About the project · Independent songwriting from Glasgow, Scotland
The Wee Glasgow Lad Behind the Lyrics
I'm a Glasgow lad who has spent decades writing lyrics. EntireEcho is my independent songwriting and music project, bringing original words, imagination and experiences into recorded music.
A Lifetime of Lyrics and Songwriting
For more than four decades, writing lyrics has been something I've done for my own enjoyment. I never expected it to lead anywhere. I simply loved putting words together, expressing my thoughts and imagination, and reading the finished lyrics back to myself.
My writing has always been personal in that sense. Sometimes it draws on things I've experienced; sometimes it comes from my imagination. As I write, I can feel the emotion behind an idea growing, and that feeling can push the lyrics further than I first expected.
EntireEcho — A Songwriting Timeline
Over 40 years of writing, from a Glasgow teenager with a notebook to the first live performance and recorded releases.
Key milestones
- Started writing lyrics at 15–16.
- Where the Heart Lies and other early songs.
- 279 catalogued songs, plus roughly 20–30 loose pieces.
- Around 250 additional lyrics written.
- Trust in Me written, 15:06–15:11.
- First live performance, at King Tut's.
- First single: Dance of Life.
- The Scream written, 01:53–01:56.
The story behind the dates
Writing for the love of it
I bought records from shops including HMV and, later, cheaper albums from Britannia Music. Seeing printed lyrics with some of those records made me curious. I tried writing alternative words to existing songs two or three times, then began writing my own lyrics independently.
Decades of private writing
Music and lyrics were a hobby I enjoyed alongside football, family life, raising my children and work. I'd write whenever I had the chance and keep the pages in folders, returning to them regularly. By August 2024, I had 279 songs on my list and another 20–30 pieces on separate sheets.
The first time my lyrics were performed
On 22 August 2026, I wrote Trust in Me in five minutes for young musician Sam Baird. Sam wrote the music, creating an excellent tune and shaping it carefully around my lyrics. He kept my original words unchanged, but shaped two choruses by bringing in two lines from a verse. He made the words work beautifully as a complete song. On 30 August, he performed it at King Tut's Wah Wah Hut in Glasgow to a standing ovation. It was the first time I had heard anyone sing my lyrics live.
Sharing the music
Dance of Life became my first official release on 22 September 2026. I'm learning the music industry as I go, bringing my original words and musical ideas to life through collaborations and AI-assisted production, across many genres.
My songs cover different stages of my life. Where the Heart Lies was written around age 22; Dance of Life was written roughly 35–37 years before its release. Some lyrics have stayed exactly as I wrote them years ago, while others are new. The words are part of the history, and listeners are welcome to find their own meanings in them.
From Handwritten Lyrics to Recorded Music
One of those songs is Dance of Life, inspired by Edvard Munch's painting The Dance of Life. I wrote the lyrics approximately 35–37 years before their release, after I had left school. The exact writing date is uncertain. The words stayed with me for decades before I brought them into Suno on 10 September 2026 and began turning the original idea into a recorded song.
Dance of Life was released as an EntireEcho single on 22 September 2026 through EntireBeats. The original lyric sheet shows where that journey began: with an idea on paper, long before it became a recording.
As life moved on, my football career, marriage, children and other responsibilities took centre stage. I continued writing from time to time, keeping my handwritten lyrics in a folder and occasionally returning to them. For years, I was writing for myself, with no particular destination in mind. EntireEcho has given me a way to explore what those lyrics can become as recorded music.
The catalogue is growing, but the love of writing remains where it began. What has changed is the opportunity to share it.
Exploring Music Through Technology
My songwriting has always started with ideas, but AI music technology has opened up new ways for me to explore what those ideas can become.
I don't simply put lyrics into a music tool and accept whatever comes back. I experiment with different musical styles, sounds, arrangements and vocal deliveries, gradually learning how to direct the results towards what I hear in my head.
Sometimes I might imagine a particular type of backing vocal: a deep voice sitting quietly in the background, gradually fading away, or backing singers entering at a specific point in the song. I might want them to appear halfway through a section, only to discover that an earlier or later entrance works even better. Those unexpected results can take a song in a direction I hadn't originally considered.
The same approach applies to the music itself. I experiment with tempos, basslines, keyboards, pianos, percussion and individual sounds. I might add something, listen carefully, take it away and discover that the song loses something without it. Each experiment teaches me more about how the different elements work together.
Sometimes an idea works immediately. Other times, it takes repeated attempts and adjustments before I get close to the sound I'm looking for. With my song Did Yeh, Aye?, for example, I spent considerable time experimenting with the vocal delivery to capture the character of a Glasgow expression. It took many versions and a fair amount of trial and error before I found a result that made me happy.
Music has always been much more than something I simply listen to. Growing up, I was fascinated by the way sounds, melodies, instruments and atmosphere could change the entire feeling of a song.
During the 1990s and into the 2000s, I loved the nightclub scene, particularly the energy of house and dance music. The beat could transform everything. A change in rhythm, a new bassline or a different sound entering the arrangement could lift the whole room and change how everyone danced.
That appreciation of music has stayed with me throughout my life. What modern technology has given me is the opportunity to explore those sounds myself, experiment with arrangements and vocal deliveries, and bring my own songwriting ideas closer to what I imagine. I am still learning how to use the tools and techniques, but my connection with sound goes back much further.
Building Our Own Lyric Video System
The creative journey now extends beyond recorded music. I'm developing and building my own lyric-video system to bring the words onto the screen in time with the music, helping visitors and subscribers engage more closely with the lyrics.
I want listeners to discover the stories and emotions behind the songs while being free to form their own interpretations. They might understand a song exactly as I intended, discover an entirely different meaning, or simply enjoy the experience without looking for a particular message. Every response is welcome. That's part of what makes music personal.
The system is still being developed, and I've already begun sharing lyric videos.
The technology provides the tools, but the ideas, the experimentation and the decisions about what works are part of my creative process.
Original Lyrics: A No Hope Situation
A No Hope Situation connects with the uncertainty faced by young people in working-class Glasgow during the 1980s. Finding work and imagining a secure future could be difficult amid unemployment, economic hardship and the political climate of the Thatcher years. The poll tax, introduced in Scotland in 1989, is part of the wider historical context of that period.
The original handwritten lyrics preserve the song at its starting point. They offer a way to explore the ideas and feelings behind it, while the recording lets listeners bring their own experiences and interpretations to the words.
More Than Listening
EntireEcho gives me the opportunity to explore my lyrics, imagination and experiences through recorded music and share them with listeners.
I want people to immerse themselves in both the words and the music. Some listeners may recognise the story I had in mind; others may connect the lyrics to their own events, memories or feelings. A song can mean one thing to the person who wrote it and something entirely different to the person listening.
I would love people to talk about the songs, share the feelings they bring out, discuss what they think the lyrics mean and exchange their own interpretations. I want the music to be thought-provoking, to raise questions and to leave people with something to consider after the song has finished.
I want EntireEcho to be more than a place to listen to music. I want it to be a place where the words, the music and the feelings behind them give people something to think about — and something to talk about.
An Independent Scottish Music Project
EntireEcho is an independent songwriting and music project from Glasgow, Scotland. It brings together original lyrics, musical ideas, recorded songs and creative production, with musicians and AI-assisted tools used where they help bring a song idea to life.
The project continues to grow as older lyrics are revisited and new ideas become songs. The aim is to share the work, invite listeners into the stories behind it and give each song room to mean something different to the people who hear it.