It suddenly dawned on me the other day that half of my day is taken up on Social Networking sites making sure that everyone and everything is up to date… Myspace, YouTube, Twitter, Facebook, My Blog, My Website. It’s too much. So I’m losing my blog for a while and I’m going to move it over to the myspace blog, it’s just a bit easier. For those that actually read this, please just follow me on Twitter and I’m sure you’ll get a good idea of what I’m doing…
Thanks for reading guys!
Greg x
Hey everyone, I’m really sorry that I haven’t kept on top of my blog recently. The truth is I’ve had quite a hectic few weeks and haven’t been able to get near my blog let alone get the time to write stuff. So let me fill you in on a few things…
The New York trip went great, for those of you who didn’t see the vlog thing I made about it, visit this link (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wQf3KFmLSEU). I had a great meeting with a certain label and I guess only time will tell if anything comes of it. I also got a chance to write with some great people including a good friend of mine Rosi Golan, to see what we got up to click on this link (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1WZ58aMUoOY).
Upon returning from New York I had a sudden moment of realisation or madness, I haven’t decided which one, and booked flight tickets to go back there, but in less than a week from now, with the intention of staying for a few months. Random I know but it’s something I’ve wanted to do for a while and I just felt that now was the perfect time to do it. Why not!!
So that leads me on to the next thing, I had a leaving gig to see me off on Thursday night at Monkey Chews in London. It was a great turn out, and sell out in fact, one of the greatest gigs in my life. Here’s a picture I took whilst on stage!
The morning after my leaving party, nursing quite the hangover, I moved out of my house in London. A strange feeling, very liberating as I walked away with a side bag and a bottle of water, waving goodbye to the car full of all my belongings driving away from me. I’d even sold my guitar so I had the money to buy a new one in New York, so for the first time in 7 years I don’t actually own a guitar! Crazy, and very painful.
From there (we’re on Friday morning now) I went straight into a great recording session with two guys named Sacha Skarbek and Jamie Hartman. Sacha is an amazing writer who has written for the best of the best, including Paul McCartney. He even wrote ‘You’re Beautiful’ by James Blunt and I’d love to find a person who hasn’t heard that song. A great guy and a great laugh, I’m very much looking forward to working with him again. Jamie is the brain behind popular UK act Ben’s Brother, he’s a very talented guy who I’ve admired for a long time, so all in all a great honour to be working with 2 such established people.
Then on Saturday morning I got on the train, and came home to stay with my family which is where I’m typing this from. Sort of the calm before the storm. In 4 days time I’ll be getting on a flight to New York to face my destiny, or something like that. So a little different from the tiny village my family lives in! But you know what, bring it on I’m so excited.
So anyway, that’s pretty much a large update on the last few weeks of my life. I hope you enjoyed reading, I promise there will be more regular updates from the Big Apple. Greg xx
So I’m going to New York for a few days for a meeting with a record label. I’m at Heathrow right now doing my typical thing of being stupidly early. I’m the only person sat at my gate haha. Well better safe than sorry! It’s raining here in London and about 6 degrees, but it’s -9 and snowing in New York so I’m very excited. Every time I’ve been to New York has been in the summer so this is going to be very different!
I’m going to be very busy whilst I’m there as im only there for 2 and a half days, but I’m going to try and do a video if I can. Hope you all are having a great weekend and I will keep you updated on any happenings or news.. Wish me luck and as the Americans always say, have a great day!
Greg x
Hello everyone, Happy New Year! I hope you all had a great time and a great Christmas too. Right now I’m just sat in my room on this cold Tuesday morning, thinking about what I’m going to do with my day off. I might head into London and do nothing but walk around. The sun (yes that’s right it’s actually sunny) is bursting through my blinds casting some nice light on the walls, so as you can see from the picture I’ve been filling my time playing with shadows… I am and have been for the last week or so listening to a French artist called Yael Naim, you may have heard her, one of her tracks was on the MacBook Air advert. She’s really amazing, most of the album is in French so I’m enjoying the melodies not the lyrics on most songs, but what is in English is amazing poetry, a very talented writer it would appear. I can’t imagine expressing my emotions and feelings in anything but my first language, amazing (www.myspace.com/yaelnaim).
Writing has been slow for me over the Christmas period, I’ve had a lot on my mind and a lot of things have happened in the last 2 months kind of turning my life upside-down, not all negative though, a lot of positive things are starting to happen. I don’t know how other writers work, but I find when I have too much to write about my head gets overcrowded and I can’t think straight. So I try to block all but one thought out of my mind, it’s a tough thing to do. Because of all these thoughts it makes it difficult to sleep too, so I’m tired all the time!
I’m feeling very good about 2009, I feel like the whole of 2008 was spent laying the foundations of what I’m trying to achieve with my music. The Living Series and The Not My Living Room Series went better than I could have possibly imagined, I’ve made my first music video, which was also featured on YouTube, and I’ve recorded my debut album. I’ve had meetings with numerous labels including some majors and all this has happened organically because of you people and the power of word of mouth. I haven’t been knocking on the doors of these labels, they’ve been coming to me. What makes me happy is I’m writing honest music that is true to me, I’m not selling out and I’m not trying to be commercial. I’m just writing what I feel. Now it’s time for me to turn this into overdrive and really go for it. No more 9-5 for me, I’m done.
I want to thank everyone reading this, without you all none of this would be happening. I’ll post again soon. Greg x
A random one really but I’m in Guilford seeing friends and half the town is flooded because of how much it’s rained. Typical England! Hope you’re all having a great weekend. Greg x
Hey guys, So one of you was kind enough to tab out ‘The Art Of Falling’ for the guitar and it was pretty accurate. I know I’ve emailed a lot of you saying ‘I don’t have time etc’ which is very true. But what I do have time to do is copy and paste the link to the tab…
http://www.ultimate-guitar.com/tabs/m/misc_unsigned_bands/greg_holden_-_the_art_of_falling_crd.htm
This was tabbed by Karl, Thank you Karl!!
That is all,
Greg xx
Hello readers 
How are you all doing? I haven’t posted for a while because my heads been in a different place lately, I won’t go into it but I’m getting on with it like we all have to do. There’s been a lot going on musically too though lately which is cheering me up. Hopefully most of you will have seen the music video for The Art Of Falling? If you haven’t then get over to youtube.com/gdholden and let me know what you think. Sign up for my mailing list on myspace too so you can keep up to date with things, I’m getting better at sending out updates
So my “time off to write” is drawing to a close and soon I’m going to be gigging on a regular basis again which I’m very excited about. I will also be armed with new material for you all too The first gig I have is on Thursday 27th November at The Soho Revue Bar in Soho, London. If you can make it to that then great because I’m well up for it. In a couple of weeks I’m heading back out to New York for a meeting that could be really promising, or not, we’ll see I guess. I will give you more information when there is more information but I’m feeling good about it, and also getting the opportunity to go back to New York makes me happy too
Yesterday I had a writing session with a friend of mine named Richard Causon. Richard has written and played with one of my favourite artists, Ryan Adams so I was very keen to get involved with someone who obviously has a similar style to myself. It went really great and we wrote a song temporarily named ‘Blankets’ which I’m sure you will all hear soon. We only had a couple of hours but I really enjoyed it nonetheless and we’re definitely going to be writing again soon. Thanks Richard! Co-writes are something I’ve not really done a lot of but are very useful things to do sometimes. Even if I don’t end up ever performing the song it opens me up to new styles and really prevents me from being such a closed book when it comes to writing music, which I can sometimes be very guilty of. Getting out of your comfort zone can be a wonderful thing.
So my friend Rosi Golan is a singer/songwriter living in New York, her album comes out today and I think you should all go and buy it. She is amazing and is going to be a very huge star, so get in there whilst she’s not. It won’t be long before she is. www.myspace.com/rosigolan
I think I’ve said enough now, I’m going to try and get back on top of my blog, I’ve let slip lately sorry. Speak to you all soon.
Greg xx
Do you like train journeys? I’ve been traveling on trains all my teenage/adult life. I’d hate to think how much money I’ve parted with to get from one place to another in no particular hurry or luxury. Yet I still love them (most of the time). I really love coming back from a good time and having that time to reflect on what I’ve done whilst staring out onto the fields, they’re usually such inspirational times and make you value life that little bit more. I also love that feeling of starting a journey or holiday with a train ride and being all excited about it. Reminds me of when I used to go back up north to see my family and friends. Usually stupidly early in the morning as I remember. Coming back is always at night as you try and leave it as long as possible before you have to leave where you’ve been. I often hate getting back to London late though because the underground is usually fucked and it takes me ages to get home, just like it’s going to tonight 
God knows why I’m sharing this, I’m just thinking out loud. That’s what I like about this blog, I can just write out loud and not really worry. And I’m doing it from my phone too so it gives me something to do on the train! 
Check out the picture from tonight journey. Hope you are all well, and maybe have even just been on a train journey yourself.
Greg xx
Cut!!!… This weekend, as most of you know from the large amount of emails and notifications I sent out, I recorded the video for my song ‘The Art Of Falling’. It was an amazing weekend but very crazy indeed. First of all I want to say thank you to everyone involved for their incredible work. I had a small production team working their arses off and it just blew me away to see them doing this for me. Everyone involved was doing it out of kindness as I’m not in a position to pay anyone, but you wouldn’t have thought it. They were all amazing. A particularly big thank you goes out to Jesus Plaza (Director), Marta Sala (Producer), Usman Tufail (Cameraman) and Zoe Reynolds (Make-Up Artist). I also want to thank all the actors/actresses, assistants and extras who were involved. Thanks for a great weekend and I hope you enjoyed yourselves as much as I did. There are some pictures below if you want to check them out. At the end of shooting yesterday, we all crammed into my living room, set up some candles and I played a gig for everyone, that was a particular highlight for me as I haven’t played live since August having taken some time off to write. I miss gigging and will be back out on the circuit in November. I have a show at The Soho Revue Bar Piano Lounge on the 27th, come along it’s going to be great..
In other news, writing for my next album is going very well and I have a lot of new stuff that I will be sharing with people once I’m back playing live again. The latest on the release of my debut album is it’s being mastered right now and shouldn’t be too long before I submit it to iTunes. Watch this space.
So how is everyone? Well I hope… Greg xx
I’m just on the bus on my way into work and wanted to share something with you. There was this woman on the bus on her own at the start of the journey. This guy got on and next to her was the only seat so he sat down. In the last 30 minutes they’ve struck up a conversation and are now laughing and joking. People watching is cool!
Anyway my point is, this shit doesn’t happen enough… We’re all far too reserved and moody on public transport! I hereby challenge you to make a random friend on a bus, tube or train whatever, just do it! You never know it may even be your long lost brother or something!
Spread the love people, life’s too short to sit on your own in silence!
Greg
