bio
It started in Sheffield with
a Pop band. Formed when Paul Ibberson was 16, within 2 years they had
recorded an EP album with Sheffield’s DMF. After touring local venues,
selling the EP (and some lovely nylon t-shirts), the band appeared on
TV, Paul wrote more songs, and then they all went their separate ways.
Having moved to London, Paul set about securing gigs and session work.
Regular spots as a keyboardist and sometime vocalist were to be had with
a funk/soul James Brown tribute act (fronted by a man who swore that he
was part of JB’s back-up before ‘nam, and subsequent desertion from the
army, forced him to flee to England!). There was also a stint as sax
player in a reggae act as well as regular gigging with an emo rock band.
In between these and recording sessions, many Sunday lunchtimes (and the
occasional evening) were spent playing cocktail piano at a local
steakhouse, until one too many requests for Whitney Houston proved that
life was too short. Paul set about writing again.
It was now in a new direction. Serious (and sometimes quite avant-garde)
classical composition followed – there was a String quartet and a
quintet, an orchestral work as well as various piano and vocal pieces –
some of all this was quite well received (even if it was by one man and
his dog), but didn’t pay the rent.
It was at this point that Paul managed to gain the use of a studio and
some technology. Once in there, a new field of writing opened up; film
music.
The best paid of these was a 10 second ident. sting for MTV, providing
the background music to the animated logo. After that came the music for
2 animation shorts for channel 4, and the soundtrack to a live-action
film by a Lebanese director. There is a CD of extended electronic
compositions intended for use as possible soundtrack material available
for licensing upon request.
As well as this, there were collaborations with choreographers and
artists. But it was songwriting that Paul wanted to get back to. He
advertised his services in the music press, and found himself providing
(and recording) music to lyrics by others, as well as arranging melodies
(sometimes hummed down the phone) and collaborating with other
songwriters.
Spurred on by this, Paul wrote more than 50 songs with the idea of
recording (some of) them himself. This he did, and the resulting
CD is
here. This first album is pretty orchestral in its arrangement and,
having finished it, Paul decided that he wanted to use only piano,
guitar, bass and drums to go with the vocal on his next one.
He wanted a rougher, more real sound. A rock band format led by piano.
This made sense because Paul has always written songs at the piano, and
he wanted to keep as close as possible to the basis of the songs. The
resulting record – Have you Heard – is here.
At the time of writing, the latest EP (provisionally entitled “the
london EP”) is in production……
- Robert Michaels 2003
