Comedy Therapist

Artwork for my first single, Everything is Fucked

This Is Bad Music

I’m currently a student at Sydney University, studying music & psychology. One of my subjects requires us to write a weekly blog post on that week’s lecture topic. Last week’s topic was “This Is Good Music”. For your enjoyment, and here is my post for this week’s topic:

Last week I argued that we listen to music because of the way it makes us feel, and that good music is music that makes us feel good. This week I’m changing teams to argue that there is such a thing as objectively bad music, using as an example my own first chart-bottoming single: Everything Is Fucked:

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By Graham Stoney, ago
Useless computer

The Top 10 Things That Really Piss Me Off About My New MacBook Pro 2019

I was a late adopter on the Apple bandwagon, holding out all through my first career as a computer engineer. I knew that Apple was cooler, but I was a nerd and didn’t want to pay the price of taking the plunge. Plus, I was into esoteric things like Linux and it ran best on an Intel platform, while Macs ran Motorola.

Much has changed since those days. Nowadays as a budding musician, I decided to get a bright shiny new MacBook Pro so that I could run Logic Pro like they do at college, and it isn’t available on Windows.

I paid top dollar and got the fastest model available with the fancy new Touch Bar, since I also want to do video editing in Final Cut Pro and don’t want to have to wait around. I compromised on the screen size because I want it to be easy to take to university with me next year, and to compensate for that I got a massive 32” 4K external screen which is great for working on complex songs with a zillion channels in Logic.

The lack of basic ethernet interface and video connecters is slightly inconvenient, obvious from the product description and relatively easily solved with an external multi-port adapter; so I’m only going to briefly complain about that here. I am going to complain at length about the following things I didn’t know about though: (more…)

By Graham Stoney, ago

Movin’ Out (Anthony’s Song) by Billy Joel

One of my favourite Billy Joel songs is Movin’ Out, also known as Anthony’s Song. For me, it’s about giving the flick to pleasing other people and setting my own direction in life. Last year I performed it on a grand piano with a group of fellow music students from Sydney TAFE at our end-of-year concert. Here’s the video:

If you want another live taste of this level of awesomeness, my final TAFE end-of-term concert is coming up at Foundry 616 in Harris St, Ultimo on November 28th. Click here for the details.… Continue reading…

By Graham Stoney, ago

Upcoming Gigs With Margot & Graham: Tomorrow and 16th November

Hey music lovers! Just wanted to let you know about two upcoming gigs I’m playing with Ms Margot tomorrow Sunday 3rd November 2019 at The Annandale Hotel and in two weeks on Saturday 16th November 2019 at Stanmore Music Festival. Click the links for details of each show.

Margot & Graham will be playing all original crowd-pleasers including:

  • Sushi Girl
  • Nothing Going Right
  • Technology
  • Normal She
  • Perfectionism
  • Everything Is Fucked

There will be a bunch of other great acts at each gig too, so come along and enjoy some quality live music.

Don’t forget to say “hi!”. Everyone who comes wearing an Everything Is Fucked Short-Sleeve Unisex T-Shirt or a This Is Not Your Office Passive-Aggressive Anti Mobile Phone Calls on Public Transport T-Shirt gets a free hug!… Continue reading…

By Graham Stoney, ago

10 Steps To Instant Confidence

You’ve probably come across plenty of fancy websites with slick videos offering you instant confidence in return for some of your hard earned cash. Skeptical? Don’t be! Just because you’ve struggled with anxiety and low self-esteem all your life is no reason to doubt those online testimonials claiming overnight success.

Why shouldn’t you be able to undo years of negative programming in an instant?

Don’t waste time and energy delving into negative beliefs, exploring your emotions in therapy, expanding your comfort zone, learning social skills or doing dicky things like public speaking, when you can have 100% Instant Confidence just by following these 10 fun, easy steps:

Be like this guy… Instantly!

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By Graham Stoney, ago

You Can Take Not Caring What Other People Think Too Far

Most of my life I’ve been plagued by the fear of what other people think of me manifesting as self-consciousness, social anxiety and fear of rejection. While this exaggerated fear can be really annoying, in moderation it turns out not to be an entirely bad thing.

A few weeks ago I started playing open mic nights with my new band The Sketch Artists. At our first gig in the inner west we met a guy who was a regular at the venue. Let’s call him Peter, because that was his name.

Peter seemed friendly and sociable, and soon joined my band-mates and I at our table while we waited to go on and perform. One of the first things that Peter said to us proudly was:

“I don’t care what other people think”. (more…)

By Graham Stoney, ago

My Worst Therapy Session Ever

I’ve had a lot of therapy in my time visiting counsellors, psychologists, psychiatrists, life coaches and emotional healing gurus. Most of them were helpful to some degree. If I were to have my time over again, I’d get help sooner like when I was a child and the other kids at school were bullying me or when parent’s arguments were frightening me and keeping me up at night.

I’m currently studying music performance full-time at a local secondary college and the environment feels a lot like going back to school; albeit one where the subjects are a lot more fun.

Last year I found myself getting into conflict with one of the other mature-age male students. He seemed like a decent enough guy but we started butting heads over some of his behaviour that I was finding triggering. He had some personal challenges that he complained about loudly and frequently in class which I didn’t want in my face all the time as we were there to study music. “Write songs about it and use it creatively”, I thought, “But don’t just keep coming in whining about it all the time”. I also didn’t like the way he interrupted and dominated conversations I was having with other people, or the way he back-slapped and touched me. (more…)

By Graham Stoney, ago

A Show About Anger

I performed A Show About Anger at The Dive Bar in the King’s Cross Hotel as part of the 2018 Sydney Fringe Festival. To set the context, it started with this monologue:

I grew up in a house where anger wasn’t handled well. Let me take you back there:

Now don’t get me wrong; my Mum lets her anger flow freely. But she rarely uses the actual words: “I am angry”. Instead, her anger comes out as hurtful criticism, put-downs and emotional bullying.

Dad isn’t any better. He bottles up his anger so badly that he often seethes with resentment so loudly that I can hear him muttering to himself when I’m playing in the next room. It’s frightening.

All it takes is for Mum to walk in and say: “What’s wrong with you? You stupid creature!”

And BANG… the next round of World War 3 is back on again.

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By Graham Stoney, ago