By Luke Voogt
Point Lonsdale’s Tex Miller hopes winning a Geelong music competition will help him burst onto the Australian blues scene.
The radio presenter and singer-songwriter won the chance to premier a music video at Geelong After Dark festival through the City’s Connecting Song competition.
“Music promotion doesn’t come cheap these days,” the 25-year-old said.
“It’s come at the right time – I’ve been looking to do a few promo pics and film clips.”
The only catch: he has just a month and a half to write a song about Point Lonsdale.
But Tex was undaunted by the challenge. He won a similar song-writing competition, Queenscliff Music Festival’s ‘Rip A Riff’, in 2010.
“You just have to put pen and paper together and make the magic happen,” he said.
Tex will work with mentor and prolific blues artist Tim Neal – who has shared stages with artists like Paul Kelly and The John Butler Trio.
“He’s worked with nearly everyone in the music industry in Australia,” Tex said.
“I love writing about the region, and I’m thoroughly looking forward to seeing what me and Tim can put together.”
Tex was surprised and honoured to be among the three winning artists in Geelong.
“There’s so much talent around the region,” he said.
“Geelong has an outstanding blues community with plenty of people to look up to for advice.”
He hopes the win will help him promote his second EP which he plans to launch in June.
“I’m really proud of it because it’s the best thing I’ve done,” he said.
The other winners, Ocean Grove pop singer Jeffrey Harwood and Geelong-born hip hop artist Shaun Fogarty, will also premier clips at After Dark.
They will collaborate respectively with rock singer Adalita and Trem One from hip hop outfit Lyrical Commision to create songs about their home suburbs.
Connecting Song is part of the City’s Mountain to Mouth – an 80km “extreme arts walk” featuring Geelong After Dark.
