Charitindie 2023 - This Year and The Next
You might’ve seen us posting about a charity livestreaming event over the past couple of weeks called Charitindie 2023. It was held on Saturday 22nd April, featured twelve independent artists and was in support of The Trevor Project. We can now tell you that event was a success and was officially our first annual event! To audition for Charitindie 2024, please read the details at the end of this article. But for now, let’s tell you about some of the things we saw on the livestream.
Charitindie banner and logo made by Katie McTigue, logo based on an idea by Edward Woodley. Top Row: Piper Wildwood, Jeremy M, Delenn Jadzia and Pacing. Middle Row: Uncle Emmington, Beanie In The Bath, Tarquin Alexandra and Scullin Bonez. Bottom Row: Brianna Carmel, Cayt W, Copeland James and Count to Ten with Nobody.
Expertly run by compère and organiser Cayt W, she introduced the artists, interacted with the chat room and put in a lot of work behind the scenes to ensure the success of Charitindie:
‘This event went so much better than I ever could have hoped, and it was thanks to the hard work, love, and dedication put in by everyone involved. I was initially nervous that the turnout wouldn’t be what we expected, I didn’t want it to fall flat for the artists that had put so much work in, especially those that have never really performed live before, but I’m so glad I was worried about nothing. Everyone turned out to support one another, the chat was full of positivity and hype, and in the end we’ve even managed to triple our donation goal! I couldn’t have asked for more.’
With a fundraising goal of $100, the current total stands at $320! Thank you for continuing to add to the total even after the conclusion of the livestream. If you’d like to donate to The Trevor Project, hit the button below to give us your preferred amount.
If you missed our livestream, or you’d like to watch it again, hit play below and enjoy some excellent music performed by our twelve artists. To find out more about the artists featured and the overall Charitindie concept, read our previous article here.
‘Hi, I’m Count to Ten with Nobody, and you’re watching the Charitindie stream.’
After a brief introduction from Cayt, our first set was from Count to Ten with Nobody, who gave us a multi-angle experience courtesy of director Thomas Stavers. Count to Ten played some new songs from his forthcoming EP due later this year, plus ‘Home’ by Cavetown and the title track from Count to Ten’s ‘pretty boy’ EP.
“I’m gonna start with a song I wrote last year, it’s called ‘boys don’t cry’ and it’s about being someone else, and forgetting who you are, I think.”
Opening with his single ‘boys don’t cry’, Jeremy M welcomed us into his bedroom and played an all originals set. He wowed the chat room with his voice, with calls of collaborations from other Charitindie artists. Jeremy continued playing songs featured on his YouTube channel, explaining the roots of each track as he did so.
‘Thank you so much for showing up to support Charitindie, this is huge, I’m so glad we were able to pull it off!’
Piper Wildwood gave us a highly polished set of three songs taken from her debut album ‘reaching for the sun’. Coincidently, our livestream aired on the one-year anniversary of this album, and to celebrate, Piper put out a deluxe edition which also features her Charitindie set. There was particular love for Wildwood’s ‘catharsis’ in the chat room!
‘Seeing how the song isn’t out anywhere yet, it doesn’t even have a title, but I hope you like it. It’s a break-up song so, maybe that’s your vibe, I don’t know.’
Next up, Brianna Carmel brought a sense of punk through their ukulele and electric guitar, playing solo music which included ’19 v 23’ from their ‘Building Blocks’ EP, as well as an unreleased break-up song. Carmel was then joined by their bandmate Josiah Masteller from their other projects Little Tiny Knife and Blooming Heads to play a track from each band.
‘So, this last song is one that we always end live performances with, there’s no recorded version of it out in the wild as of yet, but, yeah, it’s based on a true story.’
Flynn of Beanie In The Bath wowed us with a set of acoustic songs (plus a little studio majick). They opened with their single ‘Company Policy’ plus two more songs from their second album ‘The chaos, the wild & the heart’. Flynn closed with an unreleased song called ‘I Once Saw Nick Knowles In Sainsburys’, garnering unanimous acclaim in the chat room for Flynn’s storytelling.
It was at this point where Charitindie 2023 broke through its donation goal of $100 towards The Trevor Project, before we were even halfway through! Thank you to everyone who donated to make that possible, we really appreciate it.
‘This next one I’m gonna play is not only unreleased, but it’s unfinished because it’s a little, very 50’s kind of inspired love song that I wrote on April 1st.’
Everyone’s favourite Uncle Emmington was our sixth performer on Charitindie 2023, whose shorter songs meant we got more songs from Em than any other performer on the livestream! Uncle played several cuts from their second album ‘Alphabet Soup’, plus maintaining professionality when a Discord notification threatened to derail the performance of an unreleased song. Emmington’s second unreleased song, ‘April Fools’ drew praise from the chat room - finish this song Em!
‘This next song, is just a song about a perfectly normal and ordinary and usual and regular commute.’
We had the pleasure of introducing the set of Tarquin Alexandra, who opened with their most well-known track ‘Symptoms Song’, before tackling the subject of autistic masking in ‘I Play Me Well’ and bringing on Intermission Tarquin to talk about The Trevor Project. It was Tarquin’s third song, ‘A Regular Commute’ that blew everyone away, inspired by a non-existent Taylor Swift song from a fake tracklist ahead of the ‘Lover’ album.
“It’s called ‘Waiting On The 180’, it’s about being disappointed by the people in your life.”
Following Tarquin’s set, Cayt introduced Scullin Bonez, the singer/songwriter from New Jersey who would play us a rendition of their unreleased song ‘Waiting On The 180’. The track has a heartfelt lyric that comes across in Bonez’ genuine vocal and they’ve hinted that they may well be releasing this one as the response in the chat room was a positive one!
Charitindie 2023 artists in the order they appeared. Top Row: Count to Ten with Nobody, (Charitindie logo by Katie McTigue based on an idea by Edward Woodley), Jeremy M, Piper Wildwood, Brianna Carmel, Beanie In The Bath and Uncle Emmington. Bottom Row: Tarquin Alexandra, Scullin Bonez, Delenn Jadzia, Cayt W, Pacing, (Moths and Giraffes logo by Richard Parson), and Copeland James.
“Ok! Second song on the list is my most popular song by a lot. It’s not my favourite song, but I am gonna play it anyway, this is ‘Isla Vista’, I hope you enjoy!”
Moths and Giraffes returned to the screen of Charitindie to introduce the set of poet Delenn Jadzia. Unfortunately due to a technical issue with Delenn’s submitted set, we were only able to stream their first two songs. But they began with a track they collaborated on with Piper Wildwood (although this was a solo rendition) of ‘Bittersweet’. Armed with a ukulele, Jadzia continued with their most well-known single ‘Isla Vista’ taken from their debut album ‘A Mad Experiment In Living’.
At the conclusion of Delenn’s set, Cayt announced that Charitindie had doubled its donation goal!
‘Without further ado, let me introduce to you the next artist. Somebody that is very close and personal to my heart, I wouldn’t be the person that I am without this artist, I wouldn’t be the musician that I am without this artist…’
What followed was the most epic introduction in our entire livestream. The Captain, The Pirate, a legend introducing a legend, Cayt W introduced the set of…Cayt W. They opened with the title track from their ‘Mandatory’ EP, then continued with the same release for ’56 Seconds’. By the divine gods of creative editing, Cayt brought on Tarquin Alexandra to perform their collaboration ‘Good Old Days’, splitting the screen down the middle so the viewer could see the harmonies in action. With so much to say as compère, Cayt was an artist of few words, returning with an acoustic guitar to perform their single ‘Heaviness’ and closing with an unreleased song called ‘Current In The Joints’.
‘Hey guys, I’m Pacing, and this is a song about plotting to murder Tony Soprano.’
There was much anticipation for the set of Pacing, whose work songwriter Katie McTigue had never performed to an audience before, online or otherwise. Luckily for us, Pacing played seven songs, including cuts from her debut album ‘hatemail’, the standalone single ‘June’, a track from her more recent EP ‘Snake Facts’ and her cover of ‘What If I Like It?’ from the ‘Pretty Filthy’ musical. Playing acoustic guitar throughout, Pacing even debuted a new soon-to-be-released song called ‘Bite Me’. We continue to hope for a Pacing world tour.
‘Thanks for tuning into the stream again guys, we’re supporting The Trevor Project today, so you can check out our donation links for that.’
Moths and Giraffes returned a final time to introduce Charitindie’s last act, Copeland James! Copeland had everyone in the chat room wanting to buy a keytar as they played their debut single ‘Restless In Rome’ on a soft electric piano setting. The other songs in their set, ‘Full-Body Mirror’ and ‘Glendora’ had their stories explained by Copeland, and although they are currently unreleased, we’re confident we’ll see studio recordings of them soon!
We want to thank everyone again for participating in Charitindie 2023. To the performers, spectators, donators and everyone who spread the word, we massively appreciate you. Our total raised on the stream for The Trevor Project was $255, so thank you for digging into your pockets and continuing to do so after the event, taking our current total to $320.
‘One of my main goals in music has always been to create a platform that nurtures and supports new artists. We’ve seen that here with artists like Count to Ten with Nobody, who is a real talent at the start of his career, and Pacing, who despite coming across so naturally during the livestream, has never performed live solo before. I’m so proud of how everyone performed, and proud of myself for finding a way to help these voices shine. I’m ecstatic to be able to do the same thing next year.’ – Cayt W
We have decided to make this an annual event! So we hope to be back next year with some new performers and familiar faces, and maybe we’ll even do something in between too. To audition for Charitindie 2024, please send us one of your original songs and a short bio to charitindie@gmail.com by Monday July 31st. We look forward to hearing from you!
‘Now that we know how well it can go, I think we can aim higher; more artists, a higher donation goal, hopefully a larger audience.’ – Cayt W
Charitindie logo by Katie McTigue, based on an idea by Edward Woodley.
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To watch the Charitindie 2023 replay, visit the Charitindie YouTube account.
To find out more about the artists who played Charitindie 2023, read our previous article here.
Read more about The Trevor Project on their official website.
Donate to The Trevor Project via our link, or give directly on their website above.
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