Simone Gison was born in Naples (Italy) in 1991.
He starts playing the guitar at the age of 12, insipired by rock bands from the 60s and the 70s such as Pink Floyd, Led Zeppelin, Rush and Genesis. After years of experience in several bands and different styles, he decides to devote to Progressive Rock and in 2015 he publishes his first self produced EP, Circle. His style is characterized by a strong experimentation of different sounds, that combine sounds of the past with sounds of our days.
In 2014 he founds Italian Guitar Tube, an Italian site about music gear and indipendent music.
At the moment Simone is occupied in his solo project and as guitarist for the indie rock band, The Unplugged.
Exposed Vocals: How did you hear about Exposed Vocals? What made you decide to sign up?
Simone Gison: I heard about Exposed Vocals through Twitter. I decided to sign up and leave them an interview because it is one of the few existing sites that give emerging musicians the chance to be discovered by different people around the web.
Exposed Vocals: So tell us your story. Where did you grow up? What made you decide to become an artist?
Simone Gison: I grew up in Naples (Italy). I have had a huge passion for music since I was a kid and at the age of 11 my mother gave me my very first guitar. To be honest I have never decided to become an artist – I just got to the point where only listening to music wasn’t enough anymore to me. I felt the need to creating something mine and becoming part of the game.
Exposed Vocals: How did you come up with that name? What was your inspiration behind it?
Simone Gison: It is just my real name. I’ve never felt the need to give myself an artistic one, since I am kinda comfortable with mine.
Exposed Vocals: What do you think about online music sharing? Do you ever give your music away for free? Why?
Simone Gison: Online music sharing nowadays is indispensable, since it is the best way to promote your music. In general I am kinda against giving away your music for free: producing music can be expensive, even when you self-produce your work, since you need several tools and knowledge about softwares and recording. But it’s also true that an emerging artist who needs to be known around has to divulge his music for free (realistically who would ever spend 20$ or more on an unkown musician’s album?), at least at the very beginning of his career.
Exposed Vocals: Since everyone was a start-up once, can you give any smaller or local bands or artists looking to get gigs and airplay some tips?
Simone Gison: Actually I don’t have much advice to give about that subject, but I do believe that in music you never have to take yourself way too much seriously. You don’t have to think that music is a job and how many money you can make out of your gigs: you just gotta think about producing good music that fills yourself with huge satisfaction. I think that the best tip I can give someone is to share your ideas with different people and put in every single work you do always different influences and musically enrich yourself day by day listening to a lot of music.
Exposed Vocals: Do you ever make mistakes during performances? How do you handle that?
Simone Gison: Of course I make mistakes during my performances, I am human, any different would be just strange. I don’t do anything in particular, I just try to keep on playing without others understanding it – most of the times audience won’t even notice it.
Exposed Vocals: Do you tour? Anything interesting happen on tour that you think our readers would enjoy hearing about?
Simone Gison: At the moment I’m not on tour, but I’ve got a funny story to tell from an old tour I made with my historical band, The Unplugged. We were in Vienna and I was outside of the club we were going to play that night and I was tuning my guitar. Not so far from where I was sitting, there was a dog, a huge dobermann with his owner.. maybe it didn’t like so much the sound of my out of tune guitar, so it decided to chase me for all the street to stop me. It was kinda traumatic for me, but I bet it was a lot of fun for my band mates and people around to see me running around Vienna with my guitar in my hand and an enormous dog behind me!
Exposed Vocals: Where do you usually gather songwriting inspiration? What is your usual songwriting process?
Simone Gison: Usually I try to tell a story with my music. My works are mainly conceptual albums. Contents usually come up tu my mind alone while I play – usually I just play a lot of different chords and they inspire me different atmospheres that make me think about something. When I create a song I usually start from the structure: having a specific and well defined structure to make the song move is crucial. Then I work on arrangement and sound. It is important to create something that can enter into people’s head and I think it’s essential to work as much as I can to get the exact sound that flows in my head.
Exposed Vocals: Do you have a band website? What online platforms do you use to share your music?
Simone Gison: You can follow my artist page on facebook.com/simone.gison.music, but I also use Twitter:twitter.com/SimoneGison, Bandcamp: simonegison.bandcamp.com and Soundcloud: soundcloud.com/simonegison and Youtube to promote my music.
Exposed Vocals: What are some really embarrassing songs that we might find on your mp3 player?
Simone Gison: I don’t have an mp3 player, but I have a massive vinyl record collection. I prefer the sound of vinyl compared to mp3.
In my collection there is a record of a Neapolitan ironic band they called “Squallor” this for many people might be embarassing, but for me it’s just funny.
Exposed Vocals: If you were given half a million dollars and a year off, what would you do? How would you spend it?
Simone Gison: Maybe I would spend all the money in a guitar shop. I love vintage guitars and bass guitars, especially Fender Stratocasters from late 50s and early 60s. I’d probably end up buying a pair of them and of course a Gibson Les Paul ’59.
Exposed Vocals: Any planned studio upgrades? What are you working with now?
Simone Gison: I’m working with Reaper 4.57 , It’s a good software and on internet you can find tons of open source plugins, but I need something more, maybe a new Apple laptop with Logic Pro X.
Exposed Vocals: How do you find ways to promote your music? What works best for you?
Simone Gison: I do believe that live music is the best way to promote your music; you gotta bring it everywhere you get the chance to. I also think that it’s good to produce physical copies of your albums: many people don’t like digital music. And then of course you never have to disregard internet and social networks, since they are the main source of promotion nowadays.
Exposed Vocals: If you could perform anywhere and with any artists (Dead or Alive) where and who would it be with? Why?
Simone Gison: Of course it would be with Pink Floyd: if it wasn’t for them I wouldn’t be who I am now, as a musician but also as a person. I think that their music anc scenography is just perfect. I’d really love to make a show like one of theirs, with tons of lights, effects of every kind, flying pigs and crashing airplanes. I felt striked after seeing Roger Waters live in Rome, but I’d love to play at the Royal Albert Hall.
Exposed Vocals: So, what’s next? Any new upcoming projects that you want to talk about?
Simone Gison: At the moment I am working on my next EP, that I’ll call metempsychosis. It will be a concept work about reincarnation. In this new project I’ll also have many musicians that will work with me, such as Mauro Mondiello at the drums, Alessia Mauriello at the voice and Flavio Tulino at rhythmic and acoustic guitar. Hopefully I’ll release it at the end of 2015 or at the beginning of 2016, we have to wait and see.
Exposed Vocals: If you weren’t making music, what would you be doing?
Simone Gison: To be honest I don’t know, since I never think about that. I can say that when I don’t play the guitar I study computer science and I work as webmaster and reviewer for my site, Italian Guitar Tube.
Exposed Vocals: Do you remember buying your first album? Who was it? What was going through your head?
Simone Gison: The first album I have ever bought was Led Zeppelin IV when I was 15. I love them and when I bought it I thought it was the best album of the whole history of rock music. Ten minutes later I decided that one album wasn’t enough, so I came back to the shop, and bought Dark Side Of The Moon.
Exposed Vocals: How do you juggle the rest of your responsibilities while trying to stay ahead in your music life?
Simone Gison: I just try and organize everything in order to make the various tasks coincide, trying to give the best in everything I do and giving the right space to everything.
Exposed Vocals: What should fans look forward to in 2015?
Simone Gison: I’ll try and play live as much as I can. I am also organizing videos and photo sets, all directed by Immacolata Melillo, a young Neapolitan artist who has been working with me for the last year; she’s the one who created graphics for my social networks and also the one who created the artwork for my first EP, Circle.
