Gabby Rivers - 'Live Music is one of the most important things you can do'
Cover Photo: @ollyhillphotography
So Gabby, you have played some of the biggest stages in the region, from the Cambridge Junction and The Apex in Bury St. Edmunds, to festivals such as LeeStock and Latitude. How important would you say live performance is for up and coming musicians, and how important is it for an artist to progress into a superstar?
"Live music I would say is one of the most important things to do as an up and coming artist. It helps you progress as not only an artist but within your confidence, performance skills, it builds up experience and so much more. It is such a good way to network and you get to meet so many new people and are able to grab new opportunities. For example, when I was at school I got entered by my music teacher for a battle of the bands completion, the winning prize was to open LeeStock music festival and I was lucky enough to win that but by doing that and playing LeeStock it has given me so many more opportunities and helped me out so much. I first started off doing open mics and it was such a great starting point and I find playing live all the time as open mics, pubs then going to gig venues and festivals really helped me."
You blew us all away back in 2020 when you finally graced us with your debut EP Headache. Although you are a solo artist, you have a fantastic band behind with you, with Jason’s lead parts & Callum’s crazy baselines in ‘Stop Trying’, along with Coran’s drum breaks in ‘Headache’. How involved are the guys in the writing process? Do you write the songs yourself and take them to the band or do you all write together?
I am so grateful to have such an amazing band behind me and not only are they band members they are my close friends too. The guys are not involved in the writing process, I basically write all my own songs on my acoustic guitar or on the keys and then I will create a demo track in the studio with a producer I work with and then I send it over to the band to have a listen, then they go away and learn and improvise over parts and basically come up with there own ideas for there drum, guitar or bass part. They then send it back to me and we discuss what works. It’s such a great way of working together because I’m able to write my own stuff but still give them the freedom to play their part the way they would like to play it.
I remember reading in another one of your interviews that your tune ‘Drowning’ (my personal favourite!) was written about being told music isn’t a viable career choice. I was always told the same thing. If you could, how would you change the way the education industry sees us musicians, and how they could try and help aspiring musicians achieve their goals, rather than just passing off their dreams as too much work.
I would definitely make music and any creative study more common, popular and encouraged in education. For example more clubs for music, more shows, not always learning about theory and allowing more freedom to play, write, create and express themselves in what way they want to. I found at school it was popular to like P.E, D.T, English and so on which is fine, but if you ever did something like music especially at my school (I’m talking from experience) it was classed as weird or unrealistic so making it become normal and more encouraged would be amazing; especially because music and the music industry is such a cool pathway to go down with so many different jobs you could get into.
I saw you payed a visit to Decoy Studios recently, no doubt to create some more musical magic. Is there anything you can tell us about it yet?
Yes! I was lucky enough to record my new project up there and it was so much fun. I’m currently writing and recording a lot as I’m on a roll with the writing and recording process at the moment so I am making the most of it. Something is in the pipeline and will be announced soon which I am so excited to share as it’s my best work yet and I have lots to go with it as well. I’ve been working on a lot of the writing and recording and finding myself as an artist and working super hard over the past year to create better work than my EP so I hope everyone loves what I have been creating as much as I do :)
Gabby can be found at all these links below. If you don't already know her, go check her out - she's going to be huge!
Spotify https://open.spotify.com/artist/3z6ntAyylo4TSDV4l27fvq?si=Ngr3ILtmTGKHidyZ9B5eTQ&dl_branch=1
Instagram https://www.instagram.com/gabbyriversmusic/?hl=en
Facebook https://www.facebook.com/gabbyriversmusic20/photos/a.1024132221010023/2125171937572707
