I’ve recorded a cover of The Script’s excellent track Exit Wounds. The track has been used quite heavily on US TV. I managed to get a nice, slightly compressed acoustic guitar sound for the recording and mixed the DI signal with some spill into the mic. Hope you enjoy it!

Joel Pott formed Athlete in 1999 with friends he’d known since the age of 14. Four albums later they comprise an award winning and Mercury Music Prize nominated band. Best known for their single Wires, which reached #4 in the UK singles charts in January 2005.

I think Joel’s writing is fantastic and I’m a huge fan of many of Athlete’s songs. In particular, there is a powerful story behind the track Black Swan Song from the album Black Swan released in 2009, about the death of Pott’s grandfather. The moving documentary of this story is available on YouTube:

I’d heard of Del Amitri in the charts when I was at school, but I first saw them live at Wembley Stadium in 1996. They had a short set supporting Bryan Adams. I saw them live many times after that, in Cambridge, Norwich and London.

Frontman Justin Currie has released two solo albums since 2007 and to me,  many of the tracks on those albums present songwriting perfect. Currie has always been an amazing lyricist, and yet those lyrics seem to fit hand in glove with a moment in time melody or passage of music resulting in something far greater than the sum of the two components. And what makes his craft incredible is that he repeats it song after song.

I’ve often made the mistake of sitting down to start writing a song and contrasting every line or chord sequence with the question: Is this something Currie would sing or play? Invariably the answer is no, and I start again. And invariably, I end up with nothing.

Many artists have become strong influences but I can’t see my history without Currie and the guys from Del Amitri involved. If I ever pen a song with half the quality or class, I’ll stop right then.

I’ve posted a couple of videos of myself performing covers to YouTube. They are simple piano based covers but the songs are perfect examples of great songwriting. Justin Currie in particular is one of my most prominent influences – see my artists page for more information on him and his band, Del Amitri.

Most importantly, check out the music and let me know what you think.

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