LOTS of new Videos, more Better Than The Book Radio Play, "Tales of Zale" Month including a LIVE ACTION REMAKE?!? + I got a new sophisticated piece of musical equipment (i.e.: a fun new toy) + more!

LOTS has happened in the 2 weeks since the last update, mainly a lot of new videos to share (but some other stuff too)! Hope everyone had a great Easter weekend. Let's get started!

Firstly, Better Than The Book was on the radio again this week playing alongside artists such as Fall Out Boy this time (a HUGE influence of mine when I was writing the One Small Step EP) which is incredible! Not much other BTTB news to report, though I've had some more writing inspiration, so more ideas have been cataloged for the next album, but it'll be a while until I start work on that. In the mean time, "Channel Surfing" and "Cathode Ray Days" are now streaming on the BTTB YouTube Channel so feel free to give them a listen and subscribe for more music on a weekly basis:

Next on this week's news, Hikarian Animations has announced "Tales of Zale" Month, which I'll be heavily involved in throughout April! You can read about all the details on Hikarian's Blog here, but in summary, there'll be 4 animations coming out, 1 every Thursday in April, most of which I'll be doing the audio post-production for (or in some way involved in at least). It's set to be a busy busy April (first one goes live on the 7th), but no doubt it'll be a fun challenge! To kick you off, here's a trailer for what's to come this month (I was just on audio consultancy on this one):

And as an extra special start to "Tales of Zale" Month, the long awaited Live Action Remake of Episode 1!

APRIL FOOLS!!! But in all seriousness, WOW! I wasn't even in on this! Massive props to Hikarian for managing to pull this off using new footage and the audio I mixed for Episode 1! Great work!

Next up are some more tracks from the "Charlotte's Web" Orchestral commission. This week we have "There Must Be Something More" and "Charlotte's Web". Hope you enjoy them and subscribe to keep up to date with new videos as they arrive. There's lots more left to come!

That's about it in terms of audio/project news this week, but it's been eventful in other ways too! For instance, I finally purchased a brand new toy for the studio, my first physical instrument purchase since starting up this business (and it's been loooong overdue)! It's a portable recreation of some classic 60s - 70s - 80s electric keyboard instruments and their amplifiers and effects boards: The Yamaha Reface CP. Those of you who know me and/or my music well will know that I am quite the Yamaha fanboy with this being the 6th Yamaha instrument to date (unfortunately, I no longer have the old 70s organ from my teen years, but it is immortalised in one of my first ever recordings from waaaay back then "Free of Routine" (gotta appreciate history, though thankfully I've developed since then!)). Electric pianos were also featured heavily in my first track as released Jabun "Bergamot" in 2012 too, and even before actually getting to play a real Rhodes piano a few years back, I've been in love with that mellow oldschool sound. Originally I stumbled upon this instrument by accident: When the reface series was released back in September 2015 I was hugely interested in the YC combo organ model (I still am), but when I went down to the local music shop to try it out, they only had the CP and CS (Classic synth) models on display. I had a quick go on the CP to see how its general feel would be and instantly fell in love with it! The sounds, the feel, the hands-on no-menu-diving compact interface; I was instantly hooked! Since then every time I've seen it in a music shop on display, I've gone to play it for more than just a little while. I was entranced with every vist! So after a while I figured. I gotta get this, but this was during the final few months of the Two Years On album's production and I though to myself, I really DON'T need any extra distractions. As soon as that was over it was straight into orchestral commissions so I thought the same thing to myself again, but finally last week I had some free-time, some spare pennies, and some business investments to make before the tax year is over, and after all those months of waiting I now have a Yamaha Reface CP sitting on my desk! Expect to hear it in my productions soon!

In other other news, it's been an eventful 2 weeks in terms of films and animation and I have been watching intently! Batman V Superman was awesome, definitely on par with Man of Steel, but sad to hear it was not well received by a lot of people... Agreed it had its slow and/or drawn out moments, but the acting, story, music, sound, atmosphere was spectacular. If you haven't seen it, go see it before you make your judgement on it. It was no Fantastic 4 2015 that's for sure (that really wasn't so great...). My bro also got me the soundtrack on vinyl as an early birthday present too which is spectacular! I'm listening to it as I type this. Really looking forward to seeing how the story develops for the other justice league films. On the other spectrum of DC comics, the recent Justice League VS Teen Titans animated film was spectacular! Very well delivered and great to see Raven's origin story especially. A BIG contrast to my usual expectations of the characters in the form of Teen Titans Go! (Brilliant in a completely different way!). Overall I highly recommend for any DC fans out there. Star Wars Rebels, which my brother recently introduced me to, also had its season 2 finale just a few days ago too, which was phenomenal, brutal , ambiguous and left me thinking "Holy **** when is season 3 due to come out?!" Props to everyone involved in that for such a great expansion of the Star Wars Universe I grew up watching (and still do!), and props to the DC film and animation teams too. It's been a great 2 weeks of film watching and inspiration!

And that about rounds things off for this week. The next 4 weeks will undoubtedly be packed full of "Tales of Zale" action so expect a new animation in next week's update (along with the usual video schedule). I am going to be VERY busy this month! I'm dying to make some more of my own music too: something cinematic or electronic or hip hop or a combination of some of those. Hope to be able to fit that at some point! Lots to do, but for now that'll be me signing off. Hope you all have a lovely week and see you in the next update. Thanks as always for reading and supporting JabunAudio and take care!