9 Months In The life Of Tim Courtney

So what the fuck have I been doing for the past 9months? The small minority of folk who follow this blog will notice that I've not posted anything up since my exhibition in January. Thats a long time. Surely there's been things happening with the Band? An Artificial Light was supposed to be released in June/July, no?

The truth is I've had a very busy past few months in my creative life. So why the lack of blogification? (That's a word now I invented it and if 4chan pick up on it they can blow me.) In April my laptop was stolen. Along with the master copy of An Artificial Light. Rendering the past 12 months almost void and the 6 months of editing a waste of time. Yes yes I should have backed up I know that. But don't call me stupid, this was an error forced by lack of funds. I spent so much money buying my laptop in the first place to afford a 2TB+ hard drive to accommodate these massive project files. It sucks I know, I just hope the tiny fix that junky bastard got from pawning my life away was worth it. He did return one day to get the rest of my stuff but I scared him off with a swift cough "ahem" I said, "Aw fuck" he said then ran down the stairs.

Bottom line news update; Insurance companies are useless, credit cards are NOT covered by theft and you'll always need your parents. I'm 27 years old now and it did not feel too good to have my Father lend me money to replace a laptop that was not covered under my insurance policy. Apparently a laptop is a luxury item and it being worth over £1,000 needed to be itemised. Oh well. Its better to pay for 2 laptops than not have a means to make your art and films right?

So this quick post is a heads up to the many posts I'm about to put up to make up for lost time now I have a shiny new macbook pro.

A Life I've Lost

In a weeks time not only will I be a whole year older, a whole year wiser and fast approaching my next milestone birthday; but I will be celebrating the opening of my exhibition "A Life I've Lost". I'll be exhibiting illustrations, photography,film and music at kilau coffeeshop and art gallery on little belmont street aberdeen.

It has been a year since I got the nod from the curator to exhibit my work. And it will be my first solo exhibition since my Masters show in 2005. But what a year it has been for me creatively. I've managed to release an album with Katerwaul and successfully design the artwork and packaging. With promising reviews in The Scotsman and online, a successful support slot with codes in the clouds in Aberdeen and Glasgow, I've considered it a great triumph. Whilst all this was going on I was writing and preparing to make a new short film. On the eve of the album launch I was busy doing screen test and casting the film. The film is now well and truly underway with the editing already started.

I don't want to give away too much but by trauling through the this blog you will undoubtably come across work that will feature in the exhibit, but I have a few surprises in store also. So if you're reading this right now I here by invite you to the opening night. Sunday 31st January, Kilau Coffeeshop & Art Gallery 9a Little Belmont Street Aberdeen 8pm. If you can't make it the show will be up for eight weeks from the 31st January till the 28th March 2010. Most work will be for sale as well as the deluxe & standard editions of Katerwaul's "Here There Is No Why".

I hope to see you all then. In the meantime why not enjoy a sneak preview of my new film, "An Artificial Light" out later this year, by viewing the trailer below.

An Artificial Light (Trailer) from Tim Courtney on Vimeo.

An Artificial Light Polaroids

Throughout the shooting of my new film "An Artificial Light", which still hasn't wrapped, I've been taking Polaroids when I can for my exhibit in Ki:lau. Here are a select few as a sneak preview.

Auld Lang Syne

I've recorded a version of the traditional scottish ballad/poem "Auld Lang Syne". It was recorded for the next annual Ki:lau christmas charity CD available from the Coffeeshop at somepoint in the next two weeks. If you can't wait I've got a link that only lasts a week and you can download it along with the Katerwaul entry "December Doesn't Hurt". (Can you see what we did there? Cheeky fuckers that we are). Any way get it from here CLICK ME ASSHOLES!

Tim

Maybe Next Time Things Will be Different

31st January 2010, the day after my birthday, will see the opening of my first solo exhibition since my Masters show in 2005. The as yet untitled show will be based around my recent Katerwaul artwork and photography. My new film "An Artificial Light" will also steak a lot of interest on the walls of Aberdeen's leading Coffeeshop & Art Gellery; Ki:lau.

Editing on my current project is going well but I've still to shoot a couple of more scenes. Instead of sitting on my hands I've started i

nstead to edit what I do have and its looking great. I thought I'd post up some of my recent poster work for both "An Artificial Light" and my soon to be released collaboration with Shaun; "emily". As usual feedback is more than welcome.

No doubt I'll fill you in with more details on my show as they make themselves known.

Tim

Mother

This is the new film by Writer Director Shaun Hughes released under our film collective; FACTOTUM FILMS. I don't want to spoil it but I think its brilliant. The film features a brand new score by me. I played all the instruments that include; Guitar, Bass, Drums, Music Box as well as vocals (although they don't feature in the film). The one instrument I didn't play was the violin; that was supplied by the chirpy Louise Mackie. I got her in one day to just play single notes and heaps of horrible noises. It was a homage to the Joker's theme in Christopher Nolan's "The Dark Knight" and the end scene in Scorssese's "Taxi Driver", an almost atonal pedal note that delves into chaos. I love writing film scores for Shaun!

Shaun asked me, as well as writing the score, to come up with a 70's style jazz song for a dance sequence. So I wrote a piece inspired by some Nina Simone, Nick Cave and Vincent Gallo. Its called "Unrequited". I wanted to write lyrics that tied in with the film but came from the two female character's point of view at the same time coming across as a generic 70s love song. Shaun decided to cut the vocals as the lyrics were deemed distracting and almost too literal, a view in which I agreed entirely when seeing it in context. But here are the lyrics for those that are curious and give a shit.

"Rest with me

I'd rather be here

In the breath of morning light

Than part form your side.

Suckle me

And tend to all my fears

Reality wont fade my dear

Cradle me

Cradle me

Cradle me

Cradle me in your arms"

I plan on fleshing out this 2 min song into something for my solo album which hopefully will be underway by the new year.

Back In Action & Ready For Danger

Hey its been a while. We must catch up. So here's the run down of the past five (fucking, shitting hell has it been that long??) months.

Katerwaul: It was a pretty busy Summer. The album; "Here There Is No Why" was released on 22nd June. Our launch night was a huge success. It was held in the quaint little coffee house "Kilau" on little belmont street in aberdeen. Ashley Park and memebers of Y Change Costume treated us to a Musical Banquet. We then went on to promote "Codes In The Clouds", a Kent quintet on the amazing "Erased Tapes" label. They were touring to promote their album "Paper Canyon" which is out now and is fucking stonking. We played with them at the Tunnels in Aberdeen on the 22nd June and then in Glasgow's 13th Note on the 23rd. They were top notch guys who were a lot of fun to play with and we had some great banter. I talked to Stephen about possibly doing a wee video project for them and discussed with Ciaran about singing on a remix album for them. Its all speculation at the moment but who knows what the future holds??

After that we managed to kick back and have a well deserved break. We've played a couple of gigs since but with our schedules in life being so erratic at the moment we're just going to see how things go before getting back to things full time.

In the Mean time you can grab the deluxe edition of art work from Blurb here

Tim Courtney (Musician): For one night and one night only I came out of singer/songwriter retirement to play close friend Mark McCabe's leaving gig in Art Gallery, Project Slogan. This was a great fun evening and I even aired a couple of new songs. I'm not sure what I'm going to do with them yet but I've decided once I have some time I'm going to start recording a solo Album. Yes that's right I'm very egotistical like that.

Tim Courtney (Filmmaker): "An Artificial Light" is well and truly under way. My laptop died a horrible death upon the first day of shooting so excuse the lack of hurrah when principal photography started. While my laptop was off line I decided to start a production diary so I'll see if I can get some pages scanned in if I get my geriatric scanner working with my shiny new debt laden Macbook Pro.

After going through casting hell I managed to start filming a month behind schedule and its safe to say this is the hardest production I've ever had to put on. With Pamela my leading lady moving away weeks after we beginning shooting we've had to really move things along very quickly. But now Pamela's parts are all in the bag and most of Davy's scenes also finished, all we need to do are some external shots with Davy and the opening scene with a little boy. One problem though, I'm still a little boy short to film this. More news on that to follow.

Tim Courtney (Human Being): On a personal note; myself, my girlfriend Rae and best buddy Topher went to the Philippines with my folks in Sept. Now normally the weather is great that time of year. But as everyone has been made aware, with all the GREEN campaigning and comparing of carbon footprints and hemp ASDA bag for lifes, global warming is starting to take its toll on the lesser countries that just don't really effect us so why should we care? type places. Well we were in one. Having dodged one Typhoon already we arrived in a wet and windy Manila. We spent most of our time wandering around shopping malls or walking through the hot rain. Rae and Topher took a while to adjust to the staring and general alien feeling of being and Ethnic Minority (now you know how I feel). Me and Topher got a few nice pics that I'l l have to get my lazy ass into gear and get them onto my new laptop and onto my blog. But no doubt you can see some on Topher's lovely flicr page here.

Rae spent a couple of days in hospital on a drip which was nice as I got away from my nagging Father and got to watch some cable TV away from the rain. Then another Typhoon hit just before it got really hot and sunny then wet again and then we left. Despite not sounding like it we actually had a great time and its always great to see my Family and be a part of an ethnic majority for a change.

A few days later after we were in the safety of our environmentally naive country a massive Typhoon hit destroying my Grandmother's home and killing many people. I shat my pants a little as my parents were still out there at the time but luckily non of my family were hurt.

So... there's been rock and roll star-esque touring, accoustic singing and song writing, typhoon dodging and filmmaking hell. All squeezed into five months. That aint too bad.

Tim Out!