Hey Hello.
I’ll cut straight to the chase: It’s bittersweet to announce that I’ll be stepping down from my Chordblossom duties at the end of this week. Cue the violins! (If you get that, you’re ace).
Fear not though; Robert Brown (my right hand man alongside Peter Cinnamond since a few months after launching) has bought the company from myself and intends to keep things running as it always has been. It would be inaccurate to suggest he won’t slowly turn Chordblossom into ‘his’ version – but that’s a good thing as a website like Chordblossom need’s a face-lift every few years and I’m sure it’ll be a positive change when/if it does happen.
The reason for my leaving is simply that it’s always been my goal to start a ‘proper’ revenue-generating, employee-hiring, pencil-pushing, invoice-issuing with a free invoice template, creative collective – and I have been setting that plan in motion slowly over the last few years. It’s been a long work in progress and I have been keen to plan it properly. With it coming up to the end of the year, now just feels like the right time to pass the Chordblossom baton over to Robert and jump headfirst into my new company, Heartfuse. It’s always nice to start the year with no niggling in-limbo issues and a clean chalkboard for the year ahead – I think so anyways.
Another major reason is that, believe it or not, I’m actually a Musician myself and I’ve been neglecting to release any music for way too long now (Although I have put out Six solo records and an EP already). I have hundreds of songs just collecting dust and if I don’t make a plan to start recording them now, I probably will never record them. After Aeons of being glad I wasn’t in a band… I now have an incredible desire to start playing music again. So in essence, I want to have my music written about; not be writing about other people’s music. (The team have been instructed to give all my future releases a minimum of 5 out of 5 – kidding! No, really. I’m Kidding.).
Just to quash any rumours before they may begin; there’s been absolutely no bad blood whatsoever between myself and any of the Chordblossom team that led me to this decision. In fact, my two partner’s in crime, Peter and Robert, have known about my desire to work full-time on Heartfuse for quite a while [months] and not only have they been incredibly supportive of it, they’ve managed the day-to-day running of Chordblossom when I was recently too busy to do so. The only delay is because we’ve had to work out the nuts and bolts of the changeover before we let anyone know.
I have seriously enjoyed every minute of creating, developing and nurturing Chordblossom – and I hope I’ve made a small (0.0001%) difference in the lives of some local bands and possibly the Northern Irish music scene as a whole, as that was the goal – to help.
I want to say a massive thanks to all the contributors that I found (and that found us), I pestered and who worked with over the last few years – a lot of you have certainly become friends. Passion for NI music is what brought the entire Chordblossom team together, and that fire will remain lit whether I’m there or not. If you are in any way passionate about the music scene from these shores, I urge you to get in touch with the boys and join the team – there’s a lot of lessons and experience awaiting you! There’s no shortage of people who have published their FIRST ever writing with Chordblossom and who are now in paying jobs utilizing their writing skills.
Special mention goes to all the people that embraced Chordblossom from day one.
So then, I leave you all in the very capable hands of Robert Brown, who will most likely be issuing his own statement about this new change in a few weeks. Robert has been Chordblossom’s sounding board, bullshit detector and double-department head for a long time now. Please give him as much support as you gave me when we just launched because although it may look incredibly easy; keeping a website of this nature ticking over involves a lot of work.
I look forward to now being a ‘fan’ of Chordblossom now and following it from the outside looking in. It’s definitely become part of the fabric of NI Music and I’m extremely proud to be able to say that and I’m so confident the team will bring Chordblossom to new heights in 2014.
Speak soon, friends.
Daveit
www.facebook.com/heartfuse
www.heartfuse.com
