can't figure out if it's because my own band Greyn is like one hand clapping right now or because I want to test myself more and see what I am capable of.

So who knows, maybe these pages will go from being Greyn pages to being pages about Greyn and some other band I'm playing in in the future. I sort of hope so. I can get really frustrated by my perception of people dividing their attentions so much and not giving their 100% to every musical project they are busy with -- but instead giving what seems like 30% here, 20% there, maybe 50% over there. I just can't imagine that you can devote yourself totally to more than one band unless you are a professional musician earning your living that way with plenty of time and energy for music alone. When you have a family and a job and friends and obligations and a band, I just can't figure out how you can juggle so many bands or even two at one moment.

But I want to find out. Maybe I am missing something. Maybe there is something more out there for me musically. I want a challenge. I hope something good comes up.

Now back to Greyn. When you have 5 people in a band it can be so hard to all find time to just meet for rehearsal! That's what I feel Greyn is struggling with right now: lack of time to do anything good and worked out. Things do go in waves! Of that, I am certainly aware. There was a time when we were rehearsing a lot and gigging every weekend and now we are not. Maybe that's why it feels so unsatisfying now. Maybe I just miss it. I miss making songs and performing.

It's also damn hard to make new songs now and that's what we are committed to doing. I sadly don't play an instrument so though i can make melodies and lyrics when we aren't rehearsing, i surely can't make a whole song structure or anything close. I think if we met more regularly as a complete band, we'd have time to jam and to work little ideas that each of us has out better. Our guitar-player came last week with some little ideas, which was great of him. I hope I can do that too soon. I just want to see Greyn working ideas out together. I long for that.

Greyn has a gig at De Schaduw in Ardooie on Saturday the 19th of November with our keyboard-player's band Shoreleave as the opener and my best Belgian buddy Heidi and her boyfriend DJ-ing after Greyn's gig. I can't wait. Having concerts always forces a band into some action. I can't wait till that action begins again! I really hope the two new songs we are working on right now are ready to play that night so we can at least get some good stuff done and test the waters with it! For more information about that upcoming greyn gig, check out http://www.greyn.net

My next blog entry will be about the gigs I saw in Berlin. I'm also going to put links of bands that I want to advertise for whatever reason and I'm going to try to work out this template a little better. If and when time allows of course. These days I prefer to be busy with the Heidi and Sarah Face The Day blog because it's fun and beacuse until Greyn comes out of hibernation or until I find myself another band to sing in as well or other singing projects to work on, well, I won't have a lot to say about my own music or Greyn's.

Here I make it official: If anybody in Belgium happens to read this and is looking for a female Rock singer who comes from New York and can write lyrics and front a band, contact me!!!! I'm not one-bit shy and I have a big mouth and if I love something I advertise the hell out of it, take Greyn for example! In the Kortrijk/Gent/ Brugge region is best. If you want to hear my voice, go to my band Greyn's website and click on "disco" and then on the 4 song titles. Better yet, come see Greyn live on the 19th of November at De Schaduw in Ardooie.

Once again -- the sound of one-hand clapping and a tree falling in the forest -- nobody can hear me and nobody is listening...Why would they be? I wonder. Maybe i should talk about sneezing or belly-button lint or some strange fetish thing so that people will actually enter this site and read it!

Goodnight!