Sandi Thom

Thom's website states that "the idea ... popped into her head" after her car broke down travelling from a gig in York (on the 22nd) to one in Wales (on the 23rd) and following the very first live webcast she did at a gig in Edinburgh organized by her PR manager, Paul Boyd from Polar Flame Music.

Alexandria "Sandi" Thom (born 11 August 1981) is a Scottish singer-songwriter and multi-instrumentalist from Banff, Scotland.

In 2003, Thom graduated from LIPA with a BA in Performing Arts.

Thom has assisted many charity appeals for Oxfam's work in Malawi and across east Africa.

In 2004, Thom moved to London to pursue her songwriting career, working with three co-writers: Jake Field, Duncan Thompson and Tom Gilbert.

Thom signed to Windswept Pacific Music in 2005, an independent music publishing company, and its UK arm, P&P Songs, and received £25,000.

She signed a record contract with the record label Viking Legacy, where her mother was director, who released her début single, "I Wish I Was a Punk Rocker (With Flowers in My Hair)" in late 2005.

The song failed to garner major airplay or sales and release of her début was delayed.

21 Nights from Tooting was a "tour" consisting of 21 performances from the basement of her Tooting flat, from 24 February to 16 March.

These were recorded and then webcast by professional hosting company Streaming Tank.

Tickets were sold, but the venue had a capacity of "six people" ("10 including the band").

The MySpace post announcing the gigs was posted in the early hours of 22 February.

Thom's first video webcast was at the Edinburgh Left Bank venue in October 2005.

Prompted by a contact from Thom's manager's Ian Brown, news services noted Thom's promotion efforts.

Her management and music PR team, Quite Great Communications and Polar Flame Music UK, claim to have conducted a large publicity campaign, including a million "virtual flyers" (unsolicited emails).

She became widely known in 2006 after her debut single, "I Wish I Was a Punk Rocker (With Flowers in My Hair)", topped the UK Singles Chart in June of that year, as well as in Australia and Ireland.

The single became the biggest-selling single of 2006 in Australia, where it spent ten weeks at the top of the ARIA Singles Chart.

Thom has released six studio albums throughout her career, Smile... It Confuses People (2006), The Pink & the Lily (2008), Merchants and Thieves (2010), Flesh and Blood (2012), The Covers Collection (2013), and Ghosts (2019).

Thom was born in Banff.

She attended Robert Gordon's College in Aberdeen.

Thom spent three years playing piano and singing in a band from Gourdon in Aberdeenshire, called The Residents.

Thom became the youngest student ever to be accepted at the prestigious Liverpool Institute for Performing Arts (LIPA).

In a story first published in March 2006, The Sunday Times ran a piece.

This was quickly reported on by other news sources.

It was claimed that the audience for the first day was around 60 or 70, before rising to 70,000.

A Reuters story the same month mentioned that "I Wish I Was a Punk Rocker" was being re-released the following week, with the album following in April.

The publicity surrounding the tour led to major label interest, with music label representatives attending the gigs in question, and the release of the records was put back until a deal was signed.

Craig Logan, the managing director of RCA Records UK, said that the label was "drawn to" Thom after hearing of the webcasting, as has Thom herself.

Thom subsequently accepted an offer by RCA, which led to the single re-release being delayed until May, when it was released via the major label.

The news of this broke on 3 April 2006, the official signing itself being webcast.

The single was placed on Music Week Daily's playlist that day.

Paul Kelly of The Independent and others have questioned how Thom was able to sustain production of the webcast, and its viewership figures, and noted that internet traffic monitors such as Alexa and Technorati show no unusual surge of interest in Thom until she began to be covered by mainstream media.

Following her online webcast concerts from her basement in Tooting, and accompanied by increasing airplay exposure, "I Wish I Was a Punk Rocker" was re-released on 22 May 2006 by RCA Records UK and debuted at number 1 on the UK Singles Chart.

Thom performed on Top of the Pops, making her major terrestrial television début, and in June the song reached number one on the singles chart.

The song was later nominated at the Brit Awards for Best British Single.

In the Republic of Ireland, "I Wish I Was a Punk Rocker" also reached number one, and in Australia, it was number one for ten consecutive weeks, becoming Australia's highest selling single of 2006.

Thom's début album, Smile... It Confuses People was released in the United Kingdom the same month and débuted at number one on the UK Albums Chart, eventually selling over one million copies worldwide.

The follow-up single "What If I'm Right" reached the lower reaches of the charts, but "Lonely Girl", the third single from the album, failed to enter any charts.

In May 2008, Thom released her second album, The Pink & the Lily, preceded by the first single, "The Devil's Beat".

Before the release, journalists were doubtful about its appeal.