Whilst at university with friends I started a new band called, ‘The brothers with different mothers’ bought a van and the journey began playing all over the uk cities , surf towns, isle of man, Uk music festivals and even ventured as far as Tablisi in Georgia participating in a pro-democracy rally in there central park. collaborating with Georgian musicians we produced an original recording featuring there astonishing polophonic, indigenous singing style with a track that we had composed.
I decided to take a brake and go traveling for a while to south America for a while. So with not much more then my friend Beccy and my guitar we took flight. It was in Itacara in Brazil where the next chapter of my musical journey began…..
Whist playing my guitar in the posada (hotel) I guy called rich ross in the a joining room joined me and asked if I would like to record some song as he had his laptop and some microphones, we became great friends and spent the next few days hanging out and recording. I continued on my travel trip and on my return to England received an email stating that Rich had booked me in to a studio in Brooklyn New York and could I make these dates.
Feeling that life could not get much better rang around my mates and asked if any of then would like to go to record some music in New York maybe???, to cut a long story short, six of us ended up going over working with Eric Amble and Tim Hatfield at cow boy technical studio NYC and had a blast! returning three time to produce ' Under the pavement' ,the first 'the travelling band album'.
I spent four years give or take Playing more gigs than years have days in The travelling band. Probably one of the most memorable times was winning the Glastonbury emerging talent Competition and playing on there ,The other stage and the acoustic stage following up a couple of years later on the park stage, gosh! that was a hot year. We also were invited to play some music in Kosovo at the opening ceremony of a peace park in Podujevë kosovo in conjunction with MAK ( Manchester aid to Kosovo).
So that a little bit about where I'm coming from, currently I have two musical projects, one being a band that I play in called ' wild birds' of which we have produced a seven track ep and are currently working on new material which we are due to record in march.
I have a solo project working with kier Stewart at 'inch studios' in Manchester and am working on a solo debut album entitled 'WHY WOULD AN ONION CRY?' currently
https://soundcloud.com/stevieballinger/wade-in-water-mix-1-stephen-ballinger
https://soundcloud.com/stevieballinger/sky-line