I’ve just arrived in Alicante to try to make a living as a bass player. I’m travelling light. Everything I have can be carried in one go. This is my attempt on the Costa Blanca. From here, I have access to Benidorm, Torrevieja and Javea. And off the coast there are the party islands of Mallorca and Ibiza. I haven’t quit my job for this. That ended at the end of June as it was always going to. It may start again at some point in September but between now and then, my home of Madrid gets drowsy, then sleeps. Summer shut down and very little work. So I had to make another plan and this is it.
I have been a professional bass player before. That was in Ireland for about three years. I didn’t make a fortune but played in some fantastic bands and rent got paid. Since I left it behind, a story for another time, it’s been nagging at me. No, biting at me and it hasn’t let go. I’ve never let go either. I’ve tried in Madrid but all my experiences, and those I’ve heard of others, say loud and clear that being a professional musician here is not an option. Maybe I’ll get to some of those stories further down the line.
As heading for the tourist central that is the Costa Blanca is a fairly new idea, there’s been no time to save so all I have is my salary for the month and that isn’t much, especially as I’m continuing to pay rent on my apartment. If it all goes wrong I could be back within two weeks. I’m going out there with no safety net but it’s either do it this way and do it now or not at all.
I’ve been looking into this for a few weeks and there has been some talk with friends about where best to go. When I got talking to Per, a friend from Madrid who now lives in Alicante, he said I could stay at his for a week or so. That sealed the deal and I arrived tonight after a four and a half train journey without a book because I left it in Madrid. I completely emptied my suitcase on the train looking for it, not knowing if anyone was watching this mild act of craziness and not caring if they were.
I’ve also spent time hitting the phones calling bars and bands where possible, asking if they have a couple of minutes for me to bother them with questions and they’ve generally been cool. I also had a great with a lady called Sue who runs an entertainment agency in Javea. She was so amiable we ended up chatting about tennis. Tennis! I then sent an email with some Youtube links, like she asked, and she was kind enough to send that to a few of the acts she works with introducing me to them.
Then there are a few entertainers I’ve had some good Facebook communication with. The big thing that came from everyone in all of this was, ‘For anything to happen, you have to be here.’
Now I am and I’ve identified a jam session in Alicante for tomorrow at a bar called Frontera. Playing jam sessions is how I’m going to be seen and get known. In music world, you never know where any connection can lead.
Apart from all this, over the last few weeks I’ve been posting on various internet boards, including many Facebook groups. I’ve introduced myself and put up videos I’ve done, mostly recorded for scottsbasslessons.com. This is a quite amazing online bass academy run by Jedi bass master Scott Devine who is helped by the fantastic Geoff Chalmers. I’ve been a fully paid up student for about nine months. Yesterday, on the back of my Facebook posts, I got a message from a keyboard player called Christian who runs a jam session in Javea saying he liked what he’d seen, that I should come along to his session and that the area always had a need for good bass players. When I said I was going to be based in Alicante initially, he said his place might be a bit far but in the same message recommended Frontera which, as you know, was already on my radar.
So here we go.
On Per’s balcony minutes after arriving. Excuse the hair. It was windy. I got there just in time to still have enough light for the pic.
In the shed, Costa Blanca style
marks diaries 