Category: Music

HELLO, HUNTERTHEN

So this is very different than my previous beeps and boops. All those bouncy loops are still a part of my life, of course, but hey, humans are complex creatures, and over the past year and a half I’ve grown to love the utility of dark ambient and drone.

Oddly enough the search for this type of music spawned from the Headspace app. The sleep music is great, particularly “Warm Engines.” But I just wanted something a little “darker,” but not too scary. So I started putting together my own mixes under the name ‘Goodnight, Metal Friend.’

Now I’m starting to make my own under the name HUNTERTHEN, a vague reference to The Mandalorian TV series. If you know, you know.

This first release is meant for sleeping, or staring at the computer screen while you work, or maybe for walking through graveyards early in the morning. Please enjoy.

PARAVIAN SEQUENCES BY PERCIVAL PEMBROKE

A Percival Pembroke is a “British high-wing twin-engined light transport aircraft,” according to Wikipedia. Also the engine behind ‘Paravian Sequences,’ a whimsical electronic album I found on Bandcamp, meant as “movement and patterns for mesozoic bird species.”

GOODNIGHT, METAL FRIEND #16

It’s been a few months, but finally a new sleepy time metal mix, perfect for long walks in graveyards, or disappearing into the fog.

These mixes take awhile for me to make. I started this one about a week or two ago. Lots of work and work-related stuff gets in the way, and I usually go for a run or a bike ride to shake off that work stress, but tonight I wasn’t feeling either of those, so I set off to finish this mix.

Something about sitting here in front of the same machine that I use for work, and instead of fretting over incoming emails, or managing tabs, I get to just watch tracks run for seven straight minutes, and I force myself to stay present and watch the second tick by. The exact opposite of the normal work day.

Track list:

GOOD SONGS DIE WITHOUT GOOD PLANS

“Write good songs.”

This is the advice one of my close friends (whom I work for) gives to bands asking how to “make it.”

Of course, this is leads to further discussion.

“Great songs with a bad plan fail,” says Amber Horsburgh.

How do write good songs? Write bad ones. And you write bad ones by writing a lot of songs.

Yes, inspiration may come from the heavens and bless you with a hit.

But even then, you still need to know how to craft and mold that idea into an actual song.

So you gotta work.

That doesn’t even mean posting something everyday. You can do this quietly, without sharing with the world.

Write as often as you can. Do your thing as often as you can.

As I wrote about a year ago:

So don’t look too far into the distance. Make your mistakes now, get your bad stuff out of the way this year. Your work today is to keep piling up your art, your work, your magic.

Learn Your Lessons Each Step of the Way

A TEAR IN THE FABRIC OF LIFE INDEED

These six songs from Knocked Loose pack more menace and grit than some bands entire discographies. A monster step forward for the genre.

The band also made a video to accompany the entire release, too. Amazing.

Your Live Show Can Keep Making You Money Long After You Leave Town

A live show is the culmination of years of practice, grind, networking, and connecting with fans. It’s… a big deal. Now imagine posting photos from every show on your website. Photos of playing, with fans, load in, sound check. Then post the link on all your socials.

Remember – your website can have links to… your store. Where you have things for sale.

Imagine driving 1000+ people to your site every night, and then selling a few shirts. Or a record or two?

You do realize all the websites that cover shows are making money off you, right? They get on social media, “hey, check out our photos of so and so from last nights show in NYC!” They drive traffic to their website where they have banner ads, and prominent links to their Patreon site.

That could be you. You could be getting those eyeballs, turning casual listeners into rabid fans. Rabid fans buy merch.

The “content” you’re making sits on your socials. Yes, it looks pretty, but it could be working for you long after you leave the 3rd stop on your tour. Sell $100 per night through your website over 20 nights, thats $2000. Instead of just getting 2000 likes.

And here’s the thing – you don’t even have to do this yourself.

Since you’ll still be posting your thoughts and photos and all that to socials, you could have someone build those posts every night, without a lot of input. Let them curate the band’s photos, and maybe some social media posts from those in attendance.

Post the link on socials the next day, and drive a few hundred people to your site.

Hire someone (like me) to manage and build that. Make some money. Or, fuck, take this idea and do it yourself!

Just stop shoveling all of your life work onto social media for the likes, and the engagement, thinking the algorithm will magically make you go viral and somehow you’ll sell a shirt.

Note: this post started off as an off the cuff Twitter rant (here), which I then copied and pasted into WordPress. This post can now be updated, linked to, and read for years to come. Turn your social media posts into evergreen bits of magic on your own site!

We Got The Moves

Summer is winding down, but this has become my summer anthem.

Usually I’m not a fan of the “harsh vocals” switching the “clean vocals” and all that stuff that “the kids” seem to like so much, but this just works for me. I mean, the visuals do it, too. Such attention to vibe and style and wit and sass. I love it so much.