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Jake Shillingford

HE has toured the world, supported the likes of Oasis and Pulp and even released the UK's first ever MP3 single back in 1998.

Yet this Sunday's gig at Riga has Jake Shillingford feeling more than a little nervous.

He is back on home turf, having been born and bred in Southend.

"I have never played at Riga," Jake admits, , " and although I am really looking forward to it I am probably more nervous than anything as a lot more people I know will be there.

Although he now lives in Brighton the former Southend High school pupil, now 41, still credits the area with the inspiration for his musical journey.

"I really love the people from Southend," he says, "I love our sense of humour and the way people from Southend support each other."

The son of two art lecturers who taught at Southend College, Jake's father, Alan Shillingford, had been an integral part of the Pop Art movement of the 1950s.

"I was exposed at a very young age to musicians and artists," he recalls, "I loved the freedom of Southend in those days."

Mixing with the likes of Ian Drury, Dave Gahn and Martin Gore from Depeche Mode as he grew up well as a fond recollection of Alison Moyet acting as a babysitter, there was little doubt where Jake's career would lead.

Together with fellow Southenders Paul Siepel, from Eastwood on bass, Danny Turner from Southchurch on keyboard and Simon Wray from Thorpe Bay on drums, at the age of 19 they pressed 500 copies of their first ever single independently in Southend for the princely sum of £200.

"It was so DIY," laughs Jake, " that we could only afford to get the cover printed in black and white so we sat an colured all the covers in by hand."

Called Home Sweet Zoo it now fetches more than £100 at auction, and the single launched My lIfe Story and Jake on to bigger things.

Moving to London in 1987 with friend Simon Benney, he opened now-legendary indie club The Panic Station at Dingwalls, Camden Lock.

The list of bands Jake put on reads like a roll-call of late 80s/early 90s alternative pop: Happy Mondays, Pop Will Eat Itself, The House Of Love, Red Hot Chilli Peppers, Jesus Jones and The Stone Roses.

"I have been lucky in my life in that I have found myself in the eye of the storm wherever I have gone," Jake says.

Jake continued to plug away with My Life Story at the same time, enjoying the creative freedom that being independent afforded.

"Throughout my career people believed I had been classically trained but that wasn't true." Jake says.

He loved the sound though and longed to include the sweeping arrangements of string sections on his pop records as an antidote to the rising sound of grunge fast invading from the States.

After placing an advert inviting classically trained musicians to come and play "the devil's music", My Life Story, the orchestral movement was formed.

"We ended up a 13 piece band and stuck like a sore thumb, " Jake chuckles, " but the sound we made went on to become known as Britpop.

"It was coming to the end of the century, the new millennium was coming so Britpop was a period of celebration.

My Life Story began playing the circuit, supporting Pulp on the cusp of their break-through, Blur before they went mega, and, in March 1994 even headlined over a small Manchester band called Oasis.

"It wasn't a case you were influenced by the others at the time though," Jake says with a smile, " you were too busy then trying to be the best."

They were "halcyon" days according to Jake, "when people were still buying records".

It was My Life Story that helped to change that though when they released the first downloadable single in MP3 format in 1998.

"I had always been interested in changes in the music industry and saw the changes that the internet would mean for the music industry, says Jake.

"I like that the record industry in something of a state of flux. Musicians are now empowered to make their own music their way.

"My Life Story were never huge but we had cult status and this fitted in with that."

Although My Life Story continue today , "we don't get together that often as it can be quite unwieldy getting 13 of us together for a gig,"

Jake released a solo album earlier this month called Written Large.

A collection of acoustic songs they tone down the grandiose arrangements of My Life Story , "it is essentially an album to show off the song writing that you can take out on the road," says Jake.

And that is exactly what he is doing on Sunday.

"The people of Southend have always supported my career and it is great to see that people like Get cape, Wear Cape, Fly are still flying the flag."

10:33am Wednesday 26th March 2008

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