Hey everyone! My apologies for not writing as often as I should here. As the title suggests I have been incredibly busy with every part of my business at the moment! I'm gonna try to recap my last few weeks, talk about my upcoming projects, CELEBRATE 100 SUBSCRIBERS WITH 2 NEW DRUM VIDEOS and as always take you on journey through my life.

4 Bands to Keep Happy!

So one of the reasons why I've been unable to write so much is the title above. I have 4 different bands with 4 different gigs in a short period of time. Every gig is also a blues festival so I have to be on my game. With all the rehearsals, my own practice to bring me up to speed on the material and learning new (and the old ) songs and my own practice, it's been busy. I'm really honoured to be asked to do all these different projects, so let's talk about them!

Keeping all these bands happy drives me crazy! A strange photo shoot we did while on tour with Ash Grunwald

Harp Mitch and the Castors of the Blues

My first gig of this period was with my good friend Harp Mitch. I have so much respect for Harp Mitch. I love working with him and will always say yes to any project or gig from him. Why? because he is extremely professional, organized and looks after his musicians with love and care. We played a gig together where the venue shorted us on cash, he took the hit and paid us all in full. Before every gig with Harp Mitch, he sends you a set list, time table and directions to the venue. It may be a small thing but it just makes your job easy. You always know Mitch has your back and he's in your corner. He's a hard working son of a gun and he loves to laugh to top it all off. We had a lot of fun at a blues festival in Groningen and he told me to start the show out with a funky drum groove, how cool is that? Thanks for the good times Mitch!

The man himself, Harp Mitch!
Our Guitarist from Germany Helmut
One of the best bassists I've ever played with, Bryan!

The Mighty and Powerful Stef Paglia Trio

We have some gigs coming up as a powerful and unstoppable trio. We spent some time, and I had a lovely drive I want to add that in, at a recording studio in Belgian recording a little bit for our upcoming album and working on a few things. It's so much fun and so great to play with these guys. The recordings went really well and we were happy with the finished product!

As a side note, all the video making I've tried to do is paying off now because I now kind of like hearing my self being recorded. After years of hating it I think I sound..... dare I say..... OK when I hear myself back. That's a big step for me.

Jenn B band Rolls on

We are in the middle of a downtime with Jen B but we are writing and perfecting our own songs to get ready to record a short album. We have a few gigs coming up and rehearsals will begin again soon! Our next two gigs are festival gigs so again we want to be on the top of our game. I ran into some of the band at one of my gigs and it was great to see them outside of a work setting. We will be bringing the our fire to live audiences soon!

Silver Dimes in Romania

I played a gig with the Silver Dimes about a year ago and had an absolute blast. Really a fun group of guys and the bass player, Karel, kept me on track and signalled some stops and endings to help me out. They asked me to fly to Romania and play a blues festival with them. I was quite happy to say yes and we had our first rehearsal early Saturday morning. I thought everything felt great and can't wait to explore another country with these guys. Sometimes everything just lines up nicely.

Our rehearsal space in Zwolle.

Drum Videos, teaching and practice

On top of those 4 bands, and maybe working a bit more with the Silver Dimes. I'm making drum videos, teaching and practising myself to get better (and trying to keep up with one guitar virtuoso Stef!) I have some ideas and most likely I am going to film some stuff this Monday/Tuesday and edit it all together for a Wednesday release if all things go well. I have three videos lined up, one is a special project with an old friend and the other two are gonna be a lot of fun! In case you missed the last one you can watch it HERE

100 Followers, Thank you So So Much!!!

Wow, 100 followers after being on Steemit (I LOVE IT HERE!) for just a few months. I'm going to try to keep writing, get better at writing and share as much as I can with you guys. I really enjoy writing about what I've done, and for me, sometimes it's nice to reflect and think about things in a different way. A Cathartic journey if you will. Thank you to all my followers and everyone who has joined me on my musical mission to spread as much joy as possible! For the 100 followers I'll be making a new introduce yourself post, linking as many of my videos as I can, talking about my time here on Steemit and my thoughts about the future. Stay tuned for that post!

Thank you guys so much for taking an interest in my writing. Steemit is amazing and I'm looking forward to writing more great content for my followers. All the love and feedback has been amazing. Thank you isn't enough but I'll say it again. THANK YOU

Thanks for reading!

-Joel