David-Lee's Music Page

Contents: Art Work, Music, Writing , Languages(Linguistics), Links

1976 - 1978: The Panic
Started with me and some friends. I was lead singer and wrote lyrics, while my friend Warwick wrote the music. Not much of a band. Never did get to perform. Eventually it broke up when I left Perth to go to Adelaide in 1978.

1978 - 1981: The Panic (Second incarnation)
Got to Adelaide. Was playing guitar by this stage. This band never performed any where outside of our own school grounds. Still, it got to do some performances.

1979 - 1981: Phoenix / Flying Machine (other misc)
While still performing in The Panic, I was also in my elder brothers bands a little. The first incarnation being Phoenix, till a US band by the same name became popular. My elder brother then decided to call the band Flying Machine (Which I thought was a pretty stooopid name). The name changed a few times after. Not sure what it was in the end. They also mainly performed in and around the school. Sometimes I was in the band, other times I was ditched. Depended on the line-up and stuff. I was mainly used as a back-up utility player for when other members left or didn't show up. Hopefully shows how versatile I was. I was mainly interested in my own band, which never quite had musicians as commited as I was. I taught so many other musicians to play, only to have them go form their own bands.
Eventually, I left Adelaide for Sydney. "Flying Machine" ended up becoming a Heavy Metal band which played around Adelaide without me for a while. Unsure of what there name was by that stage.

1987 - 1989: Studio Musician
Did some work in a couple of studios. Nothing special, just playing on peoples Demo tapes. The engineer at one studio told me I could be charging up to $1000 an hour because I was so good! Waaaaah! I should have concertrated on this career but alas, I unfortunately got married. With my wife and mother-in-law dead set against me having a musical career, it basically drove me to quit. Bad move. Should have kept the career and ditched the wife!

1988 - 1990: Living Proof
My most successful band. Played in and around Sydney. Every time we played one gig, we got five more offers. Looked like we were going to be huge. Lead Guitarist decided to leave and form his own band. I would like to think our popularity came about because we were playing mainly my original songs. They pretty much fited into the Grunge type genre which was to appear shortly after. I just considered what we were playing Heavy Rock.
Line up had many changes. Started as a four piece, then moved to a three piece. Once again, my versatility showed. I was originally Keyboards and second guitar. Then moved to bass when we were a three piece.

Hold On, one of my many songs. Copyright 1983, 2003 David Stevenson Here is an old song we used to perform in Living Proof. I wrote it in 1983, and this was a pretty bad recording I made of it in 2003. (I hope the link works ... I'll test it).

1991 - 1992: Spyke
Last band to play with. Mainly because I was under constant pressure from afore mentioned wife to give up music all together. I actually got banned from playing musical instruments in the house when she was home.
Lesson to learn from this for anyone. Never give up your dreams for your other half or anyone. Those people may eventually leave your life altogether, and what are you left with? A job you hate, lot's of regret and you still don't have the person you gave it all up for.

Influences:
Quick summary of my influences:
Early in life, I think Motown and the Beatles were my big influences. Growing up in Penang, I don't think I had much access to anything else. Returning to Australia I found that most of the kids didn't know any Motown (other than Stevie Wonder and the Jackson Five).
Most Australian bands were a mystery to me at this stage. Afterwards though, I got into what most of the Aussies were listening too. Skyhooks, Suzie Quatro, The Sweet, Sherbert, AC/DC etc.
I should probably list AC/DC as an influence, as I originally wanted to be a lead guitarist like Angus Young.
1979 - I was already playing Led Zepplin and Beatles tunes by this stage and a bit of Van Halen. We were also playing Kiss tunesin the band. Mainly though, we were trying to churn out originals. I think the Monkeys may have also influenced me in some of my earlier songs. It was this year that I started my Classical Guitar training. That's when I got into Carcassi, Carulli, Sor, and other guitarist from earlier ages.
The 1980's saw very little I liked in the way of bands. I think U2 stand out like a sore thumb. I was a little into new wave with the likes of Duran Duran and that, but never a great fan of them.
I think most guitarists like myself were still into a lot of the old bands. The Led Zepplins, Rainbow, Deep Purple, Jimi Hendrix, Cream, Pink Floyd ... gees, dont' we miss those bands? :-) I think I've been in bands which played a bit of all those groups.
Mainly by now, I was just writing new and original material. I was waiting for what I refered to as "Heavy Guitar Oriented Rock" to reappear. My band "Living Proof" can attest, I basically predicted Grunge, though wasn't 100% certain of the sound.
By the time I did hear "Nirvana" playing, we were playing stuff which didn't need much massaging to jump on the Grunge Bandwagon. Alas, we missed our boat, as the lead guitarist decided to go create a Heavy Metal band, as he was certain it was going to come back into style! Waaaah! We'd already gone from being a four piece to three piece (with the bass player leaving earlier that year), so now we were two!
Then came the long and lonely search for band members, as many different re-incarnations took place, which never eventuated. The hardest thing being convincing people that Grunge would take off. Many were still into their Ultra Voxes and other synth oriented bands and didn't see the direction I wanted to go.
Eventually, I joined a guitar oriented band, "Spyke", though it too was missing the elements of the "Grunge"/"Alternate" bands which were popular. I really felt like I'd watched the bandwagon roll past without being able to launch myself onto it.
Nirvana, Foo Fighters and Pearl Jam would be amongst my influences from this time. Also Bush.
A lot of people are talking about music having lost it's way lately. It's like nothing more can be discovered, and everything from past era's is being regurgitated in different ways.
I'm not entirely sure where music is heading, but hopefully there will be a break through soon, and we can hear some decent music. Nothing is really influencing me at all lately. So I just continue writing originals, in the hope that either one day i get my solo career going , or I find a band worthy to play in.

Contents: Art Work, Music, Writing, Languages(Linguistics), Links

Aut hor: David-Lee Stevenson
Typed in using "vi" on a Linux machine.
Updated: 29th of March, 2005.