Interview with Kim Tink
Kim Tink is one of our favourite artists here at Belles and Gals, so much so in fact that she was one of the first singers we asked along to record an exclusive session for us. Yesterday she spent the day in the studio recording the final song for her upcoming album release and afterwards we had a chat with the lady!
Hi Kim, We first featured you on Belles and Gals when we showed the video for the brilliant “Sad Song”, certainly one of our favourite songs on the site so far. Tell us all about the song!
Sad Song was one of the first songs that I wrote and it’s basically about when you start having an issue with somebody, a friend, a relative or a boyfriend and you think ‘Oh God, I’m just gonna write a really sad song’ and you think it’s just going to be a song moaning about somebody. And then I thought, no it shouldn’t be like that, and it actually isn’t, as it’s about me not wanting to write one.
We’re talking to you today just after arriving home from a recording studio. What were you recording?!
A song called ‘Mistake’. It’s the last song that will be on the first side of the album, which is the country side (the other side is the folk side). I recently split up with my ex-partner and I didn’t realise that I still had him on Instagram. When I clicked onto Instagram he was just there and so was the girl who was not exactly in our life, but kind of in our life liking every single one of his posts. I was like ‘oh’ because the last year our relationship wasn’t exactly brilliant and basically it’s a very honest and true song coming from the soul, saying ‘I do think we should have left it earlier’. But I think that everyone that splits up from a relationship thinks that when they’ve left the person. So it’s called ‘Mistake’.
Last week you came down to London to record a session of 4 songs for us at Belles and Gals. Will we hear some of these songs on the album?
Yes, every single song from the session will be on the album! (The four session tracks coming soon!)
So how did you get started in the music industry? What made you start singing or pick up the guitar in the first place?
My music career started because of my mum. She helped me no end in making costumes etc and staying up late to help me learn songs. So if you ask who my inspiration was, I’d have to say my mum.
I started singing with an old best friend of mine on the pub and club scene when I was 19 and we did covers together as a duo. An agent put us together as I talk (a lot!) and the other girl didn’t so much, although she had a way better voice than me as she had been trained and I hadn’t. This continued for nine months but it eventually went sour (due to girls being girls) and at this point I swore that I’d never sing again!
I had a vocal coach called Sally Rivers, based here in Stoke on Trent and she sent me a text message out of the blue saying she needed me to do a gig this weekend and I refused, saying no, I’m not going to do it, but she insisted – ‘Get off Your bum, go to the gig and see what happens!’.
I met a gentleman named Doug Wilkes who is in a band called Hollywood Nights. At the time I was due to start a Uni course in London, at the Institute of Contemporary Music Performance, but Doug swore to me that he would teach me more about the music industry than I would ever learn at a 12 month university course and he did – he trained my voice and my style on stage and I joined Hollywood Nights. Hollywood Nights were actually a Meatloaf tribute band and I went on tour with them quite a few times.
I’m not sure how this happened , but the band ‘Honey Ryder’ came to Stoke on Trent last January and John, who is a really good friend, who is like my dad, said come to the gig. But I didn’t go. At this stage I had left Hollywood Nights and I was doing solo in pubs and clubs every weekend, singing to the old ladies who were playing the bingo and the usual stuff. Around 3 months later, while booking events around Stoke I happened to come across Matt Bishop (of Honey Ryder) and he suggested I come along to a video shoot, a shoot for a song that I’d literally just been listening to. I fell completely in love with the band and met Lindsay (Lindsay O’Mahony of Honey Ryder) and she said to me ‘You’ve been singing for this long and you’ve never picked up a guitar or wrote a song, what are you doing?’. The next weekend I went out and bought a guitar, fell in love with it and the next day I started writing and haven’t stopped writing since! So blame Lindsay O’Mahony!
Have you got any particular musical influences?
The main influence would of course be Honey Ryder and I’m a big fan of Celtic folk, especially Adam Holmes who is in both Rura and Adam Holmes and the Embers. I’m also in love with Holloway Road and to be fair, if you looked at my Spotify or Amazon music, it’s literally people who live down the road like Samantha Lloyd, people I could call up and ask ‘if they want to meet for a brew!’. It’s mainly Uk country artists, although don’t get me wrong I love American country artists, but as I know all of these people, I buy their albums and I listen to them!
So what dreams do you have in your career? Chart success, playing a particular venue, or winning an award?
It has to be playing a particular venue. I would love to get myself to a standard where I could get myself to Nashville and just even stand in the Grand Ole Opry and just play one of my songs, even if there was nobody in there, that would be my dream.
Tell me something completely random about yourself!
I call my guitar “Arthur!”
What was the last album you listened to?
The very last album I listened to this morning was Sara Evans, the ‘Slow Me Down’ album featuring ‘Revival’.
What do the coming weeks and the rest of 2016 have in store for Kim Tink?
We’re going to complete the album, get it out there and have a launch party and I’m hoping that by the end of the year we’ll be doing a tour on the back of the album, mainly in the local area, but we’ll hope to come south as well.
Title image courtesy of Drew Burnett Photography.
Kim Tink:
