Oliver Gearing

olivergearing.com has now been fully translated into most languages. Please click the flag links in the top bar to choose which language you wish to see! I am very excited about this, as I have always wished to be able to communicate my music effectively with other cultures and languages. Sadly my own skill at doing this is limited, so I have used google to help me with the translation. Let me know if any of the words come out a bit strange and I'll feed it back to google to help them continue to improve this tool!!

 Make Your Ears Proud!!!

Years ago I wrote a song called 'Make Them Go Away', and released it as part of my début album The End of Daydreaming. The song dealt with bullying, specifically at school. Since then I have been inundated with requests by teachers and students; to use the song in their classrooms, play the song as part of a festival, and to use as the soundtrack for videos! The blog before this one shows how JS has used the song to make his video 'Ryan's Story'. The other video that has been made is a UK Government department video which is named after the song! Watch it here...

 Advice for those being bullied:

1. Don't suffer alone - tell an adult sooner rather than later. 
2. Tell more than one person. If the response is not what you'd hoped for, tell another. Give accurate examples of what was said and done.
3. Record every incident in a notebook
4. Try to completely ignore the bully, and stay out of their way as much as possible.
5. Don't try to 'stand up' to the bully. This is what they want.
6. And most of all - focus on you. The bully will not be in your life forever. You will.

I recently heard from a guy called JS, who has used Make Them Go Away in a video. This is the second time my song has been used in a video, and I'm very proud. This true story of a suicide needs no preamble by me - please just watch and be moved.

For a while I've been toying with some songs I recorded over the last few years, and how to bring them to your ears. I've recently decided that the best way is to package them up into an album called 'The Lost Album'. The name comes from the fact that only weeks away from readying an album for release, my computer crashed leading to massive upset and distress. Not to mention 10 songs that were sounding really good.

 Between releasing The End of Daydreaming and Covering Silences with Lies I moved to Dorchester, UK with my wife Nic. In that time I wrote and recorded some great stuff - and anything that has survived the hard drive crash will be uploaded onto this site. Starting today with two Bsides from the OGB days:

 Just Another Day

Burghley Road

 It's really strange, but I keep finding music from that period on hard drives here and there; it really is a lost album. I'm somehow piecing it together over time, and will keep you posted when new songs come to light. 

 For now, please let me know what you think using this excellent Shoutbox on my home site.

 Make Your Ears Proud

You will of course have noticed the facelift that olivergearing.com has received recently - and I'd like to thank Dan Scott (pictured with me in Boston) for setting this up. Dan is a great web designer, involved with many excellent online projects (full list available here). One of Dan's main passions is Lacrosse, and he is deeply involved withthe sport in the UK. Before moving to the US Dan played a major role in the Hitchin Lacrosse Club; as player and boss of their excellent web based intranet.The team is one of the premier UK clubs, having recently won the SEMLA premiership.

I'm currently hanging with Dan in Boston, but as of tomorrow I'm back in the UK, and I'm gearing up for a new song download from olivergearing.com. This is going to start a series of regular one-song-downloads, which will keep my music in your ears, ipod or phone...

Make Your Ears Proud

Nic and I are visiting some friends and family in Boston, USA, and are having a great time. There's loads of history around this area, from the freedom trail to the USS constitution. Most of it has to do with throwing the British out, which makes for fun conversations with the Bostonians!

I saw a Bluegrass Band playing at a bar in town, and was blown away by the musicianship of the guys. They weren't signed, managed or promoted externally in any way, yet they could play better than many of my professional musician friends. I think the standard of player in the States is generally much higher than back home in the UK. The good news for UK music is that it is hugely popular over here, and gets a good rotation on the radio stations that I listened to. 

We also followed Kat's lead and visited a bar called Jacob Wirth for the Friday Night Sing-Along. There's this piano guy called Mel and he hands round a bunch of lyric sheets, and then sits at the piano and plays songs while the whole bar erupts in song. Great fun, and probably the most friendly welcome we've received. 

 I didn't book any gigs here, but I will definitely will next time - there's so much going I've felt a bit left out...

 Make Your Ears Proud