Life story so far, well thats what it feels like :P

Yo peeps! I've created this blog to keep up to date with my magazine project, and to rant and rave about anything that pops in my head at some point. Anyways I'll get you up to speed:

• Started back Uni two weeks ago. Got a bad boy of a project to do. I've gotta make my own magazine at least 40 pages in total with features and at least 3 interviews.

Being a man who loves his music I decided to make a music magazine. After making this decision I did panic slightly, as I wasn't sure what bands to interview! So luckily I've got a good friend whose tight with someone who work in the O2 Academy so simply asked him to get me in touch with PR whenever bands play so I can grab a sneaky interview with them. And at the same time I started thinking about bands that I was already going to see on tour. So I got onto good old Google and tracked down the management companies and record label execs of bands like Bowling For Soup and Shinedown. Had trouble trying to find a way to track down some contact details for Slayer and Alice in Chains but getting them would be like trying to get blood out of a stone.

Well the other week I went to see Skindred, supported by up and coming Swedish metallers Dead By April (one of my favourite new bands) the day before I found out their management's email address and sent them a nice little email explaining what I was doing and if I could bag an interview (even threw in the sneaky word 'exposure').

Fantastic news awakened me the day of the gig as I got this email back:

Hi James

Tomas forwarded your request to interview DBA for your project, as this is happening today, I suggest you just go to the venue (Club Academy) at 19:00 and call Paul, the Tour Manager on +44.....

Best wishes
Nelly

So we got to the venue and phoned the band's manager around 4 oclock, he met us outside the tour bus (even took us on and gave me an energy drink, awesome!) and scheduled us a bit of time with the singer as we'd already met the rest of the band on their way to the curry mile in Manchester. Suffice to say I was shitting a brick so to speak as I'd never done anything like this before, especially with a band that I'm a fan of. Despite this it was a great success and I'll post a snippet from the interview up when I've edited down the mp3!

And here's a sneaky picture with Jimmie the singer after the show, gutted we didnt have a better camera for when I did the actual interview!

Currently in the middle of writing out features, will keep up to date with other interviews and other things!