Hyperfocusing on my spring releases, still. Been fine-tuning track orders and what goes where. Also lots of detailing. All currently remaining to do list items are green, so not super important, but since I have time, I can indulge.

Damn it, now I'm sweating and need to go take a poop. I've noticed before that some types of metal tend to stimulate my ass neurons. Could also have been the strawberries, though.

När jordgubbarna har möglat är det dags att inse att sommaren är över.

Today, I was in the mood for this (now, in my collection of purchases to honour the day): inoculation-maggotstomp.bandcamp.com/album/actual... Raw, untamed energy up in this maðurfakkur; time to wake up. Also, when you can't read the band name, you know it has to be good.

- What are you doing? You can't spread butter on carrots! No? Watch me! . . . Oh, you actually can't spread butter on carrots; It just isn't sticking properly. Not on the cut area of a raw carrot, anyway.

I'm pouring everything I have into my next release. So much in fact that I don't do much else. My mind is occupied, my body is feeding off of my soul. If there was a pill called "dinner", I would take it.

Don't press Ctrl+S Ctrl+W... just sayin'... for no particular reason...

Something of which I keep reminding myself is that whenever I make a theme longer or more complex, I'm meant to include the shorter or simpler version first... Exceptions exist, I'm sure, but it usually works out nicely.

And another now has full lyrics plus purely instrumental parts. That's how it started before I cut it down, bit by bit, because I worried it would be considered too long. It's my little operetta now with music and theatrics and spoken lines that sound almost like singing.

Stairs are great on so many levels...

I like stairs. That's probably my most specific interest. I don't necessarily know a lot about stairs, I just like them: I like finding them, I like looking at them, I like walking them, I like thinking about them. Not so much indoor stairs, though, those are kind of boring.

I'm letting go of all fears, going all in, committing to my original vision, etc... so now, a few tracks I worried about earlier are now as long as they need to be. There's especially one that always felt like it needed to continue from where I cut it, but now it's twice as long again.

After substantial updates, I'm tempted once again to release everything from my work in progress in one big drukqs (i.e. one big chunk). While different enough to be released separately, the three parts involved are also similar enough to work together.

I woke up and there's a faint humming, as if from some huge machinery, coming from outside. I'm guessing it's from the construction site across the street—although at 2 am? That's some crazy overtime.

I've been making some kind of music for the last twenty years as a hobby and enjoy it, but it's only recently, like the last two years, I got into maybe trying to spread some of what I make. The positive side of it is that I found it to be a good motivation to put in the hours on a regular basis.

First, Bandcamp gets acquired by Epic, then Epic sells them to Songtradr, and now this‽ All this "business as usual" makes me feel like I matter even less. Wherever I go, I'm just a cog in someone else's money-making machinery.

I still haven't heard anything from Bandcamp about the switch to Stripe. I didn't even know about it until I happened to see posts about it here from other users. I also don't know any details about why. Shouldn't Bandcamp be a little more transparent about such a big change‽

Another similar track didn't make it. The 1st half was kind of boring, except that it was evolving nicely into the 2nd half, which was wilder, but also constantly sounded like it was just about to end—aaany second now. So, a 3-minute intro, no main part, and then, a 3-minute finale.

I was about to archive a track before I finally realized for sure that it actually is a _danceable_ offense. Like just close your eyes and let your body do the rest. Shut off your brain for a bit. Don't worry about looking cool or anything; everyone's there for the music anyway—just like you.

I've noticed an unusually large amount of DJ tutorials on YouTube lately; is the universe trying to tell me something or are those just happen to be trending right now? With my on-going big project soon ending, I've been meaning to get learning new things. The list is already pretty long, though.

I have to admit there was a time when I thought "not even republicans could like that fascist dictator wannabe knobhead", but obviously I was wrong. Looking at it from the outside, I thought that weird clown could never win... damn it, but okay, mistakes were made; he could never win _again_, right‽

I almost skipped a tune I've been working on for a long time, but then instead replaced it with an updated version from two years ago, effectively cancelling the twenty versions that came after it... This happens sometimes; I over-edit things and lose track of the original vibe.

Yesterday, I learned about "Composers' Desktop Project" and today I started watching tutorials about SoundThread (a GUI wrapper for CDP). In short, CDP is a commandline tool for editing wave files in some pretty non-standard ways. Allegedly, AFX used it for drukqs.

Today, I watched a video about tuba mutes, i.e. a big ass cone you put in your big ass tuba to dampen the sound. I don't own a tuba. I'm actually pretty far from owning a tuba. I got curious while using Reason's built-in tuba samples.

Any genuine piece of art you sense is the result of hard work. Any masterpiece is the result of years of training—and probably years of sucking too (which is totally fine). Art doesn't magically appear—even if some might want it to.

Talent is overrated; if you don't put in the work, you won't get anywhere. Whatever predisposition you might have is just the first step on a long journey. Don't expect a masterpiece—or even something passable—on the first try; it takes time and learning and practise and sacrifice. A lot of it.

"I'm only happy when it rains" The person feels only one type of emotion while it's raining, which is happy—not angry, not sad, not confused, just happy. If they weren't happy before, they become happy the second it starts raining, but they could also be happy when it's not raining.

5 tracks (out of 25) are still resisting being named, so my plan right now is to fall asleep on the sofa (not inside it), while listening to each on repeat, and then, whatever I dream about becomes the title.

All my music on Bandcamp is handcrafted note per note—with one exception: I was experimenting with algorithmical remixes of some of my previous releases, using a programming language for music called ChucK. Being all automated, I made it free: maskinkultur.bandcamp.com/album/avibes

Should I let any of this stop me, though? Probably not, so let's start simple with something from my bandcamp wishlist (I'll try to keep it up until I run out of wishlist):

I could definitely write more about music made by others than I'm doing right now. When I don't work on my own, I tend to listen to different types of static or put earplugs in to let my ears rest. There's also getting told my recommendations don't count, so I don't want to do it halfheartedly.

I'm going through archived tunes again; this time it's stuff I made during the last six years: 75 tunes in total, with many being variations of each other, early prototypes, or other tests.

My cover art might look a bit crap, but at least I made that crap myself, using GIMP, Inkscape, and photos I've taken during the last decade or two. There are a few covers I'm more happy with than others:

Hur vet man var berget börjar?

One of the tune titles on my last release was inspired by the poetry of Bruno K. Öijer.

Reduced a lot today, so much in fact that, in the end, not much was left, but then I started building it back up again and just got done. The tune sure sounds different now, but I think the essence of it is still in there and it definitely is a lot cleaner.

I was just going to tweak a short part, but instead I made a new tune out of it. That often means that the old tune doesn't really need any more tweaking. "It doesn't need, it wants."

This one particular tune is almost a proper genre now, like progressive... tech... trance... house... yeah, progressive techtrancehouse, of course.

Four extra tracks from the ancient archives, so currently 8 + 6 + 5 split into three releases: the artsy diversity, the silly brass party, and the wild stuff.

Getting goosebumps from my own music may seem a bit self-indulgent, but eh. I had just ended a long inspired session, building on the old, but also injecting some of modern day me into this one tune a much younger me started, but never finished. Then, I sat back and just listened...

Having basically finished everything else, I'm now focusing on the few extra tunes from the ancient archives. Especially one of them is starting to shape up pretty good; been working on it today since early morning into late afternoon.

Today, I have listened to abandoned tunes never before released from maybe 10, 15, 20 years ago. Many of them were pure crap, but I found a few I'm actually going to keep. I've got eight months left to fix them up for release.

Designing echoes using global tempo changes in the sequencer in order to synch them with following notes is a thing one could do on several occasions...

After having breakfast, I'm more willing to allow myself some silliness, so I could go with three releases (7+4+4): the artsy stuff, the wild party stuff, and the silly brass party stuff.

I started with 18 candidates basically done for my last release. Now, I'm down to 11, split between the artsy stuff and the wild party stuff.

Afternoon me agrees with sofa me about the added tracks—after a bit of editing by chair me. All 18 tracks are basically done. Now, it's tweaking and clean-up. Lots of small edits all-over. Releasing everything together would work (I've got good build-up), but for now, there's a 9+9 split.

I'm letting sofa me be in charge for a bit, which means I've already added three tunes from the list of indefinite waiting. While I'm at it, I'm also listening to both parts of the last release as if they were one. Sofa me doesn't mind. We'll see what chair me thinks tomorrow...

"Mandrake gör en hypnotisk gest..."

If sofa me was in charge, I would release a lot more—even the most freeform off-grid stuff. If chair me was in charge, I would release nothing.

I had a "everything is shit and I'm going to delete it all" moment, but then sofa me told me not to. Sofa me has the abilty to simply enjoy whatever I make without overthinking it. Sofa me just accepts.