Gerry Paul's New Children's Video Clip Out Today! With An All Star Cast Of Musician's!

Well known in Wellington for his role as Festival Director of CubaDupa and currently a finalist in the 2021 Wellingtonian of the Year awards for his contribution to the Wellington arts scene, musician and songwriter Gerry Paul has been back in the studio recording some wacky and wonderful children’s songs with some of Wellington’s finest musicians.

Gerry, who has played music at over 500 festivals in 40 countries around the world with some of the top names in folk music, moved back to Aotearoa in 2012 and needing a change from life on the road, wrote and released a children’s book and song “Hank the Wrestling Shark”. The book went on to sell more than 4000 copies and the song won the Grand Prize in the John Lennon Songwriting Contest.

Ten years on and with a six year old daughter to critique his songs, Gerry went into Surgery Studios in June 2021 to record “a few ear-worms that had been going round my head for a while”. The first song “We All Got Bones” was written for the Natural History Museum of Ireland, while Gerry was writing and presenting for RTE, Ireland’s national television network.

“It’s a wee tune that says underneath it all, doesn’t matter if you’re big or small, we’ve all got the same old bones holding us up and we’re all subject to the same vulnerabilities. Of course it’s a bit less serious than that”.

Gerry has partnered up with 48 Hour Film Festival winners Couch Kumara and illustrator Nick Jones, to make a LO-FI, western style animation that has been funded by NZ on Air. Completing the “We All Got Bones” EP are the songs “If Everything Was Made of Chocolate” - something that every child dreams about - and “The Magic of the Circus”, which was composed for a circus themed Gardens Magic Show at Wellington’s Botanical Gardens a few years ago.

The band for the recording was made up with heavy hitter Riki Gooch on drums, indie-folk songwriter Finn Johansson on guitar and keys, Fly My Pretties bassist Aaron Stewart and Wellington session musician Ben Hunt on trumpet. Gerry called in the backing vocals of Emily Staveley-Taylor from UK based band The Staves, which has given the tracks continuity from his first album “Tales From the Sea & an Elephant Tree”. The tracks were mixed by Lee Prebble.

Gerry says “I am proud of these songs. They are musical and they are fun. That’s all that matters for kids - they have enough to think about these days…”.

Follow Gerry & his Wacky Tales - www.facebook.com/GerryPaulWackyTales

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