65 MEGABYTES - BIOGRAPHY {Page 6}

DON'T WIN A LITTLE, WIN A LOTTO

I Actually Entered THIS Contest Before The New College Nottingham Talent Contest Finals Which Took Place On 31st May 2002, But I Never Expected What Happened To Actually Happen, So I Forgot About It And Carried On Preparing For The NCN Contest..... However, The Way In Which I Actually Got Entered Into THIS "Lotto" Talent Contest Is Actually Quite Strange.....

I Had Decided On This Day (24th May 2001) That I Would Go Out And Purchase Myself Some Karaoke Discs, And When I Got There, I Bumped Into My Good Friend "Benny Bartman" Who As It Happens Was Also Looking To Purchase Some Karaoke Discs..... Anyway, We Were Just Chatting Away When His Mobile Started Going Off, It Was One Of His Friends Telling Us Both That The New "Lotto" Show Was Running Some Kind Of Talent Contest In Our Local Victoria Centre..... Well, We Grabbed Our Discs And Stormed Out The Door As Fast As We Could (I Told Him We Should Have Paid For The Discs Before We Left).....


Eventually, Me And The "Bartman" Made It To The Centre (Slightly Exhausted), But We Got There..... The Show Had Already Started, So We Asked Around, And We Entered Our Names Into The List Of People Who Were Performing..... We Decided To Do "Don't Let The Sun Go Down On Me" By Elton John & George Michael As Our First Duet Number, And It Got A Pretty Average Response..... We Then Decided That We'd Take It A Little Further, So We Organised Our Second Duet Number To Be "Evergreen" By Will Young, Much To The Crowd's Delight..... After A While, Me And Benny Decided To Go Solo, Benny With "Oh, Pretty Woman" By Roy Orbison, And Myself With "Closer To Me" By 5ive..... The Crowds Loved Each Of Us Equally, But Eventually, We Both Had To Call It A Day Cause We Both Had To Work.....


.......... Well, I Had To Work THEN, But I Had More Free Time The NEXT Day ..........


The Next Day, After A Pretty Exhausting Day At Work, I Left With Haste And Made My Way Once Again To The Victoria Centre..... The People Running The Show Remembered Me From My Performance The Previous Day, And Were More Than Willing To Give Me Another Time Slot..... I Decided On This Occasion, To Grace The Crowd With The Song "The Real Slim Shady" By Eminem..... The Response I Received Was Over Whelming, People Were Actually Stopping During Their Shopping And Whatever To Watch Me Run Riot Over The Stage As Eminem..... It Really Did Feel Great.....


But Anyway, I Heard Nothing Else About It Until The 7th Of June 2002, When The LOTTO Telephoned Me Up And Informed That I Had Won The Regional Prize Of £500..... However, At The Time, I Was Half Asleep, So It Didn't Sink In For A Couple Of Hours..... This Was Actually The First Talent Contest I Had Won With My "Rapping" Talents, So I Was Kind Of Happy About It..... I Think It Would Have Been Much Better To Have Won A Talent Contest Using My "Singing" Talent, But In The End, A WIn Is A WIn!

65 MEGABYTES: THE PUB IDOL

For Many Monthes Prior To The Contest, There Were Always Talks On Whether My Local Pub Were Actually Gonna Run This Contest At All..... But In The End, They Gave The Thumbs Up, And The Contest Was Ready To Go..... Every Week About Forty People Would Enter Their Names Into The Contest, And Three Judges Would Choose Five Of Them To Go Through To The Grand Finals..... The First Round Of Entrants Took Place On The 31st July 2002, And I Entered The Contest On The 7th August 2002..... I Decided To Sing "Evergreen" By "Will Young" As I Felt It Was A Truly Beautiful Song To Perform And I Usually Enjoy Performing It Anyway..... After I Performed The Song, I Waited About Three Hours Before The Judges Decided That There Were Enough Entrants To Choose The Lucky Five From This Week..... In The End, The Judges Announced That I Had Gotten Through To The Grand Finals With A Huge Score Of "9 Out Of 10".....


The Grand Final Was To Be Held On The 21st August 2002, And There Was A Total Of Fifteen Contestants (Including Myself) Chosen Over The Three Week Period From The 31st July To The 14th August..... On The Finals Night, We Were All Informed That Each Entrant Would Perform The Same Song They Performed To Gain Entry Into The Grand Finals, And Then Out Of All Fifteen, Three Would Be Chosen To Take Part In The Very Final Round..... So All The Acts Performed Their Sets, And Then The Judges Took A Few Minutes To Decide Which Three Performers Would Be Given The Chance To Advance To The Final Round..... They Announced That The Final Three Contestants Were, A Man Who Had Travelled All The Way From Skegness To Take Part In The Contest, A Girl Who Sang Ballads VERY Well, And, Me.....


We Were All Given The Option To Choose A Different Song To Perform For The Final Round, But We All Declined And Stayed WIth Our Entry Songs..... The Guy From Skegness Had Performed "Your Song" By "Elton John", The Ballad Girl Had Chosen To Perform "You're Still The One" By "Shania Twain", And I Stuck With "Evergreen" By "Will Young"..... In The End, All Three Of Us Did Our Songs, And The Judges Once Again Retired To Make Another Decision, But This Decision Was To Decide The Winner Of The First Ever "Pub-Idol".....


We Waited For About Ten Minutes, And Then The Judges Came Back And Announced The Reults Of Their Decisions..... They Announced That The Contestants In Third And Second Place Would Each Receive A Nice Bottle Of Champagne, And The Winner Of The Contest Would Be The Lucky Person To Receive A Motorised Scooter Worth £500..... One Of The Judges Climbed Up Onto Stage And Announced That They Had All Made A Final Decision..... The Contestant Which Had Received Third Prize, Was The "Elton John" Performer From Skegness..... Then I Figured To Myself "Well, I Haven't Got Third Place, So I Must Be In Second..... There's No Way I Am Getting First Place In This Contest"..... The Judge Then Announced That The Contestant Who Received Second Prize.......... Was The Ballad Girl "Which Means That The Winner, And Our First "Pub-Idol" Is David Hurt".....


I Couldn't Believe It..... I Knew That I Had Won The Contests Before, But I Also Knew That I Had Won Them Because Of My "Rapping" Talents..... So This Felt Absolutely Brilliant, As This Was The First Talent Contest I Had Actually Won Because Of My "Singing" Talent..... I Couldn't Speak For About 15 Minutes As I Still Couldn't Believe I Had Won My First Contest Because Of Singing..... I Decided To Pick Up My Prize The Next Day, And When I Arrived, My Prize Was There And It Was Still In Its Winning Ribbons, And I STILL Couldn't Believe That I Had Actually Won It.....


I Still Haven't Had A Chance To Ride My Prize Yet, But Hopefully When I Do, It'll Help Me Be Able To Travel To More Gigs To Entertain More People, Which I Always LOVE To Do.....




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