Wednesday 16th February, 2022
It’s Wednesday again?. .
If you’re not paying attention, a week will pass you by. That’s usually a sign of two things. Either life is going great, or life is going terribly. I can confirm that both of these things are true. It’s odd how the different parts of your life can completely take their own paths, seemingly independent from one another.
Things are always strange at ‘home’, meaning the tiny room in my grandfathers house that I’m lucky to have, but terribly unlucky to need. The other day I woke up to a crippling weight. I didn’t get out of bed until 5pm, & even then, I just went for a cycle into the city. I had to visit one of my many 2nd homes (cafes). These wee, oases in the city, give me a space to feel human. I sit. I write. On the worst days, the best you can do is prepare for tomorrow, so that’s exactly what I did. These kinds of crashes, or burnouts happen all the time & it’s not a great sign of things going well… at least not in your personal life. So I’m gonna try to pay a little more attention to the reasons for these days… Jumping through the hoops of a creative job can kind of frazzle you from time to time. So much rejection combined with seemingly impossible tasks can really be tough to weather. Then you realise that the government in power is actively hostile towards those they deem ‘time wasters’…. which is everyone except for James Joyce… who isn’t wasting any taxpayer money. Maybe an artist is most valuable when they are dead cause society doesn’t need to pay for the upkeep. (I’m of course exaggerating…)
So, while my personal life gets wagged by the tail… my tail (my creative career) is ironically going great! Just this week I received the final version of Broken & Beautiful’s album art, & it’s more than I could’ve hoped for. Knowing what I’ve picked up over the years of image work, my initial concept was a bad one…. I wanted a ‘profile’ picture essentially. This meant that the composition of the image had to be just my face… & big enough to recognise it in a thumbnail. Not the most creative of starting points. I managed to finally take some portraits that I liked. (after three photoshoot attempts) The concept was already built into the song, & was even built into some of the previous artwork… so all that really mattered was execution. Luckily for moi, I work with some talented mofo’s… & it was only a matter of time before I managed to communicate what I was looking for. What’s surprising is that I actually like the image now… what would normally turn me off is the lack of narrative… but it’s just done so well, that I’m chuffed. Now I’ve a song, an image… all I need is to write the story & sell it to the world.
In other news, Brian & I have made some serious progress on the album. The other day we dove head first into one of the more difficult songs on the album: Learning Curve. Why’s it difficult? Firstly, musicals are not Brian’s forte, so he’s having to reach beyond himself considerably. Secondly, it’s the song with the most restrictions. It needs to work on the album, but it also needs to work within the scene of the film. Thirdly… I dunno, I wanted a thirdly. Anyways! I knew that it’d be a pain to get the ball rolling, so I pushed us into it asap. We had enough morale from finishing the previous track. Our attempts started out rough… figuring out the beat to a song that’s so fluid & expressive ain’t easy. Not only that, but my ability to create a beat is marred by my inadequacies. I overcompensate & try to overcomplicate. Eventually, after a lot of genuine fun & experimentation, we found ourselves in the groove of the song. (& actually scrapped a beat so that we could focus on some of the expressive parts… strings, effects, etc…) At all times, I was open to pushing things in any way Brian thought. He’s open to the bonkers ideas I throw at him & eventually, what’s right for the song wins out. This is why Brian & will be life-long collaborators. No matter what happens, we’ll always have a song on the go. Soon enough it’ll be Emily’s first single. (but I didn’t tell you that)
Speaking of my wonderfully talented sister. We’re heading off to an Aerial Hoop class at the amazing Taking Flight next week. Why are TF so amazing? Not only did they teach me how to perform on the Trapeze for the film, but they also loaned us the trapeze that I used in the film! (So show them some love & book an amazing class) Going back to classes after my appendix surgery is going to be so much fun. To be a complete human, I need the Circus. Why? I don’t know… but it’s in my bones & it won’t come out. I’ve genuinely tried to. give up Circus before… but it didn’t work. Going back to aerial, I’ll be learning Trapeze & hopefully Corde Lisse… but my Circus practice will hopefully extend back into juggling, hand balancing, acrobatics, & other kinds of flow arts. Get ready for a cavalcade of circus content… music videos, practice videos, TikToks (cause I need to give that whole warped funhouse another shot).
Everything else this week is just classes, meetings, & a lot of planning for the future. I should really get started on my new Patreon introduction video, my GoFundMe intro video, the GoFundMe fundraiser gig, the Patreon bts video, & the Patreon secret song… That’s just the basic task list. I’ve also gotta plan the album & film releases…. like, now. Cause you need to plan interviews, features, & exclusives well in advance. Phew…. lucky thing I’m studying this stuff full time! (I’m milking BIMM for all it’s worth… currently sat in the resource room, using this place as my personal office.)
Anywhoo’s, I’ll see you around, say hi, come chat…. I get bored & lonely doing all of this admin.
Your smoochums,
Nathan
