I’m back, got things to do, did you see my recent stuff? Also Game Of Thrones
750 Words — Day #21
I had to take some time out to earn some money and pay some debts. Rather than turn this blog into day-to-day rambling about React and D3 and Ruby On Rails I let it slide instead. I have the week off now so I thought I’d get back into it by writing a blog post and letting you know what’s on my mind and what I’m hoping to achieve this week.
I was talking to a film director last week about my music and he offered me some good advice on engaging PR companies. When he asked me what I wanted to achieve and I started rambling about “well, I want them to send emails and get press and this and that” he stopped me and said “no, what do you want out of this?” and I realised I was thinking in overly micro-management terms. It’s not really my job to say how this PR agency might achieve my goals, they’re the experts. So I have to put out a brief.
I don’t really know how to write a brief for a PR company. I’ve been doing some research today and I’m finding a lot more information for brands than artists. I think the brief for most album releases is probably pretty similar: “get me radio plays, raise my profile, help me sell records, help me fill venues” — i.e. “make me famous”. But I want to be more specific and come up with something engaging for people to pitch against.
I moved house recently so I don’t have a dedicated studio at the moment. There’s a bit of room for me to do things but nowhere to really settle in. I decided to hire spaces as and when I need them for now. I can book a practice room for rehearsals and book studio time whenever I need to record vocals or anything. Maybe I can start working with other engineers instead of always doing things myself.
I need to write up “Shoebox”- my 3D modelled virtual band engine — to explain what went into it and hopefully get more people interested in the video for it.
Generally I want to get into my video series — I need to start getting footage for the next one — I had to buy a new camera tripod as both of my other tripods are broken — now I have a proper video tripod so hopefully this will raise my production values a bit.
Did you see my track kinda went viral for a couple of days on SoundCloud the other week?

I didn’t do anything with it — I didn’t even make artwork — just posted it up, and people just seemed to like it and share it and listen to it over and over again. You can see how many more plays this track has had than anything else I’ve ever uploaded here:

I’d hoped that the video for it would make a similar splash on YouTube.
This thing was a ridiculous amount of work to produce. I’m sad that more people haven’t seen it yet. I need to write a blog post that can go up on Hacker News or something — maybe that will pique developers’ interest at least.
I just remembered I got some interview questions the other week that I haven’t had a chance to respond to. Oh dear — something else for the day’s checklist.
Yeah it’s all a bit of a fuzzy cloud of things I need to check off. It’s a case of “one thing at a time” ideally. But some things can be happening in the background so I need to do those first.
I need to write a good creative brief for an artist to work on my album cover. Then I can press some vinyl copies. Then I can throw a launch party. Then I can start playing it live. Too much to do. Feeling stressy.
I had a gloomy weekend last week which put me in the mood to finally give Game Of Thrones a go. I felt like something brutal, complicated and humourless. I didn’t like the graphic violence when I first tried watching it. Since Twin Peaks Season 3 any violence seems pretty mild. I’m finding some humour between the lines. I’m delighted with how in-bred Joffrey Lannister is. Even his name is in-bred.
OK THAT’s 750 I’M OUT
