Blog
2012 Year in Review
Written by Jimmy
First and foremost, Happy New Year to all of you. We hope you all had great breaks with friends and family, enjoyed lots of rest and are ready to come back to ‘reality’ all charged and ready to go. For our part, most of us scattered like the wind, to spend their breaks with families all over the British Isles. A small sad lot of us also used the time to move studios, so 2013 starts in a fresh and shiny studio. We have plenty of time ahead to tell you about our new digs. Let’s use this blog, instead, to review the year. We hope you enjoy the Music and Everything Else.
January 2012: In the real world, the Costa Concordia, a cruise ship, slams into a rock and capsizes near the island of Giglio, off the Italian Coast. In our world, Jesus joins us and we started the New Year in full bore ‘Discovery Mode’, working with Chris Kozlowski and Tait Kalveks on their albums. This included lots of studio sessions but we also took a little time to do some live videos to introduce you to Chris. Here’s Cut My Hair:
February 2012: In the real world Whitney Houston and Davy Jones die while Michelle Shocked celebrates her 50th. . In our world, Jimmy discovers a very cool toilet and Tati’s Graceless album is published on i Tunes and we release her video for Wodwo. We bring Camilla back to the studio for our second annual fund raising song for Singing Wells. Jimmy investigates the ‘History of Abubilla Music’ in his continued quest to make ‘our story’ very easy for reporters to write about when we ‘make it big.’ Behind the scenes Andy invests in our ‘Song Path’ feature on the website, writing multiple blogs on how to bring a song from the idea stage to a CD… But let’s stick to the music for February – here’s the lovely Wodwo (Jimmy’s favourite) by Tati:
March 2012: In the real world, Greg Smith resigns from Goldman Sachs and writes scatching article about the company’s culture. Lou Reed turns 70. Our dear Toby moves to the sky to chase stones. In our little world, we continue to work on Chris’s Discovery album (with Sammy doing some fantastic backing vocals) and we record another live performance by Chris at the studio. The Singing Wells team had an amazing trip across the Rift Valley recording music and met Ben Kisinja. Here’s Ben and Eddie doing an ‘Influences Session’:
April 2012: Aung San Suu Kyi Wins Seat in Myanmar Parliament. At Abubilla, we have two live gigs, at Leon in mid April and the Half Moon at end of April. Here’s Louise singing A Market Town at the Half Moon:
May 2012: In the real world, Russia and France get new Presidents and our Andy gets married. Facebook has disasterous IPO (for those who bought the shares not for those that sold them). In Abubilla world, Jimmy discovers cool foreign words and Greg finishes the video for Wisconsin. He enjoys the experience so much he creates a ‘making of’ video as well. Here are both videos:
June 2012: Morsi is elected President of Egypt. We celebrate the Queen’s Jubilee in rain. In Abubilla world, Rosie and Tatie join us for the summer to work on a Music Map and attend the Africa Oye Festival. They become stars of the music video:
July 2012: The everyone’s world the Olympics start in Londontown. In the studio, Chris goes country with our first ‘hoedown.’ We have our 6th Spanish Jam and write our 1000th blog. We write a lot of new music and finish videos from older music, including Roadside Comedy and Ed’s version of One in a Trillion:
Most notably, however, is Andy’s cover hit – he recorded Boys of Summer and Greg did the video and ‘off it went’ on you tube. Congrats to Andy:
August 2012: Olympics continue with lots of support for Team GB. Horrors continue in Syria. Wiki-leaks founder hids in Embassy and Pussy Riot gets in trouble in Russia. Rosie and Tati continue to work on the map. But we seem to mostly be on a music break. Hunter posted a video for Tati’s Tired Roar (he actually did it in July but you only started discovering it in August):
September 2012: Para Olympics blow us all away. We’re back in the studio and live at the Half Moon again. We finally get a live version of Breath and No Bells. Gus joined us with Walking. Tati did a cover of No Good Woman and Chris covered Tickle Me Pink. Here you go:
October 2012: Hurrican Sandy smashes US East Coast. Jimmy orders accidently two buckets of rice for breakfast. Our video 71 Hours to Monday gets its 15,000th view. Tiny Moses approaches 15,000 views. Our Singing Wells and Abubilla Music you tube channels get 100,000 views. Here are the two videos:
November 2012: Obama wins. We work on our fifth album inviting Millie into the studio to put on strings for Road Song. Chris’s album No One But Yourself is released on i Turnes. Here’s his video Walk Away:
Our Singing Wells Team heads off to Uganda to record. Here’s Akello with the Rubanga Kingom Awach Boys.
December 2012: We come back from Uganda and close the studio in Richmond, saying good bye to the dogs, the teenagers, the door bells and an assortment of other things that fill our recordings with the lovely background of a little DIY community. We then started to build and paint the new studio in Hammersmith. We promise you loads of new pictures and sounds from Hammersmith throughout 2013. In the meantime, please head over to Singing Wells to watch the videos from our trip to Uganda.
Happy New Year
Jimmy