Inspire is the new book by Pete K Mally, a man of many talents, including life coach, author, festival compere and radio presenter. Being an avid music fan and working with so many musical artists puts him in the unique position of being able to write this book.
Inspire explores the idea of “making it” and finding inspiration. While specifically focussing on music, a lot of the advice in the book could be used by people trying to make it in other creative industries too.
As well as using examples of how he finds inspiration, Pete uses interviews with a range of people who have made it. These include Ricky Warwick (Thin Lizzy/Black Star Riders) Nathan James (Inglorious) Verity White, Karly Jewell, Brad Marr (Massive) and Myke Gray.
While each of the artists interviewed share what motivates them and pushes them to keep creating music, regardless of any monetary reward, the author also shares his own musical motivations and memories, and ways of keeping away feelings of negativity. My personal favourite was a method he calls anchoring, which you can read more about in the book, but involves setting up a playlist of songs connected to certain memories (happy ones) to listen to whenever you start feeling down.
The advice offered in this book is useful for those looking to make it in a creative industry, although making it doesn’t necessarily mean becoming rich and famous. Instead, the message is more about creating and preforming/sharing your work with an audience. As a bonus, fans of the artists interviewed will be interested in reading their responses.
As the title suggests, the book is intended to inspire, and it does exactly that.
Inspire is out now and can be purchased here.
Review by Amanda Steel, the co-host of Reading in Bed on Anchor, and the author of Ghost of Me, which was a top 10 finalist in the 2020 Author Elite Awards.
petekmally.co.uk