[no disc]
By levelcapybara on May 5, 2024 11:38 pm
Inspired by a childhood of spacing out to the music that played when I booted up my GameCube with no disc in it. It's the sound of a game console in need of a breather, taking a break from storytelling.
Speaking of: I'm taking a break from storytelling. It's time to put down the tale of the necromancer. For now, anyway.
To tell the truth, I started WB 2024 with no plan for one. That changed when I decided I could challenge myself and grow by trying to treat the year as a soundtrack-building exercise. So I started extrapolating melodies, harmonies, settings, characters, plots, etc. from the first three weeks of submissions, and I made it my goal to get to the end of the year with a completed story and soundtrack.
It didn't work - life, and my own limits, got in the way.
But here's what the exercise taught me:
1) Don't commit to a yearlong goal without a yearlong plan mapped out in advance.
2) Don't let the perfect be the enemy of the good.
3) Sometimes it's more productive to do things out of order. Follow your heart, not your outline.
4) Don't fight your mood: write your mood.
5) And most importantly: WeeklyBeats isn't just a yearlong challenge: it's a yearlong journal. Each submission helps a plethora of memories to crystalize: memories of where we, our friends, our families, our colleagues, our communities, and the world at large were at the time. Ultimately, that's the most important story we're telling here.
With these lessons learned, I'm ready to reboot my WB 2024 approach. But I will say this: the things that began to take shape in those previous submissions brought me joy, warts and all. And it meant the world to me that fellow WeeklyBeats people were willing to listen and read along. 
Audio works licensed by author under:
CC Attribution Noncommercial No Derivative Works (BY-NC-ND)
