about myself

My apologies, we haven't been formally introduced.

The "about me" post probably could have come first, but then again, the fact that it didn't says something "about me."

Well, my name is Phil Smith, I'm 23, and music is my passion. I'm gonna go off the beaten path here and skip the novel that I just realized I was about to write. Instead, I'm going to list a bunch of tidbits about my life in music and how I got to where I am.

The early years...

• -My first favorite artist was Phil Collins.
• -I used to rock out to "The Monkees," in my underwear and a plastic guitar when I was just a little guy.
• -My first CD was Nirvana - In Utero
• -My first guitar was a no-name acoustic guitar that I got for $12 at a flea market in up-state New York when I was about 12.
• -I smashed that same guitar in the drive-way when I got my first electric guitar. (it's sad now because I don't have it, but I really always wanted to break a guitar!)

• -My first band in middle school was called Left Unsaid. We played a ton of Blink-182, and a few originals.
• -My second band was called Lost Concept and we pretty much just played Carle Place High School talent shows.
• -When I was a Junior my best friend and I organized an immediate benefit concert for the families of 9/11 victims. The event was a tremendous lesson in event planning, promotion, and charity.

• -After high school I played guitar for Greg Raposo for about 2 years. We did some regional touring and alot of Radio Disney events. It was an incredible growing experience as a musician. I met alot of great people, and learned alot about the industry.
• -The next 3-4 years I played in two different original bands called Airtight, and the other Grieving for Grace. Both were brief, but incredible experiences. We played an incredible amount of shows in a pretty short period of time. Again, I was able to learn about an entirely different side of the industry, and more specifically what it was like to start from scratch in a local music scene.
• -In the summer of 2007 I was able to go on a cross-country tour with a band called Bandcamp. At the time they were a local band from New York who had just recently landed a record deal with EVLA/Atlantic Records. I had incredible time, and had again continued my journey through the many different aspects of the music industry.
• -Throughout these years, and up until today, I have been going to Five Towns College to study business and audio recording technology.
• -One of my bigger accomplishments during this time was a seasonal benefit concert I created with a friend called "Rockin' for Tots," which is a concert that features some of the more known artists in the area. We basically collect a ton of toys to donate to the Marine Toys for Tots program. So far we have had two concerts in the last three years. We plan to continually grow this event and eventually do it with national acts.

Well, that's me in a nutshell bullets.