Mel's Blog

When I first started writing music, I thought it would only reach the ears of friends and family.   So when we were invited to play at the NXNE in Toronto, I can't explain what that meant to me!

We arrived in Toronto jetlagged but excited, all really ready to get the show on the road!   We had our first gig the day after we arrived at Union Station - which is the central hub for intercity transits.   It is the most amazing station I have ever seen.  It was built in 1914 and has incredible architecture.  The massive hall with its ceiling reaching to the sky did however provide some rather interesting acoustics, but the atmosphere that was generated from the crowd that gathered was incredible.  After the gig I met with a fellow Maltese - Victor Micallef one of the Canadian Tenors - he loved the gig and was incredibly supportive.  What a privilege!

Our second gig was at Market Lane, and we had a great time playing in such a beautiful setting under the trees, with lots of passers-by stopping to hear us. 

Most of the crowd stayed for the whole set and we sold lots of albums.  One lovely lady who bought a cd actually said 'I should be back at work, my boss will kill me, but this music is so beautiful I just can't leave', a comment like that just makes my day! Someone had unintentionally left a guitar case open and people were dropping money in the case that did make me smile! My sister and niece were sitting right in front of me for this gig so that made me a little nervous! She's my sister, she's supportive of me of course, but she's also very honest and would definitely tell me the truth about what she thinks.   She loved it!  That means a lot to me!   We were lucky enough to have our own personal photographer at our gigs, my cousin Sharon Portelli, who is really fantastic and was so truly helpful and kind to us. The photos at Market Lane turned out to be stunning!

After Market Lane - we had our merchandise stall in Dundas Square where some of the major acts were appearing later, it's kind of surreal selling CD's while listening to Iggy Pop soundcheck!

 

The jetlag definitely makes me cranky!   I felt like I was floating and little did I know that I would need all wits about me for the evening gig!

 C'est What - An established acoustic venue.   The room was packed! Canadians, Maltese, New Yorkers and some industry people lurking in the shadows taking notes. 

There are no Sound checks.  So before you go on stage, you set up and do a simple line check and go for it!  You have to get it right! The weirdest thing happened to us! My radio mic was picking up a local radio station from somewhere - Keith kept telling the sound engineer that he is hearing Arcade Fire in his head!!! It was very strange and I have to say a little nerve wracking! But we've spent a long time learning our craft and it takes more than that to throw us! It's experiences like this that make you tougher!  The response from the audience was unbelievable, totally amazing!

Saturday was our last gig at a wonderful intimate venue called Czehowski.  We were determined that the sound would be outstanding!  And it was! There was one particular guy in the audience, who was so totally lost in our music; I couldn't keep my eyes off him during the gig. It was incredible to feed off such energy in the audience.

I was pretty overwhelmed keeping up with everyone after the gigs, old friends, all my family, even my playdate back from when I was a year old was there! I'm so totally grateful to everyone who made it to the gigs.

We filmed an interview for the Maltese Channel 'Lehen Malti' while in Toronto, the piece included footage from our video shot in Gozo for the new single 'People'. Frank Attard runs the programme and he asked us questions about our beloved Gozo and our lives.  The one thing that stays with me about Canada is how kind and generous all the people there are, everyone we met was warm and sincere without exception. 

'People' our new single will be released on 2nd August here in Malta.  The new EP features 4 new songs which I am so proud of.  I really feel like we are constantly moving forward.  We can't wait to share it with everyone.  It's quite different. We have now evolved from a duo to a band. With Simon Vella on Violin, and Ismael Azzopardi, who has played keyboards with us for years and now has a major input in the songwriting. 

I think Chasing Pandora are sounding fantastic and with the right material, amazingly dedicated people on our team and having our heart's in the right place, I believe that somehow we can get there. 

You can download our new single 'People' from our website for free for the month of August and don't forget to check out the video on www.chasingpandora.com 

Have a great summer!