Pretty much since the beginning of this blog I've stuck to a single-minded approach to releasing new music: new songs go up the moment they're finished, in the order they're finished. Though I don't usually have much to say about tracks when I post them, the whole process is always immensely gratifying for me; there's something really satisfying about performing the final render, encoding MP3s at a few different bitrates (nothing but the second-best for my readers!*), and uploading a new track to the various servers and websites that Nonagon calls home. It's a fun and easy end to what's usually a relatively long and arduous creative process, and I've come to really cherish it.
Recently though, I've gotten to thinking that what I'm used to doing might not be what I should be doing. The biggest problem with the track-at-a-time approach is that it frames each new song as a distinct entity, both in my mind and (presumably) in the minds of anyone who happens across it. This isn't necessarily a bad thing, but in the last few weeks especially I've become more interested in establishing cohesive themes that tie the material I produce into something bigger than the individual songs that comprise it. If I seriously want to start tying things together, I might have to stop "releasing" songs to the world in individual units and start holding out for bigger things.
This is a really tough idea for me, and (for reasons stated above) certainly not something I'm looking forward to doing. For now I'll probably continue on the old path of posting a song at a time here, if for no other reason than to maintain morale. Sooner or later though, I might work up the courage to change my habits and secret new tracks away until the work as a whole is complete. I guess as always we'll see. And as always I'm interested in hearing thoughts any of you might have on the matter. Fire away! Or hold your tongues.
[* The clips I post here are encoded at lame -V4 quality, where -V0 is best and -V9 is worst. If this bugs you, drop me a line and I'll be happy to provide you with any encoding you desire! Even beautiful, raw WAVs. Mmmmm... WAVs.]
1 comment:
I think that there is something to be said for working a song at a time. It keeps people interested and coming back expecting more. I think that you could very well work on a cohesive whole and offer people teasers and insights as they're finished. I think that a music blog should supplement the music, give the reader an eye into the world of the artist and the making of an album. Or its a place for the artist to upload drawings of creatures playing made up instruments because he has not written or recorded anything in a month.
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