Well, not sure where to start? Born 16th May 1976. Early years were mostly spent playing toy plastic guitars and a knackered old spanish acoustic guitar that used to be my mum’s. I “customised” it by writing Darren ”Ace” Greaves on it in black permanent marker pen. Didn’t make me a better player. I was young, foolish, and liked KISS at the time…

As I grew older, tastes in music appreciably improved. (Although, sometimes late at night, if no-ones in. I break out the KISS Live DVD’s.) Mainly by being exposed to them so much by my parents, I got hugely into bands like Queen, Pink Floyd, Rush, Boston and Marillion. The first of those bands to really strike a ”chord” (haha, what a funny joke. CHORD you see? Cos I”m a guitarist?! Brillliant!) with me was Queen, and specifically, the playing of Brian May. While not your typical flashy ”500 notes a second” player, I loved his use of harmony and building multi layered arrangements. This is a style of music that was also taken to it’s max by Tom Scholz of Boston. (Hint: Go and buy Third Stage by Boston. If you don’t have goosebumps by the last track, check yourself for a pulse…) I later got into bands like Pink Floyd, and, more recently, Rush, who along with Marillion, are having a huge influence on the type of music I write now.

I played with various bands such as Last Exit, High and Wide, deMilo, Front Cover and The Vision. While I had a great time with these bands, I always had a desire to write my own music. Doing some studio work as a session player for various songwriters only served to fuel this.

I steadily got into home recording, and over time, built up a home recording setup. This allowed me to make my own music, whenever I wanted to, without having to pay for expensive studio time. It was around this time that my old friend and songwriting partner from school, Graham, got back in touch with me after being away for a few years. The timing couldn’t have been better. I had loads of music already written and recorded, but no lyrics or vocals had been recorded. Graham and I carried on from where we had left off before he moved away, and the Lucid Dream project was born.

My favourite colour is red, I alternate between boxer shorts and regular pants. I love beer. I hate bananas. Don’t eat yellow snow.