As I had hoped, what a busy month January was, and I am really pleased that so many of the planned projects have started to take shape.
The Return to the Red Planet has been mastered and is ready for production. I am genuinely really pleased when I listen to it even though I am in desperate need of a hi-fi stack with CD player, cassette player and turntable with decent speakers as my systems are all in dire need of repair.
I finished all the sleeve notes (there are a lot) and the next stage is designing and producing a great cover. I have been told of the ideas for this and if they happen, then it'll be a great way of presenting the album.
We will be having a playback with a Q&A, but I'm not sure where yet, but possibly Decoy Studios where most of the recording was done if we can arrange that with them.
Random House/Penguin Books have, in their infinite wisdom, decided to do an in-depth biography and have commissioned Ian Gittens to put it all together and to this end have already been meeting up where I have been rambling away and answering numerous questions about my life that even I couldn't remember. Ian has ghost written for such luminaries as Billy Connolly, Cliff Richard and Carmine Appice and the book will be published in the Autumn and I am hoping to visit as many book fairs and book shops as possible as I did with the Grumpy Old Rockstar books as I love doing these events.
February sees a lot of continuing preparation for the remainder of the year and that starts in earnest on the first weekend of the month when son Oliver arrives to go through the set for the Wakeman and Son tour of America in March as well as catching up on all things family.
On Monday the 2nd I will be at Erik Jordan's Nursery Studio to record keyboard additions to two different tracks. I enjoy doing these one-off sessions for Cleopatra as there is no pressure involved in doing them.
Also, in the first week I will be meeting with the builder who put together the studio at my previous house with the help of Erik (Jordan) as work will begin in March on the new studio here.
Wednesday the 4th will be an interesting day as it will be my first visit to the hairdressers since the operation and it has been quite interesting how unevenly my hair has grown since it was shaved in areas for the brain surgery . The only solution to how it is now is to have a pretty serious trim all round so it can start to grow properly again !!!.... I will not be posting photos !!!
On Friday 6th I'm off to Bristol for the wonderful Slapstick Festival where I will be playing live (piano) to a Buster Keaton short silent movie called the Boat, that evening at The Beacon and the following morning at The Lantern Theatre presenting a load of comedy musical moments from throughout the years. Should be a hoot!!
On the 9th I head to London for a meeting with Brian "Deal a Day" Lane and also attending the American Embassy where my visa is being renewed. There's usually quite a wait there and so I must remember to take a book with me!
On the 13th, (yes Friday the 13th), I'm off to Pinewood Studios to do some filming for a documentary about the late great Keith Moon. Knowing a lot of what Keith got up to I suspect it's going to be a very long documentary… and very funny too!
Throughout the month I will also be doing more podcasts with Mark Jeeves. I love doing these and the questions that are sent to us are brilliant memory jerkers and talking of questions, I will be answering a lot that readers have sent into Uncut magazine in an interview with them… so I guess I'll learn a bit more about myself that I either didn't know or have forgotten.
On the 16th and 17th I'll be doing a load of interviews for America to talk about the Wakeman and Son tour and hopefully I won't bore the listeners too much.
On the 21st, Oliver and I have a warmup show, although it will be full on and far from a gentle warm up. This is in Devizes and sold out very quickly after it was announced. It'll be a lot of fun for sure… see you next month!
Cheers Rick