Donovan Banks

I've been a little busy the last two weeks and have some interesting stories for you all...

Last week, just when I thought my business was never going to make any money a company in Canada mailed me asking for a studio in Durban to record a voice over with John Cleese. I use a few studios and this was my forst opportunity to use Source connect and I think I may be one of the first in Durban to use this instead of the more expensive ISDN.

Needless to say John Cleese is very gracious and a true gentleman. I can only imagine what it must be like having to adapt to new colleagues every job and he does it so well. He is very talented and nailed each of the scripts sent to us.

That same night I played two gigs in one. Swell band is hosting a music evening once a month and my other act, a guitar duo with Tom Hasting that is yet to be named, performed as well. I learned a valuable lesson about cheap strings as well as cheap guitars. While I was restringing in the morning my Ibanez Nylon string broke. I had to replace the tuners with an old one I had lying around. Now I need a new guitar...

Sunday night I played at Sibaya Casino again. I find this very interesting as I play 3 sets with the nylon string and the last with my strat.
What this does is keep things calm for a while, even though we give it some serious stick while I play the nylon string. Hearing a nylon string guitar playing the lead option is so beautiful. It sounds so Mediterranean and really adds so much class to what could be very boring and monotonous with an electric guitar.
The final set is always pumping and gives me the opportunity to rock a little more. We generally end the set with "Gravity", the John Mayer song and it closes our gig off so well.

Then out of the blue this week my band mates and I got called to be extra's in Spud the Movie. I enjoyed the books and am also stoked because John Cleese is in it.I will definitely be feeding back on what I have seen on a movie set so stay tuned.