It's baking hot over here and I'm back in Herne Bay again! Still need to unpack, but these blog posts are (usually) a Friday thing so that takes priority! Lots of cool news to share this week and I can tell things are gonna get busy soon so lets get straight to it!

Firstly, with only 5 days to go on OpenLabs Songwriting contest, (with a grand prize of being mentored by Linkin Park), and after 2875 votes, Better Than The Book's "Hearts Racing" is STILL at #5 out of 260 entries! Thanks so much to everyone for your support and votes! Crazy to think that by this time next week, this round of the contest will be over and hopefully, Better Than The Book will move onto the next round of trial by professional judges! Hope some of you have already won some sweet gear in the sweepstakes, and please keep voting to ensure Hearts Racing's survival onto the next round. All the details about the competition are in the previous blog posts, so I'll not repeat is here, but if you've yet to vote (or win a computer) please vote for Hearts Racing, here:

VOTE HERE: http://contest.openlabs.com/contestants/hearts-racing/

Thanks so much again for the support, and hopefully by next week, I'll have some good news for you all :D Fingers crossed!

Next on this week's news, I have the amazing pleasure to announce that my first ever animation post-production project "The 3 Little Raptors" by Fun Station 4 Kids, has just exceeded a whopping 5 MILLION views on YouTube! It's awesome to think about the unfathomable amount of times this has been watched by children worldwide and it really brings a warm feeling to my heart. Thanks so much to everyone who's supported and watched Fun Station 4 Kids throughout the 3 years I've been a part of it. It's been a fantastic ride, and hopefully as it seems to have, it'll only keep getting better from here! If you've yet to watch "The 3 Little Raptors" you can do so here. I hope you enjoy it and thanks again for this REALLY BIG NUMBER!

Lastly this week, I've just got a cool little video to share which features some music I worked on with World Beyond! The video showcases some updates to the Mental Omega game, and the World Beyond piece is called: "Rescue Zone" for which I played the guitar. It's kinda crazy, I completely forgot about this one as it's been so long since we worked on it, but it's a kickass piece nonetheless (expect no less from World Beyond's Vladimir Kuznetsov) and awesome to see it featured in the official update video for such a popular game! Always fun to work on these things and collaborate. I'm looking forward to working with Vlad again soon!

That's about it for this week! It's set to be a busy time coming up as I think I have 4 commissions / pieces to work on in the next few weeks? Exciting times and I'll keep you updated on that and more as progress happens. Thanks again for all your support and remember, this is the last week you'll be able to vote for Hearts Racing, so please do! I hope you all win lots of cool stuff hopefully I'll have some cool news for you all next week! Until next week, take care, keep cool, and thanks as always for supporting all my projects and collaborations! See you soon!

Hope you've all had a great week! This update's a little later than usual as I spent the last few days celebrating 3 amazing years with my wonderful girlfriend Eva! It's been a great and relaxing time, and a well earned rest after the past few weeks of animation work. Speaking of which, there's another animation to show off this week + some more updates on the OpenLabs competition, which is going VERY well indeed. Without further delay, lets get to it!

Firstly this week, here comes another dinosaur themed animation from Fun Station 4 Kids: "The Dinosaur Counting Song". This one is a little different than some of our recent projects as it's a little less wacky and uses more 3D elements, as well as of course being effectively a music video which we haven't done in a very long time. Along with my usual post-production duties, I created the instrumental score too which accompanies vocals performed by Anthony (the animator) and his wife Carol, and it's been great to stretch those orchestral composition muscles again (The credits music is also one of my compositions)! So far the video seems to have had a fast start in terms of views so hopefully it'll be another hit like the Dinosaur Alphabet! Last week's video "Dino 3D Shapes" seems to have taken off well too, so fingers crossed for that one as well. Hope you enjoy it, and you can subscribe to Fun Station 4 Kids on YouTube to keep updated with the latest releases. Time to count some stuff!

Since a lot of this past week was spent away from work, there's only one more thing I'd like to share, and it's an update on how the OpenLabs songwriting contest to be mentored by Linkin Park is going! If you're not entirely sure what I'm talking about then be sure to read the past few updates, but in short, I entered Hearts Racing (from Better Than The Book) into a songwriting contest to win new equipment and the grand prize of a mentoring session in the studio with one of my favorite bands, Linkin Park. With only a week and a half to go, time is running out but we're currently holding our place well at #5 out of 230 entries, thanks to all your votes (and 2487 have been cast in total)! Thank you all so much for your support! It's certainly a close competition (Heart's Racing's peak position has been at #4!) so please keep voting, and remember: you can vote once a week and each vote gets you entered into a sweepstakes draw for prizes including new computers and other cool stuff so there's some great incentives as well as just lending your support. I hope you all win big and thanks again for all your help. Lets beat the competition and stay in the top 10 to move onto the next round. Not long left now and I'll keep you all updated on how it's going. You can vote for "Hearts Racing" by Better Than The Book here:

VOTE HERE: http://contest.openlabs.com/contestants/hearts-racing/

That's about all I have to share this week. I'll be heading back up to Herne Bay on Wednesday, so my next update will be back in the more condensed studio. I do however hope to bring up a bass this time though, so session bass playing should be on the cards again by the end of next week. Not entirely sure what'll be going on apart from the move next week, but I've still got another little something from Fun Station 4 Kids to share and at the very least there'll be another update on the OpenLabs songwriting contest. Thanks so much again for all your support, and keep up the weekly votes here. Until next time, I hope you win lots of goodies and have a great few days. Thanks as always for supporting all my projects and collaborations, Better Than The Book, Fun Station 4 Kids and JabunAudio. Have a great one, and take care!

Hope you've all had great weeks so far! It's been a busy one for me finishing off the audio for this latest Fun Station 4 Kids animation and making the most of being back in my hometown. It's been a lot of fun though and I haven't been this stoked / excited for a while! Maybe it's the summer weather? Who knows! Good vibes for sure though, and there's some really cool and great stuff / news to share this week! Let's get straight to it!

Let's start off with the main attraction this week, the latest animation from Fun Station 4 Kids! As you may have noticed, it's been a while since we last saw T-Rex, as Anthony the animator has been super busy this year, but we've both been working hard in the background on some new material for you in the past few months. Due to the channel's success too, Anthony (our great animator, creator and voice of lots of people) has been contacted by YouTube directly and has been assigned an official YouTube mentor! Exciting times for the channel and I'm certainly looking forward to seeing where it takes us in the future! Onto this animation though, in this episode T-Rex will be driving a monster truck in an arena and jumping over 3D shapes! It's great fun with some awesome 3D amidst the usual 2.5 (2.75?) D style and a huge dose of puns and references in there too! I'm sure you'll enjoy it! As for what's next for Fun Station 4 Kids, there'll definitely be a speedy version as usual for this animation (I've already seen it) coming in the next few weeks + another animated song is in the works too and should be out shortly. Subscribe to Fun Station 4 Kids on YouTube to keep updated with the latest releases. Anyway, hope you're ready to learn something new and I hope you enjoy T-Rex's latest adventure!

Onto the next piece of news this week, thank you so much to everyone who's shared and voted for Better Than The Book in the OpenLabs songwriting contest for which the grand prize is a mentoring session with Linkin Park (as well as some awesome runners up prizes)! I'm just overwhelmed with the amount of support the project has received in the last week and a half, and with only two and a half weeks to go, I'm very VERY pleased to announce that Better Than The Book's "Hearts Racing" is currently ranked at #5 out of 137 entries, (and I only need to be in the top 10 to move onto the next round)! I can't tell you how much it means to me that it's doing so well, and I really can't thank you all enough. It's a close competition though so if you haven't voted yet then please do so here, and if you have voted, remember you can vote weekly so please do so too. Remember too that everyone who votes is entered into weekly sweepstakes to win some awesome prizes including new computers and laptops, so apart from lending your support, there are some great incentives. I hope you all win some great prizes and thanks so much again for all your support. You can vote for "Hearts Racing" by Better Than The Book here:

VOTE HERE: http://contest.openlabs.com/contestants/hearts-racing/

As well as the great ranking this week, Better Than The Book has also been approved for airplay on Indie Radio Music, and has been inducted into the Universal Talents artist roster! Exciting times! Not exactly sure what'll happen next but hopefully it all adds up to more people than I could reach alone being able to listen to Better Than The Book. This week actually marks 6 months since the release of "Two Years On" too, and it's crazy to think how much has happened since then! BTTB's first play on radio, first play on international radio, first interview in a web magazine (more to come by the way!), first award from Newgrounds and some great feedback and independent reviews too! If you'd have asked me what to expect when the album was first released, I really couldn't have expected all of this. I'm so chuffed that people have enjoyed it so much and I wonder what's in store for the next  months? I might have to start working on another album soon as I've built up quite the collection of song ideas, riffs and lyrics since even before "Two Years On" was finished. We shall see, and I'll keep you all informed! There's certainly lots of BTTB music that's yet to be shared!

That's about it for this week! Next week's update is likely to fairly short and a few days late, as I'll be spending a lot of next week celebrating 3 awesome years with my wonderful girlfriend Eva! I'll be sure to to post anything I can on Sunday 21st though and give you another update on the OpenLabs songwriting contest at the very least. Remember to keep up the weekly votes here and I hope you win lots of goodies for your support! Until then, I hope you have a fantastic time until I next post, and thanks so much as always for supporting all my projects and collaborations, Better Than The Book, Fun Station 4 Kids and of course JabunAudio. See you next week and take care!

Hope you've all had a good week. This week I've been busy with more Fun Station 4 Kids animation work, which I hope to be able to share with you all soon (It's looking and sounding grand!). Also as of yesterday, I'm back in Sussex and JabunAudio's original studio for a few weeks to sort some stuff out and transfer more things, as well as to see family and friends! It's been great to play bass again (one big thing I've missed music-wise in the past weeks), and last night I went to the Brighton Odeon midnight premier for "Suicide Squad" (the new DC comics film) which was awesome. It wasn't as packed as the Captain America: Civil War premier unfortunately and certainly not as lively, but it was still a great night out! Anyway, other than that I only have one main thing to say in this update, but it's HUGE, I need your help with it, and there are some big prizes to be won for supporting too, so I hope you like it. Lets get started!

So what is this big announcement? Well this week I entered "Hearts Racing" from the Better Than The Book - Two Years On album into the biggest songwriting competition I've ever competed in, a huge event organised by OpenLabs and the band Linkin Park. There's a lot to explain with it, but the short of it is that they're holding monthly songwriting contests this year (from March 2016 - 2017), and giving out some huge prizes for the best entries. Each month focuses on a different genre: Rock, Electronic, Hip Hop, and Wildcard (any Genre), rotated on a 4 month basis, and for each month the competition goes as follows:

1. *People submit their entries and the public votes on them*
2. The top 10 entries of the month go to a round of judges which scores them on a number of criteria
3. Monthly 1st and 2nd place prize winners are selected, and the rest of the top 10 are granted runners up prizes.

The monthly prizes include items such as new computers, audio equipment and Linkin Park Underground memberships, worth $1000s of dollars so certainly some substantial stuff!

BUT that's not all: 

At the end of the 12 months, the monthly 1st place entries are sent to a further team of judges including Linkin Park themselves, and from those 12 entries a Grand Prize Winner will be selected to:

Fly over to the USA for a mentoring session with Linkin Park in the studio!!!

If that's not a once in a lifetime prize, I don't know what is!

Now's the part where I need to ask for your help. In order to stand any chance of competing against the other entries (and there are some great ones) I need you to vote me into the top 10 entries for the month. I don't often ask for much, but I would love to even have a chance of Linkin Park listening to my music. Linkin Park, and their members are undoubtedly some of my biggest inspirations , and it would mean the world to me if you could help support me in meeting them so please, head over to this page and VOTE for Hearts Racing (You can vote once a week too). There is unfortunately the hassle of signing up to be able to vote, but hopefully this will be balanced by the fact that for every vote you make, you'll be entered into a weekly sweepstake to win prizes yourselves, including, new desktop and laptop computers as well as other goodies.

I can't express how much it would mean to me for you to support and vote for me in this contest and as we come to the end of the first week, I can safely say the "Hearts Racing" remains in the top 10 out of 63 entries so far this month. As to whether it remains there, that's all in your hands so please spread the word and click the link below to cast your vote. Thank you so much for the support.

Vote here: ​http://contest.openlabs.com/contestants/hearts-racing/

That's about it for this week. As for next week I'm aiming to finish this round of Fun Station 4 Kids work and make the most of being down south in terms of the equipment I have access to as well as who's around, so I'm sure it's set to be a busy time. Hope to be sharing some more Fun Station 4 Kids animations with you soon, so stay tuned in the next few weeks. Until next time, I hope you have a great week and please be sure to send in your votes and support for Better Than The Book in the OpenLabs songwriting contest (fingers crossed for you winning some sweet gear too). Thanks as always for supporting JabunAudio and my audio projects, take care and see you next week!