So...that was 2012 then

Yep, it's that time of the year again. The foot is well and truly off the gas, the many items on my to-do list are ticked off, it's nearly time to pack my bags and badly wrapped presents and head home for Christmas. This will be my last blog post of the year (I do have one gig left - next Friday at the Black Bull in Godmanchester with Trevor but I won't write it up - I can tell you now what I'll more than likely be saying about it...'such a lovely gig, great fun to be in a band with Alister Bunclark again' etc etc), so as per tradition it's time to have a bit of a look back at what I've done over the last 12 months. Because yes, clearly it's all about me. But hopefully this does serve as some kind of justification for not seeing friends as often as I should do, for my excessive Red Bull drinking and the fact that I always look just a bit tired. I have no idea how long this post will be, but I imagine it will be a bit rambly, and very self-indulgent. Sorry about that. Anyway, 2012 - here's what I went and did...

I entered the year with a renewed sense of ambition; looking back to my first post of 2012 in January I had shorter, tidier hair and vowed to eat less pizza. I didn't stick to either of those things as the year progressed, in fact - I've eaten like a horse (a horse who likes pizza, bacon and microwave beefburgers) and my hair is a shambles, but it's always natural to start a new set of 12 months with unachievable goals. But it was a good launch into the year - I woke up on New Years' Day around a friends house to a text message saying that the FLAMING JUNE release I'd played congas on had won an award - the FATEA award for our EP, 'Nerves Of Steel.' Flaming June have played a big part in my year, Louise has changed the line-up a bit, there's been some cracking gigs, and just recently I nailed my parts for the forthcoming release which is out next year. Also in January, THE BRITISH IBM were born - a lovely bit of re-branding there, it's the band I'm in with Aidy and Dave, and alongside the name change we started rehearsing new material. At the end of the month, the three of us started recording sessions at Half Ton Studios, and our self-titled album was eventually released in July. It remains my favourite album I've been on, and the singles (especially Animal) had brilliant promo videos too - it's difficult sometimes to big-up projects you're a part of because we're all modest and all that, but I'm so proud to be on this one. Also in January I played my first gigs of the year with TREVOR JONES and also a show with JON ORCHARD. I spent a lot of February working on new material, including a 6-episode YouTube sitcom called, 'The Oscar Pike Diaries' which we never actually got around to making but I'll use this material somewhere along the line next year, played a wonderfully surreal London gig with Trevor (and band) and meetings also started with IZZY REES/NICOLSON (she uses her maiden name for acting stuff) and GRACE WILLIAMS about Edinburgh plans. I didn't quite realise at the time just how much I'd be working with Izzy on stuff this year, the poor girl must be sick of the sight of me. More gigs with Trevor in March, and it was a month where things started to get proper busy, where all the plans started to take shape. We hosted two rather fun fringe fundraisers; at the Cornerhouse in Cambridge we put on a gig called '100 Songs In 5 Hours' - the plan was to simply try and have 100 songs performed before closing time, no reason for this apart from the fact it just made it more of an interesting gig. It was a great night full of my favourite bands, 84 songs were played in total. Our second fundraiser was a newly written murder mystery which I'd bashed out in double quick time, MY UNFUNNY VALENTINE: DEATH OF A COMEDIENNE - it starred Izzy, Grace, Alan Stewart, Vaughan Allanson and myself, plus we had live music too. It was a nice show, with good food at The Missing Sock, not a rousing success, but nice enough. The same weekend as both fundraisers I played the part of Darren in a short film called MR ABERNATHY - it's a quirky and highly entertaining little film by CHRISTOPHER DANE and really nicely produced. Also in March I went on my good friend Marcus' stag-do where it was clear I am useless at shooting things, and played my first gig of the year with EUREKA STOCKADE. The month ended with my play, PROBABLY THE GREATEST GOAL EVER SCORED running at The Horse in Waterloo for 2 nights, that team did a wonderful job. April started with the news that 'Greatest Goal...' had been chosen to be performed for a further six nights at The Horse which made me happy - this time as part of the APRIL SHOWERS festival; it was a joy to watch, I just kept on going to see it. Played my first gigs of the year with The British IBM - in Stockton as part of the Stockton Calling Festival, and also played live with Flaming June and Trevor Jones. Both EDINBURGH FRINGE shows were confirmed and MICHELLE GOLDER was signed up to direct 'Greatest Goal...', it was a big step deciding to take two shows up there - considering how tough it is to even take one, but it was a challenge that excited me greatly, and at incredibly short notice I got asked to drum for THE WEDDING SINGER - THE MUSICAL at The Mumford Theatre in Cambridge. I'd never drummed in a musical before, and although preparations were rushed and stressed, it worked really well and I was really glad to be part of a show of that scale. I turned 31 in May, which panicked me a bit, finally nailed the scripts for the Edinburgh shows, played some more gigs with The British IBM, recorded with Trevor Jones and started rehearsals with the complex and challenging (in a completely positive way) beast that is DOWSING FOR SOUND. June was just crazy. Some cracking gigs with The British IBM (including a really nice show at Proud Camden in London), Trevor Jones (including a BBC session), Flaming June and Eureka Stockade, and the biggie - the Dowsing For Sound show at The Corn Exchange in Cambridge. It was an occasionally magical, exhausting, thrilling, emotionally demanding gig unlike any of us have ever experienced before (my thoughts in full are here: http://theboyrichards.blogspot.co.uk/2012/06/gig-report-dowsing-for-sound-corn.html), still not entirely sure what to make of it all but there is nothing like Dowsing For Sound and I wouldn't swap it for the world. A couple weeks later we played a less stressful set at the Ickworth Race For Life festival - I also played with two other bands and did the relay dressed as Santa, like you do. On top of all of that, my really old play CRACKERJOKE WRITER was performed at The Welwyn Drama Festival. July was soon among us and so were the fringe previews, I returned to my role as Oscar Pike for a second year running with a new show titled THERE'S ABSOLUTELY NOTHING WRONG WITH OSCAR PIKE and this was on a double bill with our own production of 'Greatest Goal...' - the show opened in Bristol, before a couple nights in Cambridge and a show in London. Rough around the edges, but with plenty of life, it was a project that we had to push through with not as many rehearsals as we wanted but seemed to go down well everywhere, and this little team of myself, Izzy, Grace, Michelle and our soundman Alan worked really well to bring it all to life. In between the previews, I gigged with Trevor Jones and Eureka Stockade, and I also drummed for another musical - this one a show simply called THE SOUND OF MUSICALS which ran for four nights at the stunning New Wolsey Theatre in Ipswich. A week later, I was off on tour with the British IBM to promote the release of the album - our first electric tour (the one last year was acoustic), this was perhaps more testing than the last one but we came out of it with some good memories - we played in Middlesborough, Leeds, Boston, Leicester, Manchester, Warrington and Birmingham. If you're in a band you really should be on the road, yeah? I'm hungry to do it all again. In August the British IBM played a BBC radio session and I also gigged with Flaming June and before we knew it the Edinburgh Fringe was upon us. With both 'Greatest Goal...' and 'Oscar Pike...' up there, it was an exhausting time - of course we made mistakes, our marketing wasn't great, audiences weren't exactly packed, it was without question the most difficult fringe I have ever done...but I'm still fond of these shows, proud of what we did up there, it is still the most magical place in the world and within weeks of returning Izzy and I met up and formed Fat Fox Productions with next year's Edinburgh very much one of our priorities. A week after the fringe it was LODESTAR FESTIVAL time where I'm the Director Of Theatre. Lodestar is always one of the highlights of the year and I'm lucky to be able to book some fantastic comedy/theatre for them, Helen Arney in particular was brilliant this year. Alongside all of the fun, we did 'Oscar Pike...' in front of a healthy audience - it felt like it was the best performance of Oscar, like we had finally done it justice, and a lovely way to say goodbye to this character. It was probably the first time where I felt like an 'actor', and I say that in the loosest sense - because as we all know all I do is play myself anyway, but I just got a feeling it was starting to work, that I was starting to get the hang of it. Also at Lodestar, I wrote a script for Bristol-based blues band, THE OUTLINES, and the result was an alternative musical called YOU DON'T MISS YOUR WATER which was performed on the Sunday of the festival. Another project which perhaps was written and put together a bit too quickly for comfort, but worked out pretty well I'd say. Later that month I started recording with Alister, Steve Calder and Clare Calder for a project that would eventually emerge in time for Christmas, as well as recording my parts for the new Flaming June release, and I also played live with Trevor and The British IBM. October was very gig-heavy, playing all over the country with the British IBM, Flaming June, Trevor Jones and a very cold outdoor show with Dowsing For Sound, alongside working on new script material, and the launch of our regular Fat Fox Productions new material evening, THE FOX DEN in Cambridge. I also lost my wallet and went slightly mad for a week as a result, but wrote a play I'm really proud of. In November I toured that play ('The Wallet') with another new piece, 'Man V Ants' with my first ever solo-ish show, SOME PLAYS BY PAUL RICHARDS. It was a scary step, I know I'd had quite a lot of stage time already but still - me on stage chatting for an hour really could go either way, just so much to learn if anything else. It was a step that was perhaps not on my to-do list, and the circumstances as to why I chose to do it probably aren't suitable for this blog, but - thanks to some brilliant direction from Izzy and some lovely acting from CLAUDIA McKENZIE who made her acting debut for the tour as my landlady, Pauline, it was eye-opening and I thoroughly enjoyed doing it, more than I thought I would - I just seem to get an odd pleasure out of being completely out of my depth. The show was performed in Norwich, Brighton, Wales, Bristol and Gamlingay, I reckon we'll do it all again soon. Also in November I found a little time to write the Christmas show, we put on another new material night, played the last British IBM gig of the year in Birmingham (this followed a really fantastic filmed session in Nottingham) and there were also live shows with Flaming June - the radio gig at The Maltings in Farnham was particularly enjoyable, plus a recording session with THE PRISONER OF MARS. And so here we are...December. A frenetic end to the year, with recording sessions with Trevor Jones resulting in our festive single, A VERY MERRY CHRISTMAS EVERYONE, finishing off the audio bits with Izzy for our story/music Christmas album, TINSEL FACE (the music bits were the tunes I recorded with Ali, Steve and Clare all those months back) which is now available as a download, gigs with Trevor and Flaming June, and - as per tradition, we put on a nice and childish Christmas show, this one was called MARTHA AND MARVIN'S REALLY QUITE EXCITING CHRISTMAS ADVENTURE and ran for four nights.

It's not been a bad year, you know, can't really complain. As always there was things I wanted to do but simply ran of time (releasing my novel - which is still being proofread so will be out finally early next year, recording the radio sitcom, Technically Single etc) but I've probably done enough to warrant a few days off. Two tours, one as a drummer, one as an actor/writer, various festivals in various places, and worked with/met some really amazing people, you know who you are. So, some stats:

This year I have played 71 gigs with 7 different bands
I've drummed on 4 albums, 3 EPs and 4 singles
I've written 11 plays, and my work has been performed publicly 56 times


For every gig and show there's an anecdote, countless hours spent on the road and in late night service stations, the occasional crisis, the more than occasional glimmer that good things are really starting to happen. They are - and I'm quite excited about hitting the ground running for 2013. Lots of friends have supported me this year, and that's not just turning up to the shows - it's listening to me ramble on in the pub about ideas, and plans, successes and failures. A lot. Now look...I know it's been said, many times, many ways, but Merry Christmas to you. See you next year, I've got a feeling it will be a bit of a busy one x