The First Time I Heard My Own Record In A Club

There’s a strange moment that happens to many artists the first time they hear their own music played in public.

For years, you’ve imagined it - you picture euphoria, validation, perhaps even a sense of arrival. Yet when the moment finally comes, the reality can be something entirely different.

My latest Substack essay, The First Time I Heard My Own Record In A Club, revisits the night The Chemical Brothers played one of my records for the first time, and the unexpected reaction it triggered.

Rather than celebration, all I could hear were the mistakes.

The piece explores perfectionism, self-criticism, and the often complicated relationship artists have with their own work. It is also a reflection on how our perception of music changes once we become the people making it.