Simon’s Story

As far as I can work out, my depression started when I was 14 years old just after my Father died.

I say “as far as I can work out” because it was only much later on in life that I actually realised that I was depressed. I had always been an anxious child, shy even, but being that way seemed normal to me and was just something that was accepted by those around me. Around the age of 12 I started to play the guitar in the hope of forming a band and putting music to the lyrics that I had already been writing for over a year. I loved the flamboyance of Prince and the heaviness of Metallica, along with a gaining a deep appreciation of songs from the 50’s and 60’s thanks to my Mother, and much more besides.

I love music, but mostly I love the feelings that it can conjure up. Songs have always made me cry, catharsis is a wonderful thing. I eventually formed my first band when I was 14 and it couldn’t have come at a better time, we were soon entering battle of the bands contests at school and playing a mixture of self penned songs and covers live. The feeling was electric and magical. It wasn’t long before I attended my first ever gig, Metallica at Milton Keynes Bowl in 1993, with a friend of the same age. We were already into drinking alcohol by then and the combination of live music and drinking went hand in hand. Over time the bands I was in changed but the alcohol stayed, accompanied now by various drugs to enhance my mood. I didn’t realise that I was self medicating. The music was becoming more Interesting and by the time I was 20 something I had moved to London permanently to open a recording studio with my oldest friend. We wrote music together for ourselves and for other people and I had the opportunity to record with some outstanding songwriters and musicians, this time just using my voice.

It wasn’t long before I attended my first ever gig, Metallica at Milton Keynes Bowl in 1993, with a friend of the same age. We were already into drinking alcohol by then and the combination of live music and drinking went hand in hand. Over time the bands I was in changed but the alcohol stayed, accompanied now by various drugs to enhance my mood. I didn’t realise that I was self medicating. The music was becoming more Interesting and by the time I was 20 something I had moved to London permanently to open a recording studio with my oldest friend. We wrote music together for ourselves and for other people and I had the opportunity to record with some outstanding songwriters and musicians, this time just using my voice.

Singing had become my true passion. When the recording sessions ended the drug taking began, then it was during the recording sessions and afterwards for days and weeks on end. The drugs and alcohol and a hedonistic lifestyle had replaced the music. I was still writing songs, many books of lyrics were churned out in a haze of debauchery, but I was no longer recording. It was time to go home. After sorting myself out I eventually moved back to London, even though I was in two bands in Leicester that meant the world to me. I got married. The debauchery had crept back in in a big way. We moved out of London and I felt isolated and lost. In the two bands, The Kinells and Temple of Lies, we had continued to write and perform on and off but eventually it was Temple of Lies that took up all of my thoughts. The marriage fell apart and I got divorced.

TOL recorded a couple of albums and we performed at lots of gigs up and down the country. Music had saved me yet again but I needed to get off the drugs and alcohol. With the support of my family and friends I attended counselling sessions which eventually led to me quitting drugs for good and taking a year off alcohol, for starters. I learned how to perform sober again, something that I hadn’t done for twenty years. And that leads us to now, after a year off singing because of vocal nodules, something that has been depressing for me and frustrating for my bandmates, I can happily say we are about to record a new album. If it hadn’t been for my Family, friends and girlfriend I would have given up on singing and then I don’t know where I would have been. Even though I couldn’t sing properly, writing and recording demo tracks for this album has saved my life, given me purpose.

My advice to anyone, my wonderful nephew included, is learn to play an instrument, but even if you can’t manage that you must sing. Sing your favourite songs or better still put your emotions into words and sing them. Set your words free, you will feel better and you might just help someone else in the process.