Hi everyone and hope you're having a fine start to August. It's been a week of mixed emotions here at JabunAudio with some necessary updates coming I really didn't want to have to make, but before we get onto that, let's look to some of the positive stuff. Pre-vocal editing for Better Than The Book's 3rd full-length album (and then some) is going reasonably well with 7 out of 14 tracks now ready for vocals, so about half-way there! Still a lot to get through but hopefully it shouldn't take too long and it'll be back to recording (vocals and more) soon! It's also Bandcamp Friday this week along with the final few days of the Better Than The Book 50% off sale as well as time for some more $1 Patreon rewards and some setting and reflecting of goals! Let's start off with the Patreon news: 

As of yesterday, last week's $5 Patreon rewards are now out for the $1 patrons: "Piggyback Ride" (+ an exclusive LIVE Jabun ambient modular synth jam for the $10+ patrons)! In case you missed last week's post you can read more about this month's rewards below and remember that you'll gain access to all historic rewards and posts for your Patreon tier too when you become a supporter including the full Better Than The Book and Jabun discographies and much more! Hope to see you there and thanks as always for supporting my work on Patreon!

Read more: ​https://www.patreon.com/posts/53164468/
$1+ rewards: https://www.patreon.com/posts/53164467/
$10+ rewards: https://www.patreon.com/posts/53164465/
Become a Patron: https://www.patreon.com/NickStanding

Discover the Reward Archive (4th October 2018 -> 4th August 2021):
​https://www.patreon.com/posts/announcing-posts-50344842

That's it for the rewards this month and we'll be continuing with something a little different next time. Hope you're looking forward to it!

Next this week, it's once again Bandcamp Friday and Bandcamp are waiving their revenue shares again so you can support the artists you love directly for the first Friday of the month (August 6th from midnight to midnight Pacific Time)! If you've been meaning to pick up one of the recent Jabun albums or some Better Than The Book, then now's the best time!

Don't forget that it's also the final week of Better Than The Book's 50% off Bandcamp sale in celebration of 2 years of Hopes and Dreams! Grab a huge discount while you can by using the code "2years” and thanks for an amazing 2 years of Hopes and Dreams! The discount sale ends this Sunday 8th of August.

Check out the Bandcamp pages below and thanks for supporting my music in any way you can, it really means a lot: 

Better Than The Book
https://betterthanthebook.bandcamp.com/
 
Jabun
https://jabun.bandcamp.com/
 
Nick Standing (< The sillier old stuff)
https://nickstanding.bandcamp.com/ 

And I hope you enjoy the jams!

Next for this blog post, and before we get onto the usual setting and reflecting on monthly goals, I have some important updates about JabunAudio and my various music projects which mean that some unfortunate big changes will be occurring in the coming weeks.

To cut a long story short, JabunAudio as an independent self-employed small business, like many similar endeavors I'm sure, has had its ups and downs over the years, and while my music and projects both solo and collaborative have exceeded my expectations and hopes in terms of world-wide reach, achievements, and output (with over 40 million views of collaborative animation work, music featured in video games, press articles and played on radio stations all across the globe, and well over 200 music tracks released since 2012), financially JabunAudio been struggling for quite some time for various reasons, and COVID has not been kind to this industry on top of that. With the last government support for the self-employed ending this month, and the extra work I've been doing to help drum up some more revenue for JabunAudio not yielding sufficient results, I'm having to make the tough decision to restructure JabunAudio and my various associated music projects in order to look for more stable alternative income streams.

While I have no intention of stopping JabunAudio or any of my projects entirely, this unfortunately does mean that I'll be moving JabunAudio and other related work to part-time only, effectively losing many hours I'd usually have for creating and working on projects. I'd like to make it clear that JabunAudio is still open for business and accepting new projects/clients along with my long time and recurring clients/collaborators, and I will try my very best to continue to provide the high level of service and productions you've come to expect from me with the reduced time that I have. Please don't hesitate to send me a message to discuss your latest projects, though I ask for your patience during this difficult time.

In terms of my own current ongoing projects, the likelihood and reality is that upcoming projects such as Better Than The Book's 3rd album will see some delays for the foreseeable future as well. I'd have preferred to finish these current projects before making any changes, but that option isn't really available to me any longer, and while it may take a bit longer than expected until these projects are released now, I'll continue to strive for the highest possible standard of productions rather than rushing out half-baked ones. I'm sure you'd prefer that too.

In order to streamline the remaining time I have to work on JabunAudio and my own music work, I'll be making some changes to my workflow to prioritise audio production time and cut back on less creative admin/promotional work. The first change will be a cutback on social media, newsletters, and similar promotional posts unfortunately including the (mostly) weekly JabunAudio blog and re-posting of press features on most channels. The JabunAudio blog will now be a shorter monthly round-up in the first week of the month only, apart from any major updates such as album releases (which will also be promoted on the usual channels).

The second change will be a major restructuring of my Patreon page including the removal of the $5 patron tier and a change in the specific reward benefits. All monthly Patreon rewards will now be released on a single day in the first week of the month (probably still Wednesday) and much like the JabunAudio blog I'll aim to make only 1 round-up news post per month now (with special exception for certain things). I'll provide a full update once these changes have been implemented later this month, and there are still a few more months of back catalog music left to upload too, after which I'll make another restructure (at some point next year). I hope that by cutting down on these things, I'll be able to dedicate more of my JabunAudio and "free" time to the actual projects you support and get them to your ears faster.

I want to say a big thanks to everyone who's helped support me always and especially at this difficult time with special mention to Eva who's been beside me (literally) through all of this. I can see it being a tough few months ahead, but I'll be doing my best to continue watering this plant I potted almost a decade ago now, and once things are settled into a new routine, I'm sure things'll start going a whole lot smoother again. Thanks for your patience and thanks for supporting JabunAudio, Jabun, Better Than The Book, and my various solo and collaborative projects.

With all that said, I think it's time to set and reflect on the usual monthly goals. Here's what was set for July:

1) Finish recording organs for Better Than The Book's upcoming album
2) Finish recording any pick-up guitars for ^^^
3) Start consolidating edits and set up sessions ready for vocal recording (at least 5 tracks)
4) Sort Patreon Rewards for the next 2 months

And it's been a busy but successful one! 1), 2) and 4) are done with no comments and my tentatively set 3) was exceeded with a total of 7 tracks out of 14 ready for vocals now! Not really much else to say on that, so let's set some new ones.

1) Finish consolidating edits and setting up sessions ready for BTTB vocal recording (7 tracks left)
2) Restructure the Patreon page and other necessary JabunAudio related things
3) Finish the Better Than The Book Bandcamp promotional sale and associated admin

As I'm sure you can appreciate, I have a whole lot of personal goals on top of this to sort out too. 3) should be easy and finished by next Monday, 2) will be a chore but hopefully won't take too long. 1) unfortunately may be overly ambitions, but we'll have to see how I do and recalculate come next month. Wish me luck I guess and feel free to leave you own goals in the comments below.

That about wraps things up for this post. Not the post I was hoping to make this week, but the times they are a'changin' as Bob Dylan said. The next post will be about the Patreon restructuring which will hopefully be next week, after which I'll be moving to the monthly JabunAudio blog posts only. Thanks again for being patient with me during this difficult time, and thanks as always for supporting JabunAudio, Jabun, Better Than The Book and my various solo and collaborative projects however you can. This isn't the first time JabunAudio's gone part time, but it's been a while so it's going to take some adjustment. Take care, enjoy the music and all the best.