Hi everyone,

I’ve been considering doing an update of things, admittedly not that there’s much going on but I’ve got the odd thing swirling around in my brain and I thought it’d be good to add this update which I think will be the last one I’ll make until late January on the progress of the solo album and these bloody wrists of mine.

Firstly, I’ll make a quick note on the album… I’ve made no progress unfortunately. I had a holiday to the Lake District again at the end of November, which I was thinking ‘brilliant, a good opportunity to take my mind off the wrists and get on the road to getting sorted.’ Nope, unfortunately that didn’t happen. The morning we were going away my back went, which saw me doing a very good Spider-man impression on the wall’s trying to straighten myself upright and tried loosening myself up enough so I could go out every day, but I ended up being limited, until I got home, typically when it seemed to set itself right. I think that has kind of put the cherry on top of what an unusual and trying year it’s been for me with having an incredibly bad break up which triggered a nervous breakdown and bouts of severe depression, to my band Hamerex falling apart over night approaching the 14 year mark, because of some bullshit from Diz that wasn’t true and Marc quit the same day leading to it going on an indefinite hiatus as I don’t think the mental capacity was, or still is quite there to revisit a struggling underground band that has had more than its fair share of bad luck and hindrances and member changes over the course of a decade and nearly a half. I still can’t really bring myself to listen to the last E.P. we did, though I have managed to listen to the rest of the discography prior to that. Then there was a big falling out with Marc, who I was quite close to and then I announced the solo project and I severely damage my wrists so it’s all been a bit of a crazy year and an emotional one at that. I think all that has kind of made me pull away from the whole social media thing even more than I was.

I know, that’s quite negative isn’t it? But, but, but… I do actually think I’d prefer to write these blog posts or mailing lists out than being on Facebook, which in fairness in my time in trying to promote music with very little money, I’m finding quite restrictive these days, even when you pay money to get the so called “reach”.

Regarding ‘Back in Hell’, I’ve decided, when I get it recorded eventually, I’m going to try my best to get the CDs properly printed like all the Hamerex stuff was, so it’ll be proper CDs glass mastered, like you’d expect to get from the shops, as a lot of bands do get the CD-R type printing done as it’s more cost effective, especially when you can’t guarantee sales. But I suppose I’m a bit of a mad bastard in this respect for considering this approach as I don’t have a live band, but getting the discs separately to the cases allows me to do different packages and maybe even a collection of however many releases I do as a solo artist I suppose you could me. You never know, it could take off, plus I can get the album on to Amazon and what have you. I’m quite a quality kind of guy when it comes to packaging and I have quite a bit of belief when it comes to this project with how supportive everyone has been and the amount of pre-orders that has come through which has surpassed anything I did with Hamerex, weirdly enough. Pre-orders that is, not overall sales, though I’m hopeful and will be trying to keep an accurate tally of what I shift. Plus I have ideas and themes for 3 more albums after this one.

I’m definitely rambling more than I expected to with this, but when it comes to music I’m really quite passionate as some of you reading this may be quite aware of.

But yes, I’m still as passionate as ever about music, and try to perform to the best of my abilities on everything I do. I’m just really apologetic over the whole fiasco of trying to get myself to a point where I can record and release this album and seem to have lost a fair bit of the momentum I had when I first announced it. But, the EP, ‘Facilis Descensus Averno’ is out on the expected streaming sites and downloading retailers and if anyone’s that’s maybe getting a bit fidgety about how long this is taking or just wanting a bit more music to check out, you might like what I did in Hamerex which you can find all the releases over on Bandcamp.

In the meantime, I’m going to see how I get on over Christmas and New Year and if there’s not much progress in the healing around the back end of January I’ll be checking with the doctors to see if much else can be done to speed things up. I am reluctant to just push on with it and get it done and risk setting myself back anymore as I’ve had a few talks about doing a couple of other projects, one recording project for a charity single I’ve actually done parts of vocals for and sent them over so I may be involved in a couple of other releases next year all going well. I’ve set myself up a bit for a creative year musically, it’s just a case of waiting on me, which I know it must be incredibly frustrating to them as well as me for things to heal. Again, I’m just very apologetic to them, but I’ve been told no rush and to get sorted. I’m just looking forward to being able to pick up a guitar again and not have anything to worry about. Plus I’ve got a book to put out at some point.

I’ve rambled a touch looking back on this, but I think I have touched on everything I wanted to say. On a final note, I just want to say thank you to everyone for the support this year with the music, or whether you’ve spoken to me with some of the shit I was dealing with earlier this year. A lot of people helped pull me out of what seemed like a black hole. I’m not going to be around much as far as Facebook goes, I’ll still check stuff and reply to messages, but in general I won’t be spending much time on it other than some bits here and there.

Thank you all, and have a great Christmas and New Year, and I hope I’ve got some positive news before too long to share with you.

Steve