This is designed to let you know what Im up to and to tell you a bit about me.

Hey guys,

So the latest update is obviously long overdue, but I have just been so busy that I havent had the time. I have a new assistant now called Claire who has taken over dealing with my Youtube account and will also be doing bits and pieces on here along with a few other media areas, so hopefully this will keep things updated a bit more often...

I've been doing loads of gigs with Jenny Lynn Smith which has been great. There is a real buzz around her at the moment and things are going from strength to strength. We are doing a residency at the Ramshackle music venue in Fulham, near Putney bridge over Sep - Dec. Check Jennys myspace page for more details: myspace.com/jennylynnmusic.

I've been playing quite a few gigs at the Roadhouse in Covent Garden with the Tide which has been a real laugh. All your favourite covers - Sweet Child of mine, Walk this way etc. Great to get away from the more serious studio side of things every now and then!

May saw a number of sessions including Rob Phllips from the West country recording some great folk/pop/rock stuff over 3 days. That will be out early next year. One particular mammoth session I feel I should mention was recording backings for a UK singer who wanted to do a number of Paul Anka tracks, plus a load of Lou Rawls tracks and some other famous crooners. Having not seen or played any of the music before the session, I was quite proud to get 26 tracks recorded in 4 hours!!! You can hear some of them on myspace.com/theplanetgroove. They really came out fantastically, all credit for mixing and production to the ever increasingly talented Vince Benjamin, who seems to play bass on pretty much everything I'm involved with too. He is a fantastic player and we really sit well together, so no complaints there at all!

I've been doing a load of stuff with the Bridge too, and there are now some clips flying about on youtube somewhere of the Live studio sessions we did at Terminal studios in London. Ive also been playing a couple of great Jazz/fusion residencies, one at the Sun and Doves Pub in Camberwell and the other at Bodegas in Watford. Again, some great players have been on these including awesome trumpeter Gabriel Garrick (yes Mike Garricks son) and of course Mr Dave Holland who continues to write some wicked grooves!

July saw a few gigs with the mighty Payback and a TV Jingle plus rehearsals for the Nat Griffiths Album recording. Nat is a great Australian singer, whose album is being produced by Chris Ryan, whom I have been doing a lot of work for over the last year (5 albums so far since october!). We flew to the famous Artesuno studios in Udine, Italy for 10 days to record Nats album. This is a fantastic studio. The drum sound from the DW's was absolutely amazing, probably the best I have heard in fact. That will be released early Feb 2009, but hopefully I'll be able to get some videos of those sessions up before the end of this year as there really is some very special playing on here, with Vince Benjamin (surprise surprise!) on Bass, Ryan "hair" Haberfield on guitar and Juan Zelada on keys. It was my first trip to Italy, and it was more than I had hoped for! We stayed on a fantastic vineyard, drinking incredible wine, coffee and eating the best Italian food! Two days in venice at the end of the sessions rounded of a great working holiday.

Two days after getting back I flew to Glasgow for a gig and noticed something was up with the vision in my right eye. Unfortunately my Retina had detached! Which is very serious. So I had a big eye operation at the end of August which has meant I have had to take 3 weeks off work to recover. It's very painful and unpleasant and I just hope that this operation will solve it for good. Fortunately, I had managed to get a reunion in with some of my old friends and fellow band members from Canadian Band Barrage a few days before the operation as we all happened to be in London for 2 nights! Not that I can remember much mind..... ;-)

And to top of the summer, I started playing cricket again for my local team. This has been great. I played when I was younger, and despite having 14 years off, I found myself back opening the bowling as I used to, so I guess I haven't lost the old cricketing skills too much!

Right then, a rather mammoth update for you there! Im sure Claire will be on at me to keep this a little more regular. Any questions/comments, please Email Claire via the above link (claire@uksessiondrummer.com) and she will arrange getting them to me in my spare time and hopefully Ill get back to you asap.

Cheers!

Matt

www.mattmcdonough.co.uk

www.uksessiondrummer.com

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