Second album release from Lisburn musician

Paul, who grew up in Finaghy, is a past pupil of Friend’s School Lisburn, has been playing the guitar since a young age and decided last year to release his first CD, entitled ‘Ride The Wind’. This was followed this year by ‘Robinsons’ and, with over 100 songs written and recorded, another two albums are already in the pipeline.

Paul’s father bought him his first bass guitar for his fourteenth birthday along with a homemade amplifier. Two years later he was playing with a professional band, The Method. After re-sitting two failed ‘O’ Levels he was allowed to leave school and his musical journey began. It was whilst with The Method that he supported The Who, The Searchers and they once stood in at short notice for The Cream.

During the 1970’s Paul moved to Tralee, Kerry, where he played with Stagalee. Next stop was Dublin where he joined Homegrown. Itchy feet took him Guernsey with a group of friends. Whilst there he learnt to play acoustic guitar and started writing his own songs.

He then moved to London and played in folk clubs as a singer / song writer. When he returned to his parents’ home in Lisburn he was asked by Tiger Taylor to join his new band, The Tigers. After The Tigers broke up Paul got a telephone call from Cahir O’Docherty offering him a job in Dublin with The Dazzle Band. He returned to Lisburn when the band later broke up.

Marriage and children during the early 1980’s settled him down and he moved into IT, where he became a manager and then a consultant. He continued song writing and bought his first virtual recording studio. Paul later met up with a husband and wife team from Antrim, The Vizit. They played in pubs and began recording together. Ray also did a lot of sketches to go with the songs Paul wrote and these are being used for the artwork on the CDs.

It was after the split with The Vizit that Paul started working with Komodo Recordings from Hillsborough on some of his earlier songs. He bought himself a more sophisticated virtual recording studio and spent his spare time recording in between working and family life. He now has over 100 songs written and recorded.

His daughter is married and settled in Lisburn. His son, who lives at home with his mum in Larne, also plays and teaches guitar. In 2009 Paul moved to Orkney where he has turned his dream into a reality. With two CD’s already produced, ‘Ride the Wind’ and ‘Robinsons’, there are two others due to be released later this year. As there is an artist with the same name, he picked the name Solmar from the title of one of his songs.

When Paul decided to finally produce his CD’s he decide to use Komodo Recordngs in Hillsborough again. The quality of the finished product created by them has allowed Solmar to upload his songs using Tunecore.com to Amazon, iTunes and Spotify.