Truth to Material - Buried Treasure

Truth to Material is a challenging project in that it is directly inspired, in the short film and music, by my connection to Birmingham and the Midlands. I think about who will relate to it outside of it's local West Midlands identification that isn't a 'Brummie?' I toured various festivals across the UK in 2022 and as the songs from Truth to Material were my most current, I performed them live. They were moderately well received. Quizzical eyebrows were sometimes raised during my impassioned story telling on songs such as 'High Rise' about the ghosts of industry, and the unnamed migrant workers that I had envisioned rising from the clay of the giant excavation ground of the HS2 in Birmingham city centre. At one show I supported Macka B, his band were primarily reggea artists from Birmingham who had a coach load of 'Peaky Blinders' there to cheer them on. That was a lucky break for me as one of the attendees said they recognised the park in Perry Barr I was describing in the song 'Pride of Place' because their mom lived near there too. I also treasure the fact that 'Buried Where?' the first song from the collection to be posted on Youtube is doing well, with lots of plays. It didn't cost a lot to make the film, The Rotunda, that's the round building in the heart of the town centre, gifted me the use of their penthouse suite for a couple of hours, so that I could get a wide backdrop of the town for the clip. I have had listeners say they can relate to the lyric of the song and that they too have an urge to acknowledge the unsung characters of their own towns and within their family histories that define them. In the song 'Buried Where?' I sing to remember the babies and young children of Birmingham, who were refused gravestones and church burial due to their families not being considered religious. It is now being discovered how they were cast to the side of a burial site in Birmingham's Jewelry Quarter without memorial. Local heroes are uncovering the site and laying flowers. I wanted to know about them and other unsung souls and their relationship to my city of birth. They all relate to me, which is the purpose of this adventure.