The Vocalist side of me:

For those who don't know me I will give you a brief insight into who I am and what I do for a living. I was born in Glasgow many. many years ago and my real name is Stevie Gilroy, the name Max Taylor came from my 2 son's names Taylor the eldest and Max three years younger and I might add it was not for any dubious reasons, I just thought it would be cool to have a stage name as my own is kinda nothingish really.

so,....... as a vocalist I sing in many styles including - Country, Pop'ish, Swing, some Rock'n'Roll, Reggae, Irish ballads and party songs (not 'tunes', as 'tunes' means something totally different in Glasgow). I also sing the American standards and even the odd Spanish, Portuguese and Italian opera. My work is always well accepted by audiences in any country I am working in which may be down to the simple fact I like hearing myself singing. That's one of the reasons karaoke is a torturous time for me when ever I choose to present one. I was never good at suffering other people's attempt at singing - kinda rotten I know but I am being more honest this year. "When your work speaks for itself, never interrupt"  don't know who said that but I like it.

In closing this wee part - I sing many styles, extremely well, and get my kicks from audiences enjoying it.

The Musician side of me:

It's all explained here. At around 13 or 14 I started to learn guitar because I saw my older brother Andrew's brand new Rickenbacker and thought what a brilliant looking thing so asked for my first guitar. Money being tight in those days my old man Charlie and Andrew went 'up to Glasgow' and they managed to get a hold of an old Antoria acoustic and brought it home and voila, my music career could be beginning now if I worked hard enough at it. I obviously did and carried on.

At around 16 I was taken to a Feis (Irish dancing competition) which was being held in Glasgow and my cousin Paul was competing at it. There was one guy on stage playing a fiddle and again, I was dumbfounded by his sheer genius. This music was all fiery and stirring and at my age I had no idea what it meant. I started learning violin at school but soon became uninterested in reading notes - it was too slow for me, I wasn't getting quick enough results so I gave up on it. The music though, I had to learn what it was and why it was different from Scottish music. It wasn't really that different, the only thing I can put my finger on is Scottish music had no decent role models. The ones on telly were kinda arsey nuisances coming on TV. with the kilts and tartan shit and knowing what I know now we did have proper musicians but they were always considered just background people and never got the chance to shine. We have great Scottish musos now and singers producing wonderful material.

That is how I got into the Irish music and I now wanted a mandolin as it was the same tuning as the fiddle and the tenor banjo. I studied mandolin and tenor banjo at the same time and just loved it. Playing by 'ear' (not reading the notes) is kinda long winded but the results are continually progressing at a nice pace, so that's how I got into the music side of my life. The singing came from messing around with my brother David's bass guitar. and discovered I had to have something else going on or it was a kinda crappy sound so I would sing along to Everly brothers LPs - yes, LPs.

From that I thought I could actually sing a bit so started looking for 'bass player with vocals' jobs in bands. I was in a few and formed a few of my own with some great musicians from my area. I always wanted to go it alone and just couldn't get the backing tracks and unlike Ireland, sitting playing just a guitar was not an option for Scotland. It would never be acceptable. Computer technology was not too great at this point and software for producing backing tracks had not been created but, it was eventually so I now make most of my backing tracks that I use on stage. Playing by ear did pay off for me as I know what I like in particular songs so I program the nice bits in. Probably totally pointless for the listener but I know the bits are there.

For the past eight years or so I've been working in the biggest Irish pub in Portugal - Erin's Isle in Montechoro. The years have been getting more difficult for the trade and the season is getting shorter so I will have to get more work and just come here for this particular job and fly out again. I managed to get through four months of the worst winter of 2009 and came back just as it started to thaw out and you know, it wasn't too bad being home for that amount of time. I went home for a job that turned out to be a shambles of an operation with a total lack of leadership, interest or enthusiasm but, hey ho! - shit happenz, and now I'm back, back in the new max groove, so let's see what this year brings.