North Bay

Tom aka North Bay

-Who are you?

I'm Tom and I am the mastermind behind my music project, North Bay.

-Why did you choose the name North Bay, is it a reference to nature?

I spent ages trying to think of name for myself and this was the only one that I felt sounded alright for me. It's not really a reference to nature, although it's a pretty open ended moniker so I'm happy for people to interpret it as they wish.

-Why do you make music and what does it mean for you?

Loads of reasons I guess. I find it quite therapeutic and it's pretty much my main creative outlet. It's always very satisfying when a song reaches the point where you know it's going to work, looking back and comparing it to when it was just a half formed idea.

-Talking about the compositions of “Demos”: what’s the story behind it?

Well it's called Demos because (unsurprisingly) all the tracks are demos I recorded in my room. That's not to say that I didn't put a lot of effort and time into them, the reason why I still refer to them as demos is because my music production skills are still pretty ropey and I feel that were I to go into a proper studio and record them again then I could get them sounding even better. I've still got an ambition to re-record at least a couple of the tracks.

- How would you define your sound?

Let's see, I guess people would say it's ambient music at the moment but who knows how my sound might evolve in the future.

"Demos"

-What genres and artists influenced your music the most?

Tough to say really, because there's plenty of music that I really enjoy listening to but I wouldn't say it's influenced my music. Probably someone like Bibio.

-You come from England. What do you think about the music coming from the UK and how do you see yourself in relation to them?

I would say the scene here is pretty good, there's plenty of different genres floating around which keeps things interesting. I still see myself as more of a music fan than a music maker at the moment.

-What's your favourite artist and song?

Tough. Artist would probably have to be Foals and song would be The Hunt by Youth Lagoon.

-Who do you think are the most relevant musicians nowadays and who are you listening to the most?

I'm not sure about relevance but some artists I've been enjoying recently are Flume, Gallops, Bear//Face and Thrupence to name a few.

-Where and when did you start learning to play ?

I got a guitar for my 11th birthday but didn't start writing stuff till I was about 16.

-How much does the live element matter in your music?

 Well I'm yet to perform live, but it's definitely something I want to do, it's just a question of working out how it could be done. I've thought about how I could play live a few times, but I wouldn't want to do it if it was just me behind a laptop/sampler. I'm consciously trying to write songs nowadays which are more suitable to be played live

-If you could pick an artist or a band to play with on a stage, who would you choose?

Probably Bloc Party. I learned their entire first album when I was younger so it would be nice to play it in front of a big crowd.

 -What do you think about the music industry nowadays?

Well it's easy to get cynical about it when you see awful artists/bands getting success, but at the same time I think it's a lot easier nowadays for new artists to reach an audience, so there's good and there's bad.

-What is the message that you'd like to express to the people who listen to your music?

Well my music is all about being shrouded and insular so hopefully it means that it's a bit ambiguous as to what the message is. Basically it can mean what people want it to mean.

-What is your favourite book and movie?

Book would probably be Moneyball, film is Lars And The Real Girl.

-How and where do you see yourself in ten years from now?

Hopefully I will have breached 300 likes on Facebook.

-Beatles or Rolling Stones?

Can I say neither?