That everything is slowly coming together.

I really haven't made much of an update except posting a few videos on my youtube account. I honestly don't know where I'm heading in life. I'm in at the point where I'm just unsure of everything. Spreading my time across the things I want to do has been a bit troublesome but, for the better. College is obviously the thing on my mind right now. I want to go to the right college and I want to be able to have some success coming out of it. Though now that I think about it, college is another four year ordeal. I feel like I'm running out of time to produce my best work but, honestly, I have 4 more years to build up my best stuff.

Anyway enough blabbing I figured I'd give everyone an update on my progression in music. Hell I don't even know if anyone cares to read this, I suppose this is more for myself. I'm not one to talk about these things with people so I figured if you want to listen go ahead. A few people know, that talking to me I constantly strive to achieve a certain sound I have in my head. They say it takes 10 years to master something but, I don't have that time. I want it as soon as I can get it. That being said my mixing has taken one of those steps that you have every now and then when learning something. I guess structure is my next obstacle.

One Last Chance, my EP demo. Honestly it HAD potential but I went and messed it all up. How? Well about halfway through I suppose I lost the idea of it all. Some people will like it others might get a WTF factor. I myself enjoyed it and learned quite a bit from it. Though structure wise it seems like I went and lost track of the direction I was going. It's not a bad song don't get me wrong, it just isn't professional. I'm close to my target goal in trance and that might just be a one time thing for me. I don't know as of now but I have to juggle the genres I'm making.

Onto the newgrounds part of my life. Sometimes I would love to review a track but, 90% of the time when I check the newly submitted list I can't find a track I want to review. I listen to a new submission everyday and sadly very few I can give an opinion on. It might sound like I'm being a snob or an elitist but, really I don't want to review a song that is obviously bad. Sure I can tell you what is wrong, what you might want to change, and why I don't like it but, honestly if I don't enjoy listening to the song I just don't want to review it. The main reason I suppose I come to newgrounds now is to help others out, check the forums, and every now and then post a song. It's not much but it is the best I can offer as of now.

Being a bit nostalgic it's kind of interesting how I've made a foot print in the history of newgrounds audio, and possibly newgrounds itself. I came here around 2004 to 2005, I didn't have an account at the time and had no idea there was an audio portal. The only reason I found the Audio Portal was because of this flash animation and wanting find API's song. Funny how a simple chain of events lead me to start posting on the newgrounds audio portal. I was about 14 years old at the time, so of course I picked up FL as my first DAW. I used my dads computer to make my first submission using the program Sonar, was a piano song and I had no idea what I was doing. Thirty minutes to an hour later my submission had been approved (funny how fast it was). Thanks to who ever did that.

After my first submission I decided to use FL, my dad had showed me a demo of it and I remember hearing Toby Emerson's Rain drops on it. I, like many others, liked "Techno" but soon realized what it was, Trance. I think the version of FL was 5, back when they still called it Fruity Loops. I started off like everyone else using Sytrus presets thinking, "hey this isn't that bad". Sounds terrible actually, I leave those submissions up not because I'm proud of them, I leave them there so people know I didn't have an amazing skill to start with. I like everyone else started from the ground up, and those submissions are there to prove it.

After a few submissions and videos on youtube I realized that my samples and VSTIs were crap. So I got a few new ones (I won't go into anymore detail) and started to learn a bit more. Hell I just wanted to make songs with cool supersaws in them. I had no idea who Tiesto, Armin, Above & Beyond, and many others were. I didn't know what Trance was and as soon as Karco contacted me on AIM I soon found out. An amazing guy he is, very mature, always knows what to say. Modest in nature, he helped me out, showed me where to improve and most of all gave me a sense of what real Trance was. At this point I started listening to more and more Trance and I can say I then was addicted. (Thanks Karco)

All of this was a secret from my parents, they had no idea that I was upstairs making music. I had never mentioned anything, sometimes I would ask my dad to show me how to use Sonar but, other then that all they knew was that I played the piano from time to time. People probably remember my song Take Me Away if I had never made this song I would of quit music. This song, which I can't say shows it but, it came after a simple few words my dad said. I still hate that he said it to this day, I felt and still feel that everything he had told me, that he would support me with anything I did was just a lie. I was 15 (I think) when I told him I had started making music, my neighbor and mom were there. It was Friday "happy hour" for them, it's just something we/they do every week. A day like any other and I guess my dad asked me what I do in my room all day when I'm not with my friends. I told him. I told him I make music, and he asked me why I never tell him or let him listen to it. I'll never forget what he said to me and I don't think he ever apologized for the words he said then and there in that moment.

I told him, I make Trance. To dumb it down, I said Techno. The first reply I received, and no other reply was. "Why the hell are you making Techno?". I figured it would be obvious, I liked it. I was pretty much shattered at that moment in my life. My dad hadn't accepted what I said, the one person who I thought might share something in common with me, had questioned the one thing I truly loved to do. I like to make Trance, I like to make classical, I like to make Drum and Bass, the list goes on. He tried to explain to me why he was surprised, he never just said "I'm sorry" he would just continue on like he hadn't wronged me. Of course I don't hate my father for this, it makes me upset, someone who said he was so accepting and open to ideas closed off the options. Even today, when he asks what I've made I just show him the classical/contemporary songs I've made. Of course he knows I make Trance but to what extent I'm not sure. He can Google this at anytime, read it whenever he wants. I don't think I could tell him, face-to-face, how disappointed I am in him. I'm sure it would hurt him to read this, but it hurts me to write, remember, and think about it. At some point I figure I will tell him, for now I suppose the music will suffice.

He currently thinks Trance for me is just a "Phase" in my musical life. It may be but, for now it is a hobby and something I enjoy making/listening to. I would love to prove him wrong in my future by fusing the genres I currently like into something cinematic and featured in a full length cinema.

I wrote quite a bit didn't I, I'm still not done. I need to do this from time to time, get things off my chest let people know what I'm thinking. I keep things private most of the time and right now I think this it is best that I can get it out. It might just make for a good college essay too, so why not. If you read this, it might just disappear within a day. I often write things and then delete it. It is not the first time I've done something like that.

To continue the story, after those few days after those events I continued making Trance. I'm not sure why, it might of just been the only thing I felt I could do at the time. One of the reasons I made Trance was that it was much more accessible then orchestral music was. A synthesizer was just so much easier to load up then crappy string instruments. Trance just sounds so much better since most of the sounds are inhuman. So I improved as much as I could, it shows in some of the submissions. I was improving at quite a fast rate, learning new things. I wanted and still want to make the mix that I can say "is just right".

I then came into contact with F-777. I sent him a PM asking if it was okay to add him to my MSN. This was after some other evens that took place (a death of someone I knew). I won't go into anymore detail, the song I made which sadly could be so much better today has everything I needed to say in the description. I talked with F-777, told him how I enjoyed his music, conversations like that. I can't say if he truly enjoyed my song Deep Blue but he helped spread word of it. Everyone knows he has thousands of fans, he PMed some of them for me and linked my song. I had never gotten top 5 before, no one knew who I was at the time. I hadn't really posted on the BBS before so I was relatively unknown.

I guess I was lucky. At the time Deep Blue was submitted the Audio Portal froze. Lists were not being updated, songs that had been rated a 5.00 had stayed that way on the list but really their score was much lower. My song at the time was somewhere hidden in the list. As F-777's fans viewed their PMs my songs scored started to rise. Tuesday (Wednesday for East coasters) rolled round and sure enough my first Top 5. I was probably the happiest kid on Earth. Funny, something so little made me so happy. I guess though I should be extremely happy for that moment, if not I wouldn't be where I was today.

My next song Sytrus was a challenge to prove that Sytrus wasn't bad if you didn't use presets. I think I submitted it on a Monday, somehow it managed to gain enough votes to stay on the top. Sure enough the next day I had received another top 5. This song quickly attracted people for whatever reason. It got tons of downloads in such a short period of time and I see it on youtube from time to time. My next song to Top 5, was a thank you to F-777 for his help with Deep Blue. As you may know, I remixed F-777's song Air Fantasy this one still gets quite a few views. My highest listens is on this song as of right now. I might as well say it again, thanks F-777 for the help, I truly mean it.

At this point I started to feel a bit lacking in my music. FL had slowly started to cap it's self, right around the time the first Electronic EP came out. I was lucky enough to get in since I had started on Miles Away at the time I felt it was perfect. Soon after the EP was released money started to come from my music. I was soon making my way to my goal, I could sell my music and people would actually buy it (lolz). Miles away may not be my greatest song, at the time though it sure was a big step in some areas for me. FL was getting tired though and I think I either had to find a new program or something to improve it.

I looked at Reason 4 at this point. I "picked" it up and learned it fairly quickly. The learning curve wasn't too hard since I had FL as my previous DAW/program. I produced One wish and Give Me Cowbell with it. Cowbell was a joke but, somehow top 5ed. Can't say that was a proud moment. I found that Reason just wasn't for me, I still wanted to make classical music and Trance. Reason couldn't offer me just as much as other programs could.

At this time my birthday was coming up and my dad had mentioned buying me a laptop to prepare for college. So we went to the Apple store some weeks later and looked at the Mac book pros. This was one of those impulse moments men have. We called my mother, she didn't answer. We then bought a new Mac Book Pro, I'm currently writing this on it. Thank you dad for doing this, I would not be where I am now without it. After getting my Macbook I needed a program to make my music. I had been looking into programs that I could use to make electronic and orchestral music. Ableton, Reason, and Logic came up to be my choices. Ableton I didn't do much research in and was a last minute look at and decided not to go with it. Reason I had been happy with but, I just wasn't sure if I wanted to buy it just yet. Logic, I had never heard of in my life. I looked up information about it, everything seemed really nice. I ordered it, using my money I had earned through winning 2nd place in a MAC contest and others that I had saved up. At the time Sylenth1 was on sale so, I made sure to get it too. I got about a 100 dollar discount and glad I got it when I did.

Closer to the present now. Getting Logic, I changed my creation method drastically. Things changed and I had to go about doing things different. Progression was slow, classical music started to come out. The samples were not terrible and I found that I wasn't half bad at what I really wanted to do. I started making classical music, I still make Trance but, the samples offered in Logic gave me a jump start into a new genre.

As I improved I started talking more and more with MaestroRage. Maestro is someone I look up to, someone who knows things I don't, someone who can help me, someone who did. He helped me realize I had potential, that I just needed to get myself out there (I still do). He showed me places where I can offer my music for license deals and get shafted in the profit. Though the money isn't what mattered, exposure was what I was looking for and still am. He has been there, helping me and I can't say thank you enough Maestro. I hope that someday I can meet you, maybe even compose with you. You have a skill, I'm glad you shared it with me.

Now we've reached present date. I'm preparing for college as I said and I'm letting things unfold as it goes.

Thank you Karco, F-777, MaestroRage, newgrounds, everyone.
I wouldn't be here today, where I am without you guys.