^{After some discussions after the rehearsal, Ben has explained that he would absolutely love to join the band full time but is due to be very busy this term. We have agreed he will join us for the odd rehearsal and some of our upcoming gigs and then join full time in the new year!}

^{The track being played in this clip is a song I wrote called Beneath The Sheets... one of my contenders for being a single release next term!}

^{When we initially started writing the track, we hadn't written it with the bassist so this was his first time trying it out. So we spent some time walking through it with him first but I had also lost the lyrics that I had written so I spent some time working through these and trying to remember roughly what I had written.}

^{Once we all had the song down, we started workshopping it. We incorporated a small bass solo, some extra stabs at the end of the chorus and we made sure the ending was tight and everyone was ending on the same note.}

^{We confirmed our final setlist for this gig and then went through each of the tracks. Our final setlist is:}

• ^{Beneath The Sheets}

• ^{The D Word}

• ^Cocoon

• ^{You and I}

• ^{Rolling In The Deep}

• ^{Rollercoaster}

• ^{Ain't It Fun}

• ^Lifeline

^{We managed to run through the set twice, making sure we knew all of the sections and we timed the set to ensure that we were inside of our 30-45 minute set time. It all went really well and we are feeling super prepared for this gig.}

^{I have attached our conversations.}

^{Whilst JT taught Matt and Tom the instrumental sections to this track, I went through the demo that we were sent to really get down the lyrics and melody of the track. We then reconvened as a group again after about 20 minutes to put everything together and it was sounding really pretty! JT would like to rewrite this track at some point down the line so we will be documenting this process as we go along and decide on what vibe and route we want to take this down.}

^{We started off at quite a slow pace, struggling to find our feet with the sound of the songs. Things were just sounding a bit flat. We persevered through this and by the end of the rehearsal, the tracks all sounded much bigger and more powerful. We also added a big intro into Bad Romance that included loads of swells and a lot of build of dynamics.} 

^{I am very pleased with how the songs started out but we will definitely need to look at what made us start of so slowly to help us avoid this more in the future and stop anyone from feeling demoralised in any way.}

^{I sent Paddy a pinterest board of ideas and inspiration but struggled with ideas for places around Brighton to do the shoot so I left this pretty much completely up to Paddy (the best idea!). We started off near an old train line, then moved to some places that had a lot of greenery around. We found plenty of spots that had graffiti behind us too because we all agreed the shapes and the range of colours looked very cool and would be eye catching to anyone scrolling or walking past. We did both group photos and individual shots so that we had a range of different things to use dependant on the type of promotion needed.}

^{JT also had a last minute idea to do a photo shoot in a toilet where the boys all look like they are using the toilet... but so do I... as a comedic shot and to also promote the idea of the boys being my McE-Boys!}

^{We used this gig as an opportunity to get some really exciting content for when we start posting on our new TikTok account. We decided to do some Q&A style videos in the car on the way up to the gig. We then did a big vlog style video too...}

^{• 𝐌𝐂𝐄𝐕𝐎𝐘 •}

^{you have all met the majority of the band so far however, we have had a little bit of a switch around and would like to welcome the very talented @route.6614 🤟🏼🤍}

^{we have some gig announcements to make very soon so keep an eye out for all of these and make sure you come down 🤍}

^{and the biggest thank you to @who_paddy for these AMAZING AMAZING photos🥰}

^{This post gained 105 likes.}

^{I also included the posted for each of these gigs. My caption for this was:}

^{• 𝐔𝐏𝐂𝐎𝐌𝐈𝐍𝐆 •}

^{We’ve got a couple of gigs coming up in the next month…}

^{Next Tuesday we are going to be opening at the Prince Albert for 𝐇𝐚𝐥𝐥𝐨𝐰𝐞𝐞𝐧!! We expect to see you all in costume👻}

^•

^{We have a special little something we will be playing on the 15th… more details to come VERY soon!!}

^•

^{Our lovely @matthew_020304 and @jtwinteriscool have organised “𝐍𝐨 𝐂𝐨𝐯𝐞𝐫𝐬, 𝐌𝐨𝐭𝐡𝐞𝐫𝐟*𝐜𝐤𝐞𝐫𝐬”. A night of original, unreleased music… so come down wearing your best pair of 𝐟𝐮𝐧𝐤𝐲 𝐬𝐮𝐧𝐠𝐥𝐚𝐬𝐬𝐞𝐬 😎}

^{𝐀𝐥𝐥 𝐭𝐢𝐜𝐤𝐞𝐭𝐬 𝐥𝐢𝐧𝐤𝐬 𝐚𝐫𝐞 𝐢𝐧 𝐨𝐮𝐫 𝐛𝐢𝐨🩶}

^{Another big thank you to @who_paddy for these crazy good photos😇}

 ^{This post got 81 likes...} 

^{We made a big atmospheric introduction into Bad Romance and tried changing up the instrumentation for Toxic. We kept Tainted Love and Zombie pretty close to the original but added long solos to the end of both of them for Ben to show off in due to this gig being his debut gig with the band!}

^{I think that this is due to the fact that the band all felt like we were under a lot of pressure. Unfortunately, the organisers put the task of bringing a full drum kit and then going to collect a bass amp in separate trips onto Tom so he arrived with very little time before we were due to start. One of the band members was then nagging at Tom a lot and I feel that this threw the energy off completely with everyone.}

^{Despite this, after watching back some videos taken of the gig, I am still very pleased with how everyone performed and sounded so it is definitely still a successful gig!}

^{I really ended up loving the versions of Lifeline and Beneath The Sheets as we have never done something like it and it gave me room to play around with the melodies. We felt super prepared for the gig later this week.}

^{We met up together before the rehearsal to discuss some harmony ideas through the songs for her to use and I gave her all of the lyrics. At rehearsal we went through and decided what parts worked best with and without BVs.}

^{Ben also brought the idea of having an intro to our set where Imani and I walk onto the stage for a big entrance. This idea came from a Reuben James gig at the Hope and Ruin a few weeks back so we made a more 'McEvoy' version of this. Once again, we felt super prepared for the gig by the end of the rehearsal!!}

^{The set itself went amazing and everyone played great. There was great stage presence even through some technical difficulties that we had to face at times!}

^{Due to this, I had to contact Spotify and there was a lot of back and forth due to the fact that the company could not find the account or the track. Eventually, we gave up on changing the name and decided that due to the fact that we do not like the mix of the version that Small Pond are releasing, we will keep the wrong name and then open a new account under the name 'McEvoy' to release under in future so that this version is not linked directly to us.}

^{See week seven for my tweaks and email to De.}

• ^{The concert toms in the last section - they could sound more loose and ring out more, as if they were quite literally being played in a giant concert hall.}

• ^{The main guitar line at the end could come up a little bit along with the 'Running' ad libs.}

• ^{The final main violin come up just a smidgen more.}

• ^{There could be more reverb on the guitar and just turning it down slightly in the first verse, it feels a little overpowering.}

• ^{A little more high end on the kick drum.}

• ^{Just a tiny bit more reverb on the vocals and we asked if we can we play around with planning in the outro.}

^{I left this with him for a couple of weeks and he would start to build an idea for this...}

^{See week nine for more...}

^{What kind of industry or career would be your Plan B?}

• ^{I would like to work in photography, mostly still in the music scene, especially live music.}

^{From your list of identified good practices, can you transfer any skills? Examples?}

• ^{The idea of being consistent in what I am doing - social media, promoting photography business.}

• ^{Having a schedule each week and to do lists - include time to relax.}

• ^{Being organised and having good time management.}

^{Which of your skills cannot be transferred and why?}

• ^{Songwriting… It is purely based around music.}

^{Do you think it is important to have a Plan B? Why?}

• ^{Yes, just in case things do not go as planned in any way shape or form.}

^{Will you actively avoid it or will it be incorporated into your Plan A purposefully, and why?}

• ^{I will be actively incorporating my Plan B into my life around my Plan A because I do live music photography for the most part so it all links in and I would one day like to incorporate my photography into my band’s image (like JP Cooper).}