Five Things with Alex Gibson

1. Growing Up

I grew up in a household that loved music but [it had] no musical background. One day when I was a kid I just started singing and I didn’t stop. I loved it so much that my parents decided to put me in a choir and organise piano lessons. The biggest shift in my musical education came at our holiday shack in the Snowy Mountains. We didn’t have a television so we entertained ourselves with an old record player and a big box of old records including Thriller by Michael Jackson, Pipes Of Peace by Paul McCartney and an old French record that I can still recite to this day. These records changed my life.

2. Inspirations

When I was at school I discovered The Beatles. I used to sit in my room and listen to every one of their albums back to back for hours on end. They inspired me to write songs that could impact on people’s lives. This connection is the most important thing and I only knew this because I was so moved by the music. Within a second of listening to music my mood could alter, my life could change.

3. Your Band

I metmost of my band around the traps in Sydney. They come from completely different musical backgrounds but it’s their influences that have helped create a sound that I am very proud of. The producer that I worked with for my debut record This Is Life was James Englund. It happened by fluke, I saw him play at The Basement and loved his music, and later found out he had a studio. He is a musical genius.

4. The Music You Make

I write my songs on the acoustic guitar. The music I write is varied in terms of musical styles, and is about all sorts of different topics. I guess if I was to describe it I would say it is soul/folk/pop…

This Is Life is my debut record and is a collection of songs chronicling my life journey so far. I recorded it live at Studios 301 in Sydney with my band, and had it mastered by Greg Calbi at Sterling Sound in New York. It has 13 tracks and was a lot of fun to write and record. It is available on iTunes. At my live shows you can expect a lot of intensity, and a lot of fun. We have a laugh, but take the music very seriously and try our best to inspire people.

5. Music, Right Here, Right Now

I love the music in Sydney, especially the busking scene and the mates I have met while I’ve been busking like Mark Wilkinson, Patrick James and Taj Ralph – there is so much talent out there. The obstacles of the industry are just creating more spaces that respect original music, like The Brass Monkey in Cronulla or Lizotte’s.

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