sorry to be the harbinger of bad news but no one really knows if anyone has what it takes to make it, even A&R guys are taking huge risks everytime they sign someone and they don't sign people solely on the basis that they thinkt hey've got "it"

your best bet to do somethign with music is to do covers. you might scoff at it now but you tend to find that the people who are more inclined to go out and make a living doing covers are the ones who have did the original thing for a while around a decent scene and found out that the dream is much much nicer than the reality.

I'm only a year older than you, by time I was 18 i'd done pretty much anything an unsigned artist could do up here and alot more in a great scene with a great band and "could" have gone onto more theoretically and even now I don't see it as giving up the dream. as i said, the dream and the reality are two different things. doing your ownt hing and havign people respond is great but all the stress and crap it involves seriously detracts from it.

be realistic. london is mad expensive for rent and living and you won't be the 1st or last musician who's went down there to find fame and fortune only to be slapped with a nice hard reality check. whats up with staying in newcastle and try n get a shit hot band going up there?

it's better to be a big fish in a small pond than a small fish in a massive pond.... one of the reasons we done so well was because even in a busy scene liek glasgow, we still stood out for varius reasons, in london we would just have been another good band slogging away at it....