Whoaaa! Has it only been seven days since the last blog post?! So much has happened that it seems like ages ago. It's been such a jam packed week for me working on so many different things that it's probably best we just go through them one by one systematically without any intro. Let's get started!

Firstly some HUGE Better Than The Book news: Last week, I finished recording for the songs on the upcoming album and announced that it was time to move onto creating some interludes to bring everything together. A few days away from it and I came back to listen through the album in order for the first time, and I was super pleased. I had a play with some extended intros and interludes, but everything I seemed to add, removed from the feel and journey of the album. I sent the tracks out to some friends for their opinion and their thoughts were similar to mine. Unlike in Two Years On where the interludes were a fun and necessary addition for the journey of the album, there was no room for such things in this one that followed it. I ended up adding just a few sounds to the beginning/end of some tracks to help things flow, but as for interlude tracks, for the first time on a BTTB project. and in the spirit of all killer no filler, there will be none! 
          And with that said, I'm happy to announce that after 6 months of busy work, recording is officially finished for Better Than The Book's 3rd album! Next thing to do is the final edits and clean-up on certain things, then it's onto mixing! It's been an incredible journey so far and I feel like I've learnt and grown a lot as a musician throughout writing and recording this. I really can't wait to be able to share this with you all and I hope you're as excited as I am to hear it. Still no ETA on the release as there is much work left to do, but I'm excited to finally reveal the title and tracklist for this project I've been working on since Two Years On. Thanks so much for all the support so far, and looking forward to sharing more updates with you as and when I can. Without further wait, here's "Hopes and Dreams"

Better Than The Book - Hopes and Dreams
Tracklist:
01 The Hardest Part
02 Artificial Ignorance
03 And I Fear
04 Meteor Shower
05 Brighton
------------
06 Get A Haircut
07 (The Travelling To See Eva Song)
08 GG
09 You've Got A Lot To Say
10 Hopes and Dreams
(Approx length: 39 minutes)

And if you've yet to hear Two Years On (or even the One Small Step EP), head over to bandcamp to catch up, and I hope you enjoy it! Exciting times ahead!

Next this week, some updates on another album that's in the pipeline, this time from World Beyond! It's been quite a while in the making, and I still can't release much information on it, but this week I've been busy recording some final guitars and bass for it as well as taking photos for some of the promotional material. It's certainly the biggest project I've worked on with World Beyond and I'm really looking forward to sharing more details with you as and when I can. More exciting times ahead with that!

Onto non-album related news, with the upcoming Better Than The Book album finished in terms of recording, and around 3 weeks ahead of schedule because of it, it seemed like finally a good time to get back to working on the Patreon page again! On top of all the other things that have been going on this week, I've been tidying up the campaign page, adjust a few things here and there, scripting videos and recording some video, though I must admit that speaking in front of a camera is a skill I've yet to fully master... Still, it's the first signs of progress in a few months now, and with a few weeks left in September, I'm hoping to be able to finish it in time to launch at the beginning of October. It's definitely going to be a challenge, but I think I can just about do it. Wish me luck!

Finally in this week's news, I just wanted to share with you a little bit of fun I had on Sunday morning which also happened to be #909Day, a celebration of the famous Roland TR-909 drum machine which although a commercial failure at the time later became one of the most sought after pieces of music technology after its invaluable influence on the development of electronic dance music, techno, house, and acid. 
          After 6 months of concentrated recording for Better Than The Book's new ska punk album, it was great to clear my desk (and head) and spend some lazy time jamming on my synths again with no purpose other than to just relax, make some noise, and have fun! There were no 909s or even emulators of the great machine, but there was a whole host of other little synths all connected with a criss-cross of patch cables. It's nothing super special music-wise but I thought it'd be nice to share a little clip from my phone before I packed it up for the day. I definitely look forward to getting back to some electronic Jabun music again in the near future when I have a chance, and I hope you enjoy this little sneak peek into my inspiration and ideas gathering process!

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And that's about it for this week! The next couple of weeks are set to be pretty busy with non-work related stuff, but I'll be focusing on the Patreon page with all the time I can. It's mainly just a video intro to produce now, though that's going to take a fair bit of work in an area I'm not so familiar with (video picture editing) so that'll definitely be a challenge. Until next time, I hope you have a great week whatever you're up to and thanks as always for supporting JabunAudio and my various projects. See you next time and take care!

Hello everyone and hope you've had a splendid week since the last blog post! It's been a busy but exciting time here at JabunAudio finishing off song recording for the upcoming Better Than The Book album (more on that in a moment) as well as writing some more articles for the JabunAudio newsletter (more on that in a moment too!). Fun times! With that said, let's dive straight into this week's news!

First up, a huge milestone update on the upcoming Better Than The Book album. On Sunday, after many busy months of plucking strings, pressing keys, programming synths, and belting at microphones, along with illness, injured fingers and lots of unexpected happenings, recording was finally finished for the 10 new Better Than The Book songs on the upcoming album! It's been quite the journey so far, and there's still much of the journey left to traverse! Although the songs are recorded, now it's time to turn this collection of songs into an album with some interludes to bring it all together, before I get started on the final edits, mixing and mastering. Thanks for all the support so far and I can't wait to show you how far things have come since "Two Years On"!

Next on the news, ​it's the beginning of another month which means another JabunAudio music production newsletter has been sent out! This month I'll be discussing dynamic vs condenser microphones for recording vocals in the studio, why I opt for a Shure SM58 stage microphone for recording the majority of my vocals, and why you might want to do the same depending on your situation! If that sounds interesting to you, sign up for free on the JabunAudio.com home page, I hope you enjoy it, and be sure to share it with anyone you think would be interested! With this article being sent out, it's come time again to write some more, so I look forward to sharing more music production knowledge with you soon in the coming months!

Finally for this blog post, as has become tradition for the start of each month, let's look back on last months goals, see how we did, and set some new ones for this month! Here's what was set for August:

1) Finish recording the songs for the BTTB album (6 tracks to do)
2) Plan the interludes for the BTTB album (up to 4 tracks) *
3) Sort out the Patreon Page *
(* indicates lower priority)

Overall not a bad month considering that I was away or busy with other urgent work for much of it! 1) although a day late was successfully completed on Sunday and while I haven't started recording the interludes 2) yet, I have started gathering samples and planning them out roughly. Of course the Patreon page remains on the back burner... hopefully I'll be able to finally get back to that soon. So setting goals for September, let's try to keep things simple but challenging:

1) Write 3 more articles for the JabunAudio monthly music production email
2) Finish recording the interludes for the BTTB album (up to 4 tracks) 
3) Sort out the Patreon Page *
(* indicates lower priority)

I've already started writing the monthly articles, and aim to have those finished by the end of the week which gives me almost 3 weeks to work on recording the interludes. I'm really not sure how difficult finishing 4 full tracks in that amount of time will be, since they're only short, but will require a fair amount of recording, programming and creative sampling. There's also the issue that much like last month, I'll be away for a few extended weekends as well so I'll have to be efficient with my time during the week. We'll see how it all goes. Again the Patreon page will be a low priority goal this time as I want to keep ahead on the album's production schedule. Wish me luck! Any goals for you this month? Feel free to comment and share below, and all the best with your targets too!

That's it for this week! The following week for me will undoubtedly be busy finishing off writing those articles before getting stuck in with some BTTB interludes. Should be busy! Until next time, I hope you have a great week whatever you're up to and thanks as always for supporting JabunAudio and my various music projects. Take care and see you in the next one!