Hi everyone and hope you're having a great start to October so far! It's time for the monthly blog post and Patreon rewards, and this time I have a brand new track from Better Than The Book & Jabun "1314" (the track I proposed with) to share with you before some studio and project updates and the usual setting and reflecting on monthly goals. Let's start with the new single!

On August 22nd 2021, the night of our 100th full moon together, I proposed to Eva with a specially written song "1314", a mixture of my 2 musical personalities Better Than The Book & Jabun with influences from her favourite musicians too, and she said YES! WOOOOOT! A huge thanks goes out to Eva for being my everything buddy and now fiance, all her support during the ups and downs throughout the years, and for letting me share this track with you all. It was made for her ears but I hope you enjoy it too!

Thank you also to everyone else who's been a part of my musical journey and our relationship all these years so far too: all our family and friends, everyone who's played the music and spread the word, and my closest regular supporters on Patreon with special mention to the top tier contributors Michael White and Nathan Puray! We couldn't have got this far without all your support and I'm super excited to see (and hear) what comes next! My love to you all and thanks so much!

1314 is available now on Bandcamp and should be out on iTunes, Spotify, Amazon, etc... imminently if not already:

​https://betterthanthebook.bandcamp.com/album/1314-single

And you can also listen to the song on YouTube, SoundCloud and Newgrounds:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uAUGCsr60kg
https://soundcloud.com/bttb_uk/1314a
https://www.newgrounds.com/audio/listen/project/1735813

But what does "1314" mean and what's the deal with the artwork?! If you want to know the full story behind the song then you'll have to become a supporter on Patreon, and with such a big release, there's a tonne of rewards out in celebration too! All patrons now have downloads for 1314 and full-resolution artwork, and for the $10 patrons I'm also sharing with you another ambient LIVE Jabun jam, this time from my 2021 808 Day celebrations! On top of this there'll be the usual monthly project/studio updates in which I'll be sharing with you some pictures and sounds from my newly completed homemade/recycled spring reverb unit (more on that in a moment)! If that sounds good to you then become a patron for as little as $1 and remember you'll be receiving the entire back catalogue of rewards for your tier too as soon as you sign up including the full Better Than The Book and Jabun discographies and MUCH more. Explore the posts below to see all the details:

$1 rewards: https://www.patreon.com/posts/55832143/
$10 rewards: https://www.patreon.com/posts/55832145/​
Reward Archive: https://www.patreon.com/posts/50344842

Onto some studio updates, I have something super exciting to share with you this month! Remember in the last blog post I mentioned I was building a reverb unit from recycled 1970s Yamaha organ parts? We'll it's now finally complete and ready to share with you! Introducing the JabunAudio "Vintage 'Verb":

And here's a peek under the lid at the electronics and spring too!

The Vintage 'Verb is a super simple single-spring mono spring reverb unit which you can run anything you like into for an instant and oldschool reverb effect; anything from the tiniest subtle added ambience to a complete surfy washout and everything in between! I thought I'd just show some pictures of it here, but for a full deep dive into all the controls as well as an exclusive jamming guitar demo of it, become a Patreon for as little as $1 for the full show and hope you enjoy my noodling! I can't wait to use it on some new tracks!

https://www.patreon.com/NickStanding

Onto some project updates and things, there were no new press features to share this month unfortunately, but that's ok because it's been a super productive month project-wise! I've just about got all the instrumental editing done for Better Than The Book's 3rd album (and then some) which means I can start recording vocals very soon! I've also set up all the horn sessions for tracks where that's applicable (so I can finish arranging and programming the final horn parts) and am currently going through the lyric sheets to make sure the words are top notch before I reach for the mic! There's plenty to get on with on the days I can record vocals, and lots to do on the days I can't too, so I'll definitely be busy with things and hopefully won't reach any roadblocks soon! Wish me luck and hopefully I'll have some vocal tracks recorded by this time next month, and maybe some horn parts done too! 

Finally this week, let's reflect on last month's goals and set some new ones for October! Here's what I set last month:

1) Finish consolidating edits and setting up sessions ready for BTTB vocal recording (5 tracks left)
2) Prep this new track from the proposal for public release and get everything scheduled ready for release.

And a productive month it has been! I wasn't actually expecting to get all 5 tracks done for goal 1) but looks like I'm back on track and on my way to the next steps of recording soon! 2) is all done too with the new track out now! All in all a good show! As for what to set for next month, here's what I had in mind:

1) Finish promo and updating websites etc... for the 1314 single
2) Finish at least one track of vocals for BTTB 
3) Finish arranging and finalise at least one horn part for BTTB
4) Finalise all the lyric sheets for the upcoming BTTB projects

I think these should hopefully be doable, though I'm not sure what the availability for recording will be and how smoothly things will go, so while I hope to get at least one vocal and horn part done, ideally things'll be a little more productive than that. Promo for 1314 is due to finish on Monday anyway so that should be done shortly, and while there are 12 lyrics sheets in total to sort, 4 are already done, so just 8 left to go (and things are mostly settled already too). Things are still a bit up in the air over here so we'll see how everything goes but wish me luck and I hope you all have a productive October too!

And that wraps things up for this month's blog post! I'm not sure what's on the horizon for the coming weeks, but there'll be at least some more Patreon rewards and goals to share with you next month. Until then, I hope you have a great October to come and thanks as always for supporting JabunAudio and my various projects however you can! Enjoy the new music, all the best and take care!

Hi everyone and hope you're having a great start to September! It's been a super hectic time lately with lots of visits and time away from the computer, not a whole lot of music making, but some fun things and big news to share nonetheless! In accordance with the recent updates and changes to the way things are running at JabunAudio, this blog post won't be as in depth as it has been in the past, but for a more detailed rundown of all the news, you can join me on Patreon for a front row seat of all the action:

https://www.patreon.com/NickStanding

And speaking of Patreon, I have some more rewards to share with you this month along with some studio / equipment updates, some big life news, a round-up of this month's press features, and some goals to reflect on and set as usual! Let's get started!

First of all, it's another month and time for some more Patreon rewards! This time, I'll be sharing downloads and the story behind the 2013 chiptune track "Our Adventure" (as well as detailed stories and updates from the studio this month). The $10 patrons will also receive an exclusive acoustic demo from Better Than The Book's upcoming album projects! If that sounds good to you, then become a patron to read more and dive into the action and remember that you'll get all past rewards for your tier too as soon as you sign up. Check out the Reward Archive below which includes the full Better Than The Book and Jabun discographies, Patreon exclusives and much more, and thanks for supporting my music and projects on Patreon!

$1 Rewards: https://www.patreon.com/posts/53164475/
$10 Rewards: https://www.patreon.com/posts/53164473/
Reward Archives: https://www.patreon.com/posts/50344842
​
Some studio updates to share: after a long pre-order wait, an amazing piece of guitar pedal history arrived for me in the post, one of the limited 40th anniversary BOSS SD-1 Super Overdrive pedals! The BOSS SD-1 has been a key part of my sound since my late teen years, and I've been meaning to get a 2nd one for a few years now! I also purchased a load of spare parts for my Yamaha YC-25D organ which came with some parts I don't need including a genuine spring reverb tank! I've been having fun building that into my own custom outboard reverb unit which is sounding great and is just awaiting the finishing aesthetic touches as I type this. It's been a while since I build an effect! The other parts from the purchase include some incredibly rare 1970s electronics which will be useful for keeping my own organ working for years to come (touch wood), and I plan to sell on some of the less useful stuff in the near future!

Next, a quick round-up of the press features this month! BTTB's Hopes and Dreams was featured on The Tank Tribune / Phonograph Vol. 6 playlist on Newgrounds.com! Thanks so much for the sharing the tunes folks and feel free to check out the post here:

https://thetanktribune.newgrounds.com/news/post/1202116

And although it didn't happen last month, I also noticed that my custom oscillator NOISE for the Korg NTS-1 digital synth kit has been shared amongst the community a lot since it was released in May! Check out the May 2021 features below on the JabunAudio press page and super happy to hear people are enjoying NOISE!

https://www.jabunaudio.com/press.html

Onto some HUGE life news I'd love to share with you. I don't often talk about my personal life, but on August 22nd I finally popped the question to my long time partner of over 8 years Eva, and she said YES! WOOOOT! I'm sure it's no stretch to guess that I did it with a newly written and recorded track so there will be a music update coming shortly once I have all the admin stuff sorted for it! It was written for her ears, but I hope you enjoy too! More on that soon!

And finally this month, it's time as usual to reflect on some goals and set some new ones. Here's what I set for August:

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

Goals 2 and 3 went along without a hitch, though unfortunately it's been a much less productive month for BTTB with only 2 tracks out of target 7 completed... I'm hoping to pick the pace up a bit this month, but things are still a bit up in the air at the moment, and as you expect I left the hardest tracks until last too, so things might be even slower than expected. With that said, and the trends I've seen this past month, I'll not be setting many goals for September, but let's go with these:

1) Finish consolidating edits and setting up sessions ready for BTTB vocal recording (5 tracks left)
2) Prep this new track from the proposal for public release and get everything scheduled ready for release.

I'm not sure I'll be able to get these both fully done, but I'll also be keeping on top of Patreon rewards to sort, as well as preparing those extra organ parts for selling on eBay when I can. I have a feeling it's going to be another hectic and maybe less musical month ahead but we'll see how it all goes. 

And that about wraps things up for this month's post! I'll hopefully be finishing off that reverb unit very soon, as well as announcing that new track so be on the lookout for associated posts and stuff online. It's still looking to be very uncertain at JabunAudio at the moment, but until the next post, I hope you have a great September to come and thanks as always for supporting my projects in all the ways you can. Enjoy the music and take care!​

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.

Hi everyone and hope you're having a great (and much cooler) final week of July so far! It's been a busy time here at JabunAudio plodding along with editing for Better Than The Book's 3rd album project as well as getting my final Covid vaccination and being a little bit under the weather as expected in the aftermath. More Patreon rewards to share with you today so let's get straight to that and the rest of the news!

Yesterday was the final Wednesday of the month which means its time for another dose of $5+ Patreon rewards and this time we're continuing with some more soundtracky (but slightly different) stuff with another track from 2013, "Piggyback Ride"!

Piggyback Ride is an interesting one in my catalogue in that it combines orchestral and chiptune elements for a retro videogame-esq vibe with the clarity of more traditional scoring. This piece was originally written for a game on Newgrounds asking for people to submit tunes for the soundtrack, but after sending it over and some feedback, the makers decided to go with something else. I was a bit disappointed at the time as this would have been one of my first compositional rejections, but as I wasn't sure how else to improve on the track, I ended up releasing it as-is for people to listen to at the very least, as I was still pleased with the way it had turned out. As it so happened, while the originally intended audience wasn't so keen on Piggyback Ride, the track was eventually picked up by a MUCH higher profile interested party: EDF Energy & The British Science Association for their online "A to Bee" game which you can still play online:

https://jointhepod.org/teachers/games/a-to-bee-game

It's a great example of how one track even if not initially well received might lead to something big (and that's happened to me a few times throughout my career as I'm sure you know by now). Piggyback Ride has been featured in a number of other multi-media productions since then and is a fun one I look back on with fondness! Since it was designed for use in games as well as for listening, I'm including 2 versions in this months rewards: the looping version which was featured in various games, and an edited version with a fade out for your personal listening pleasure! Grab Piggyback Ride when you become a supporter on Patreon, and listen to the track on YouTube below:

Piggyback Ride: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ukGJmuw057E
$5+ rewards: https://www.patreon.com/posts/53164462/

And for the $10+ patrons, this month you have an exclusive LIVE Jabun ambient modular synth performance to look forward to! Become a $10+ patron to access that and many more rewards now, 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! With the newly updated REWARD ARCHIVE it's never been easier to catch up with all those posts and music downloads you've missed too! I hope you enjoy them!

$10+ rewards: https://www.patreon.com/posts/53164465/
Become a Patron: https://www.patreon.com/NickStanding

Discover the Reward Archive (4th October 2018 -> 1st May 2021): 
https://www.patreon.com/posts/announcing-posts-50344842

That's it for the rewards this time and Piggyback Ride will be available for the $1+ patrons next Wednesday! Something a little different will be coming in the next set of rewards, but until then, I hope you have a great August to come and thanks as always for supporting my music on Patreon! 

Next in the news, in case you missed it last week, it's currently 50% off on anything from the Better Than The Book Bandcamp store to celebrate 2 years of "Hopes and Dreams"! Use the code "2years" and hope you enjoy it!

https://betterthanthebook.bandcamp.com/

Offer ends next Sunday 8/8/21 so grab a discount while you can!

Finally this week, some nice radio news to share as Better Than The Book was back on Button Down Radio with The Hardest Part again! Thanks so much to BDR for sharing the music and you can read more about what they have to say on Facebook:

https://www.facebook.com/buttondownradio5446/posts/2965822327022918

That's it for this week's news! Next time I'll have the $1+ Patreon rewards to share as well as the usual monthly goals to set and reflect on, and we'll see if there's any further exciting updates to share as well! Until then, thanks as always for supporting JabunAudio and my various projects however you can and hope you have a great week to come! Take care and all the best!

​Hi everyone and hope you’re having a great July so far! It's been a super busy time here at JabunAudio since the last post finishing off organ and guitar recording for Better Than The Book's upcoming 3rd album project as well as consolidating edits ready to start recording vocals! Still a few more tracks to edit to make my monthly target but we'll see how it all goes! Meanwhile I have something huge to celebrate with you today from Better Than The Book's previous album! Let's get started with the news and a limited time special offer!
 
Time really does fly and would you believe this week marks two years since the release of Better Than The Book’s 2nd full-length album Hopes and Dreams?!

With 9/10 tracks from the album airing on radio stations from as far as the west coast of the USA, to here in the UK (including 2 tracks on BBC Introducing), to even Australia, a tonne of online features and coverage from various web magazines, and even one track appearing on a ska music compilation album by The Ska Show with Beefy (the second most listened to Ska music podcast in the world), Hopes and Dreams was undoubtedly my most well received project to date, and I want express my sincerest gratitude to everyone who made that happen!
 
A HUGE thank you to the BTTB (not quite yet) LIVE band, Sam, Andy and Eamon, the radio DJs with special mention to Beefy and Melita, Meg, the album’s PR extraordinaire, my subscribers on Patreon with special mention to top tier supporters past and present Michael White, Bob Roberts, David Klein II and Nathan Puray, and of course everyone else who’s made some noise for BTTB over the years! You folks really do make my dreams come true!
 
To celebrate a fantastic two years on from Hopes and Dreams (puns intended), I’m launching my very first Better Than The Book Bandcamp discount sale! From now until August 8th (the end of the weekend following the next Bandcamp Friday), you can get a whopping 50% off anything on the Better Than The Book Bandcamp store below using the code “2years” at the checkout. Enjoy!
 
https://betterthanthebook.bandcamp.com/
 
Or if you’re feeling extra keen, you can grab the entire Better Than The Book and Jabun discographies and more including many exclusive downloads and bonus tracks when you support my music with a front row seat over on Patreon for as little as $1/£1 a month! New rewards are published monthly and I hope to see you there in the comments!

https://www.patreon.com/NickStanding
 
That’s it for this post and I’ll be back with another reminder before August 6th for the next Bandcamp Friday! Next week's post will be announcing the next set of Patreon rewards at the very least, but until then, I hope you have a great week to come and thanks as always for supporting Better Than The Book, JabunAudio and my various music project in all the ways you can! Take care, stay safe and all the best!

Hi everyone and hope you've had a great week since the last post! It's been a lovely one over here, not so much in the studio, but instead visiting my hometown, family and friends for the first time in 11 months (due to the pandemic)! A long overdue and fun visit, and apart from the demolition of a gig venue close to my heart, it seems that most of my usual haunts have made it through this tough past year which is great to know! I also had the pleasure of listening to in the flesh a LOVELY Moog Modular at GAK which was amazing, though also a space-launch away from my budget level at almost £12,000! Whoa! I did however also see a special something which IS at my price range and I now have on pre-order, but I'll wait until it arrives to reveal it! Been meaning to get another one of these for about a year and a half now, but with a special edition released to celebrate its 40th anniversary of uninterrupted production, I thought it'd be very nice to own a limited piece of history! No more clues, and it should hopefully be arriving later this month! Onto the main news for this week, there's not a whole lot to report since I've been away apart from some more $1 Patreon rewards being released! Let's get to it:

As of yesterday, last week's $5 Patreon rewards are now out for the $1 patrons: "Closing scene" and "See Ya Later" (+ an exclusive work in progress studio demo from Better Than The Book's next album 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/50804846/
$1+ rewards: https://www.patreon.com/posts/50804859/
$10+ rewards: https://www.patreon.com/posts/50804790/
Become a Patron: https://www.patreon.com/NickStanding

Discover the Reward Archive (4th October 2018 -> 1st May 2021):
​https://www.patreon.com/posts/announcing-posts-50344842

That's it for the rewards this month and we'll be continuing with more soundtracky work next time!

And that about wraps things up for this blog post too! The coming week looks to be filled with some usual beginning of the month chores/admin such as backing up the computers, as well as sorting out the next few sets of Patreon rewards, and hopefully I'll be back to some organ recording later this week too! Until the next post which'll likely be in a fortnight or on the 29th, I hope you have a great July to come and thanks as always for supporting JabunAudio and my various projects in all the ways you can. All the best, take care and stay safe!​

​Hi everyone and hope you've had a great few weeks since the last post. It's been a super busy time over here recording Better Than The Book's upcoming 3rd full-length album, and by a stroke of good progress and fortune, ALL (ish) the guitar parts are now complete! That includes electric, acoustic AND bass guitar! Great stuff! As such I've moved onto recording organs and piano now which has been incredible fun and is going well! With 9 tracks to do in total, only 3 remain, and I cannot tell you how wonderful it is to be recording with a REAL combo organ this time, my Yamaha YC-25D (see above), rather than just some (still excellent) digital emulations and a midi keyboard! It's not just the sound, but the tactile experience too! Been a blast! As with such good times though, I also realised after taking apart my guitar recording rigs that I missed just one small thing... some feedback in one of the tracks, so there will be some minor guitar parts to pick up once organs are finished... Such is the way! Onto other news, yesterday was the final (Wednes)day of the month and so more $5+ Patreon rewards have just been released! Let's look at that!

For this month's Patreon rewards we're continuing with more 2013 soundtracky pieces, this time a pair of them! "Closing Scene" and "See Ya Later" are variations on the same musical theme both released in May 2013. The first is a musical box style track and the second a subsequent string orchestra version of the same piece! At the time I composed Closing Scene, I'd just been given some new samples to play with including a set of thumb piano notes (if I remember correctly) and I thought it would be fun to compose a simple musical box theme with them. Interestingly, at the same time, one of the rooms in my parents' house where I was living at the time was being redecorated and had no carpet on the floor, giving this really cool and lively ambience. I ended up dragging some computer speakers to the room and playing the piece out loud with a microphone set up to capture the reverb on the other side of the room. Mixing the original dry piece with the live recorded room reverb gave a really nice effect for the final track! I do love taking advantage of these rare acoustic opportunities!

After recording Closing Scene, I got the feeling that there was more I could do with this theme, and by swapping the thumb piano samples for my usual pizzicato strings, I thought it gave a really nice and different vibe. With a few extra tweaks, some added percussion and woodwinds, See Ya Later was created! When I listen to See Ya Later, it evokes images of being in an old wooden floor house, early on a sunny summer Sunday, tiptoeing tired around the house before making my way outside for a day of adventure, like something in a Hayao Miyazaki film. Those of you who have been following my work for years may also recognise See Ya Later as the credits music to much of the Fun Station 4 Kids videos, and indeed this piece was another door-opener for a tonne of amazing collaborations in the years to follow (totalling to over 30 MILLION YouTube views last time I checked)! I really should get back to more of this orchestral work soon (maybe even more variations on this theme), but until then, I hope you enjoy Closing Scene and See Ya Later! 

Grab Closing Scene and See Ya Later when you become a supporter on Patreon, or listen to the tracks on YouTube below:

$5+ rewards: https://www.patreon.com/posts/50804674/
Closing Scene: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6TDdv7YpNYY  
See Ya Later: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SAM40nKQ9UI

And for the $10+ patrons, this month you have the first work-in-progress studio recording demo from Better Than The Book's upcoming 3rd album to look forward to! Become a $10+ patron to access that and many more rewards now, 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! With the newly updated REWARD ARCHIVE it's never been easier to catch up with all those posts and music downloads you've missed too! I hope you enjoy them!

$10+ rewards: https://www.patreon.com/posts/50804790/
Become a Patron: https://www.patreon.com/NickStanding

Discover the Reward Archive (4th October 2018 -> 1st May 2021):
https://www.patreon.com/posts/announcing-posts-50344842

That's it for the rewards this month, and "Closing Scene" and "See Ya Later" will be released to the $1+ patrons next week! We'll be continuing with more soundtracky work in the next set of rewards I'm sure, but until then, I hope you have a great July to come and thanks as always for supporting my music on Patreon! Enjoy!

Finally this week, it's time to look back at last month's goals and set some new ones for July! Here's what I set for June:​
​
1) Finish recording electric lead guitars for Better Than The Book's upcoming 3rd album

Just one goal as I was unsure what the month would have in store, but with all the electric, acoustic AND bass guitars as well as over half the organ/piano parts on the album complete, I think I very much exceeded expectations on this one! Great! Continuing with the BTTB theme, I think the next month of goals should be easy to set:

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

These should keep me busy on top of some other personal goals I need to take care of. 1) should be ok (it's just 3 tracks left, though they're quite in depth), and I think 2) is just that little bit of feedback I mentioned previously, though I'll have to do another check to make sure I don't miss anything else again. For 3), it seems like a good idea to get edits for the instrumental stuff (minus horns and production extras), solid before recording vocals, so this feels like a good idea as to not be overwhelmed with edits later down the line. 5 tracks might be overly ambitious but we'll see how it goes. 4) Should be a piece of cake, just some writing to do! Overall I think it's going to be a busy time, but if I can get goals 1), 2) & 4) complete, and make good progress with 3), that'd be great! Wish me luck and feel free to comment with your own goals below!

And that about wraps things up for this post! Looks like it'll be a very busy month ahead, but we'll see how it goes! I'll be back next week to post about the $1 Patreon rewards, and hopefully there'll be more exciting news to share then too! Until next time, I hope you enjoy the music and are excited for more to come soon, and thanks as always for supporting JabunAudio, Jabun, Better Than The Book and my various projects however you can! Take care, stay safe and all the best! 

Hi everyone and hope you're having a great June so far! It's been a busy few weeks since the last post, mostly recording lead guitars for Better Than The Book's next album, though I did find some time to do some acoustic guitar recording as well as a bit of Jabun jamming / recording too! Productive! If all goes well, I might have ALL the guitar work for BTTB's next album finished by the end of the month, though we'll have to see how it all goes. I suppose it'll be onto organ after that which I'm looking very forward too! Anyways, onto the news for this week, there's a surprise new video to share from World Beyond as well as a special Juneteenth Bandcamp Friday fundraiser tomorrow to help in the fight against racism (always a good thing). Let's get started!

First of all this week, the collaborative music project I've been part of for many years now, World Beyond has just released the final video from its Nobody Asked For This So I Did It album which came out in December 2018: NOT THE END! It's been a grand few years since the album was released and thanks so much for supporting the project over the years! Vlad sure kept this one quiet as even I didn't know this video was coming out and I was playing bass (and guitar maybe) for it! I hope you enjoy this epilogue/conclusion to the album and I'm looking forward to sharing WB's next project with you all soonish (super exciting stuff coming)! Check out the video below:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LtDWwxfJZQ0

And pick up Nobody Asked For This So I Did It on Bandcamp:

https://worldbeyond.bandcamp.com/album/nobody-asked-for-this-so-i-did-it

Finally this week, a special event and time for some serious talk. Tomorrow is a special Juneteenth Bandcamp Friday event to raise funds for some important stuff I think we can all support: putting a stop to racism and making the world a safer and more accepting place for everyone.

Instead of a usual Bandcamp Friday where all Bandcamp's reveune shares go directly to the artists, this Friday June 18th from midnight to midnight Pacific Time, Bandcamp will be donating 100% of its usual cut to the NAACP Legal Defense Fund to support their ongoing efforts to promote racial justice through litigation, advocacy and public education. You can find out more on Bandcamp here:

https://daily.bandcamp.com/features/juneteenth-fundraiser-2021

With the ongoing Black Lives Matter and Stop Asian Hate movements (amongst others), I think it's clear there is something terribly wrong with society which really can't be ignored any longer, and that instead of "not being racist" (which should be obvious), it's time if you haven't already and are able to to actively look out for your friends, neighbours and community to make a stand and say enough is enough, we will not ignore or condone any acts of racism. The same can be said for acts of homophobia, biphobia, transphobia, etc... (and a Happy Pride month to all by the way).

I know it's not always easy or comfortable to talk about this stuff let alone actively do something about it, but if we all make even the smallest effort to look after one another and make the world a better place, I think that'd be pretty neat!

So if you've been thinking of picking up some music on Bandcamp, do it this Friday! It doesn't have to be from me, but whatever you buy I'm sure will help put the world on a better path, and if you do decide to pick up one of my albums, then it really means a lot too. You know where to find my Bandcamp stores below and I hope you're able to help:

Better Than The Book (Ska punk): https://betterthanthebook.bandcamp.com/

Jabun (Ambient and experimental electronic): https://jabun.bandcamp.com/

Nick Standing (other older stuff): https://nickstanding.bandcamp.com/

And if your wallet is empty or there's nothing you want at the moment music-wise, you can help by simply talking to your friends and family about this stuff and raising awareness of the issue. Remember it's not about who's lives matter over who's or one group of people against another, it's about everyone working together to put a stop against racism and allow everyone to live their lives feeling safe and respected regardless of ethnicity, culture or skin colour (or gender or preferences too), and I don't think there's anyone who can reasonably argue against that. Thanks for doing your bit to help however you can.

And that about wraps things up for this post! I'll be continuing with guitar recording as much as I can until that's finished and if there's no post next week I'll definitely be back on July 1st for the next one! Until then I hope you have a great rest of June and Pride Month, look after and be kind to each other, stay safe, keep hydrated, and thanks as always for supporting my projects however you can! Take care and all the best!

Hi everyone and hope you've been having a great and sunny start to June so far! I've been away for much of the past week so there's not been too much going on over here at JabunAudio, but it's been a nice week on my end nonetheless! Finally got my first Covid vaccination too (along with the expected achy arm), so feels like things will hopefully be returning to normal in the UK soon? I hope so! A little bit of lead guitar recording for Better Than The Book since the last post which has been fun, but other than that, not too much to report, so let's just get to some quick Patreon news before setting and reflecting on the usual monthly goals!

As of yesterday, last week's $5 Patreon rewards are now out for the $1 patrons: "Mayhem Market" (+ an exclusive unreleased Jabun demo from the writing sessions of 2019/2020: "Arc-welder" 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/50804671
$1 rewards: https://www.patreon.com/posts/50804654
Become a Patreon supporter: https://www.patreon.com/NickStanding
Explore past rewards: https://www.patreon.com/posts/announcing-posts-50344842  

Finally this week, it's time to reflect on last month's goals and set some new ones for June. Here's what I had set for May:

1) Sort Patreon reward posts for the next 2 months
2) Finish the Generation Supernova promo period
3) Record all but one of the bass parts for Better Than The Book's upcoming album (12/13)
4) Launch my custom white noise generator for the Korg NTS-1 as a downloadable product!

And overall a successful month I think! Patreon rewards have been set, Generation Supernova promo has been concluded, BTTB bass parts are done and I've started on lead guitars already + my custom oscillator for KORG's NTS-1 synth has been released and well received! Not much else to say on that. A productive month! Onto goals for June, maybe it's because I've only just got back from a break, but I've really no idea what to set for this month, as I'm not sure what's going on and what availability I'll have for acoustic recording... As such I'll just be setting one concrete goal this month which should hopefully be doable:

1) Finish recording electric lead guitars for Better Than The Book's upcoming 3rd album

There's 7 tracks left to go, 5 of which are just the solos, though I still need to practice and write those up. If possible it'd be great to start on acoustic guitar or organ recording though we'll have to see how things go and I've got a fair few personal things I need to sort out this month as well. Not much set for this month but hopefully it goes smoothly. All the best with your own goals too and feel free to post them below in the comments! 

And that about wraps things up for this post! As I'm not sure there'll be a lot to report in the coming weeks, I'll be going a bit more sporadic on the weekly blog posts for a little while, but you can be sure there'll be at least 2 updates a month coinciding with the Patreon rewards coming out, and I'll be sure to post up anything interesting in the mean time as and when too! Until the next one, I hope you have a great June to come, stay cool and hydrated and thanks as always for supporting my music in any way you can. All the best, stay safe and take care!