It takes place hundreds of years ago in India when a young King got bored of the games that were available, so he commissioned a poor mathematician to invent a new game for him. The mathematician went away and eventually came up with the game of chess.

The King loved it so much that he told the mathematician that he could have whatever he wanted.

The mathematician said he’d like 1 grain of rice on the first square of the chess board, 2 grains of rice on the second square, 4 on the third and so on doubled for each of the 64 squares of the board.

The King was puzzled, and asked why the mathematician didn’t ask for silver or gold instead of grains of rice. But the mathematician assured him that the rice would be enough.

The King agreed without giving it any more thought.

After paying the mathematician the King was left bankrupt.

I had to look up the exact figures as I couldn’t work it out myself.

Basically by the 64th square, the mathematician had 18,446,744,073,709,551,615 grains of rice.

About 18 billion billion.

A 100g bag of rice contains less than 3 million grains of rice.

This story probably isn’t true, and is barely relevant, but thought I’d share it with you anyway, it reminds me a bit of how things go viral on the internet. Psy gets over 25 million views in one day after he releases a new video on YouTube by people sharing and sharing it, and the views multiply every time and double and double again a bit like the Indian mathematician with the rice all those years ago. At least that’s how it works in my head – I may be wrong. Nice story anyway.

Charlie

This claim originated from a few different success stories. The Beatles played over 1,200 shows in Hamburg in the early sixties, amassing over 10,000 hours playing time, Bill Gates supposedly spent 10,000 hours programming a computer in High School etc, etc… You get the picture. Success is not just about talent and luck; it’s also about determination and a hell of a lot of practice.

When you realise that Ed Sheeran played over 300 shows in a year before he got anywhere, you start to realise that the X-Factor “overnight success” stories are completely fabricated! (Even the guys on X-Factor have usually been playing in pubs for years and years)…

I loved it when Elbow won a ‘Best Newcomer’ award a few years back. They said “Best Newcomer?! We’ve been doing this for 10 years!”

So I always remind myself of the 10,000 hour rule when I play a gig like the one I did last night… I travelled over an hour on delayed tube and train lines, through snow and ice to arrive in a dodgy end of East London to play in a dive of a pub which had about 4 or 5 people in it, mostly playing pool or talking over the music.

I overheard one man at the bar recounting a story about a time he was squatting in Holland when he was 16 with a load of heroin addicts and I quickly found a quiet corner of the pub to hide in. (Hiding wasn’t as easy when I was on stage). The promoter wasn’t there, the barmaid was more interested in her phone than to tell me where he might be, and I waited another half an hour for the sound man to turn up. He might as well not have, because the sound was awful anyway, everything was buzzing and feeding back, we changed every cable at least twice because I was getting static shocks off of the mic! I had to stop a couple of times because the monitor nearly blew up… Anyway you get the picture! ‘Twas a shite-hole…

But it’s exactly times like that, that I remember the 10,000 hour rule and how anyone who’s ever achieved any success in any field has put the ground work in at the beginning, and every minute, in every song, in every gig, is just one more to tick off of your 10,000 hours.

I just wish I could include travel…

Charlie. x

I was already starting to make an okay living in Bournemouth, playing covers in pubs, restaurants and the odd wedding, but even though I wasn’t working a day job, this was still essentially beer money. I was living with my parents, eating home cooked meals every night (thanks Mum!) and enjoying all the other luxuries that comes with earning money and being able to spend it.

But I knew I was pretty serious about music, so when the opportunity to move to London came along, I couldn’t turn it down. I wanted to play my own songs, which I do, but as the money isn’t really there for that kind of thing, I had to subsidise it by playing covers some nights. I moved in with some friends,  and after we got over the initial excitement, two problems became apparent.

I had to pay rent, and I had to buy my own food. And for this I needed some regular dollar.

As to not break with my main philosophy in life of never doing any real work ever under any circumstances, I had to find a way of turning the occasional function gig into a consistent income. This was pretty difficult at first, as in Bournemouth I mainly relied on pubs and restaurants booking me, which would sometimes lead to a wedding or two, but this was all done through word of mouth, and was more of a bonus when it happened.

Firstly, I tried to get in a few pubs around where I live. I spent a couple days going round and handing out promo packs, CDs, and business cards, following up with emails and phone calls and everything else I could try, but had no success. I quickly learned that while pubs make more money up here, there are so many musicians that they don’t have to pay anyone to play. A pub in London can put on an open mic night, have ten musicians play for free, and they get to put “Live Music” on the posters. On the few occasions that I’ve been offered a paid gig, it’s been for about half or a even a quarter of what I was getting in Bournemouth. So for the first couple of months of living here, I was travelling down to Bournemouth most weekends (A gigging weekend being Weds, Thurs, Fri, Sat, Sun), and doing 5 or 6 gigs to make ends meet, which sort of defeated the object of moving to London in the first place.

So I decided to start looking for function work closer to London. And that’s when I found lastminutemusicians.com, which has been a life saver.

I was reticent at first as there was a small sign up fee, but I eventually took a chance on it, and it paid off ten times over within a week when I got my first gig. I just put a little page up, advertising myself as a function singer, and now I’m able to support myself, work as a full time musician, and put the majority of my time into  song-writing.

So, if you want to support me and help me to make music, and you happen to be having a party or your getting married or you just want me to play in the background at your company’s wine tasting event (or whatever else you want), then check out my Last Minute Musicians page here: http://members.lastminutemusicians.com/charliehole.html

Or if you want to have a look at other musicians, bands, DJs or magicians etc… just click this link: lastminutemusicians.com

Thanks,

Charlie. x

But YouTube is a good place to be so I thought I might as well try it! And it’s nice for you guys to see which songs I really love.

So here’s the first three, they’ll be more to follow and hopefully some original songs as well! I’ll try and find different places to shoot them and keep them interesting. All you have to do is to sit back and watch, and if you really like it, share it round your friends and followers, anywhere you can, Facebook, Twitter, Tumblr, even take a screenshot and put it on Instagram if you want.

Awesome. So here goes:

Number 1)

U2 ‘I Still Haven’t Found What I’m Looking For’

Number 2)

Outcast ‘Hey Ya’

Number 3)

Green Day ‘Basket Case’

So I hope you like them! Share them if you really like them, and if you really really like them, check when i’m playing live in my gigs section and come see me!

Charlie x

11th: Broadway, Fulham 8:30pm
12th: AAA (Archangel), Kensington, 8pm
13th: Proud, Camden, 8pm
14th: All Star Lanes, Holborn, 7:30pm
16th: Bar Vinyl, Camden, 8pm
17th: Fiddler’s Elbow, Camden, 8pm
18th: The Crown Inn, Theale (Reading) 7:30pm
19th: The Islington, Islington, 7:30pm
21st: Acklam Village Market, Portobello Rd, 12pm
21st: The Rattlesnake, Islington, 6pm
22nd: Cellar Bar, Bournemouth, 8pm

Please find more info here: http://charliehole.com/live/

Hope you can make some of them!

Charlie x

Give it a listen and let me know what you think.

So I thought seeing as I said please it would only be polite to say thank you!

Due to you lot signing up and liking my Emerging Icons page, I’ve made the chart and I’m gonna be on University of Surrey’s GU2 Radio on Sunday at 3pm if you wanna tune in!

As it turns out I won’t be listening as I’m gigging at Aruba on Sunday 1pm-4pm, but it’s all good and apparently they get loads of listeners…

So… A massive thank you for all your support, I never felt like asking you guys to vote on anything before as I hate nagging people and sometimes I worry that no one’s out there. But you’ve shown me that you’re amazing and I really appreciate your support!

So cheers, here’s to bigger and better things!

Charlie x

Thought i’d post this lovely little review I got from Emerging Icons…

Love hearing that people enjoy my music…

………..

“You know you must be doing something right when you get Rod Stewart listening to your music and saying that it’s ‘a beautiful song’. Well, this here is the tune in question- ‘Stones on a Sandy Beach’- and it comes from aspiring singer-songwriter, Charlie Hole. Bournemouth native Charlie is living and writing in London as the next step in a career he’s taking very seriously. Having decided that this was the path for him, the young musician opted against heading to uni once he’d finished high school in order to concentrate on what he loves. It’s a passion that adds real sincerity to his fresh, gentle approach to a classic folk sound. Combined with the subtly emotive vocals and gorgeous lyrical imagery it’s a chilled out treat.”

…………

Check it out for yourselves here: http://www.emergingicons.com/News/Article/325/youneedtohearthis-featuringthedeadfamous

Thanks,

Charlie

I’ve got a few gigs coming up in London and I’d absolutely love it if you could make some of them…

So, here they are:

26th March – Bar Vinyl, Camden

1st April – Nambucca, Islington

14th April – 15 minute Club, Holborn

19th April – The Islington, Islington

21st April – Acklam Village Market, Bloomsbury Place (noon)

21st April – The Rattlesnake, Islington

7th May – The Troubadour, Earl’s Court

9th May – The Regal Room, Hammersmith

24th May – The Constitution, Camden

Ok, so I know you’ve all got lives and families and TV programmes to watch but I’d really appreciate it if you could make it down to one or two of these, it makes a massive difference and will effect whether I get booked again…

These are all really great venues to play in London and I’d love them to go well!

Please SHARE this round anyone you know who lives in London, or anyone you think might be interested.

Thanks so much,

Charlie x