An introduction to Believe in Noise
What the hell I’m doing and why the hell I'm doing it.
Let’s shake hands
Let me extend my digital hand out to yours, introduce myself, let’s shake off the weird and figure out why we are all here. Well, mostly why I’m here typing into the dark mode void of the internet.
Firstly, I swear, I must have written and re written this introduction 10 times, trying to navigate the abstract element of who I’m writing to whilst simultaneously writing to no one. I have been constantly fighting the self conscious monologue, telling me I have nothing to say that anyone would listen to. That I’m gonna come across as a massive dick. Well, I’ve come to 2 conclusions.
I am writing this for myself.
Fuck what people think.
Who am I?
My name is Caine Hemmingway. I do extreme vocals and experimental noise in my band Believe in Nothing, who recently got signed to the awesome UK label Church Road Records. I am obsessed with music. Truly obsessed. I’m absolutely enamoured by the UK heavy music scene especially, mostly what would be regarded as the underground. I have recently moved away from my hometown of Eastbourne to Edinburgh. In the last 5 years, alongside some incredible people, I’ve helped grow a music scene and community from nothing in my hometown, under the umbrella of Eastbourne Music Collective. I’ve been promoting and organising gigs across the South East and now Scotland. I manage a sex shop. I have 3 cats and a beautiful fiancée up here in Edinburgh.
Here I am doing a gig, screaming a chain out my mouth at a horned skull.
Believe in Noise
My whole idea for this Substack is to document this period in my life. I want to document my experiences in Believe in Nothing, as candidly as possible. And I want to document all the incredible bands I’m either playing with or going to see. I see it all as a once in a lifetime experience, and I purely want to carve that into something I can look back on. A digital tome. If me sharing any of these experiences is helpful, informative, entertaining or makes anyone feel anything at all, that’s a real bonus.
Why Substack?
Well, as far as I can see, it’s where longer form writing gets a platform. In no way is instagram or Facebook an environment that is supportive of longer blocks of text, and honestly, it’s not a place I would ever want to put this stuff.
Paid subscriptions
Subscribing locks us in a room together, and silence would be awkward. All the gig reviews will be available for anyone to read, all the time. I’ll be figuring out the exact dynamics of what else I want to share for free.
Paid subscriptions do a couple of things, and it’s less so about financial gain. Firstly, only people who genuinely care enough to drop a few quid a month will be in the room, which to me is really important. I can only write in a sincere and candid way, the commitment paid subscribers show puts me at ease to be able to untether for people to read. Secondly, worth. I’ll be sharing a huge backlog of long form writing, and continuing to document as I go. I feel that’s worth more than nothing.
NOTAFLOF
All that being said, if someone is genuinely gutted they can’t afford the paid elements of Believe in Noise, drop me a message and I’ll give you a free subscription. No dickheads rule applies.
Thanks for taking the time to read.
Caine.
All photography by Len Court.