quantifica may

Hey team. Last month I said "this one's a bit less fun." Wish I could say this month is different.

MANA

This does not track the entirety of List of Songs that Signify "Smart Music" as the video is not technically done yet. There are a few revisions to make - a bit of audio leveling, a version of Spiegel im Spiegel that won't trip the copyright bots (it's the ONLY "Smart Music" song not yet in the public domain), a sponsor read to add to the end. Also still deciding how I wanna go about sponsoring this one - I don't expect it to do numbers, and low sign-ups can affect my sponsor rate, so there are a few different options to consider. Basically I can make good money now but possibly hurt my ability to make good money later, or make weak money now without hurting my chances in the future, or set a balance point of risk and reward between those poles. Haven't pulled the trigger on any of them yet.

Overall, this "goofy weekend project" was more work than expected. But, moreso, I was much less able to work than expected. The burnout continues, due to a lot of shit going on in my own life. The goal was to make a silly video and then spend the month on Alt-Right Playbook shorts to me released in June. It is now June, and I am only just finishing the silly video. That's not great.

FINANCIALS

Second month without a release has continued the financial slump. We are still, in aggregate, way ahead of schedule for the year, but this does me an official concern. All the plans and systems in the world don't mean much if you're too exhausted to do any of it, you know? The money AdSense withheld due to last month's copyright strike came through and is included here, but it wasn't enough to bump us up to target. Harrumph.

Now that the video is (almost) ready to go, the priority is writing the Afterword for Jacob Geller's book. It's due by the end of the month, I've got about a page already written and the whole thing is outlined. The payment for that will make up some of the last couple months' shortfall, and, however this new video does, it will almost certainly go public this month and will bring in some traffic and get some sponsor money. We may not exceed target, but I'm hoping we get back on track. But my reflex says to hedge - I came into May with optimism and had a rough month, so it's hard to predict how June is gonna go. We'll just have to see.

BINGOS

Well, at least this is going okay! Two more on the board. Making headway!

MAY MINIMIX

More tunes! Things went have been a bit dance-poppy lately and this month was a hard pivot into various kinds of metal with a bit of goth industrial. Apologies in advance if "a German screaming at me in a weird time signature" is not your vibe, it was just that kinda month for me. It gets more fun after the first song!

Blud
- music map: looked for a band similar to Genghis Tron

Mu
- every noise at once: exploring the jazz metal microgenre

Foreword.
- Spotify rec after listening to Mu

Acid Rain
- ditto

Trust
- saw this band in NYC for a friend's birthday in April, really enjoyed their set and spent some time with the album

Ephemeral
- felt like time to finally listen to Pelican; they are more groove/less drone than I had imagined!