Journeys Unknown - Stage Two, R&D - Course Correction

In this post I'd like to talk about some of the challenges, decisions and research which have led me to refocus and refine the project.

In the 2025 summer break, between second and third year, I started working on what would become 'Journeys Unknown'. I started working on the concepts, planned the arrangements and themes, and created a mood board to help inspire and remind me of the direction of the music. Initially, it was a longer project, with more tracks, closer to an album, but it soon dawned on me that if I was going to get my other assignments finished on time and be able to complete this project, I would need to reduce the scale and break it into more manageable chunks. I settled on 5 tracks instead of 9 and reduced the amount and type of equipment I was planning to make. I had originally planned to make a colour box, an E-bow, and spring and plate reverbs along with the pieces seen in previous posts.

I started to write some music and got a demo of 'Sleeping With a Screaming Mind' down pretty quickly but as I tried to follow it, the process slowed, so I sifted through years of old demos, ideas, and DAW projects looking for riffs or pieces of music I could reuse or build upon. However, nothing was really speaking to me or the project, it all felt old, boring and already used. I think I started to get a bit of writer's block alongside Imposter Syndrome. I became frustrated with my efforts not being good enough. When I eventually found a couple of bits I was able to stick together, the result was a song I named 'Executive Dysfunction'. This song was the hardest to finish and is very different from the initial demo I made. The other two songs, 'Recently Deceased' and 'Slow' came together out of jam sessions with my girlfriend, who despite not being a musician, kindly agreed to play some Synths. She's also responsible for the cover art of the EP.

I was getting distracted and spending more time than I liked playing video games and doomscrolling through Instagram. I'd specifically started a new account for this project, after having had a year without social media, and it quickly returned to being a distraction I did not need. I realised why I had deleted it in the first place. I still have the account and post updates from my laptop, but the app is long gone from my phone. Not long after this we had a lecture on focus, distraction and flow state and the book 'Stolen Focus' by Johann Hari was recommended to the class. This book investigates how social media and modern living has affected our attention spans and our ability to concentrate and focus on things for long periods of time. 

 

 

One of the more technical problems I encountered proved to be beneficial to my writing process. At the start of the project I was using Cubase to write the demos but after updating the OS on my MacBook, it became slow and started to stutter during recording and playback. I spent an afternoon moving all the projects into Logic Pro, expecting to carry on from where I left off, recording DI's and programming the synths and midi drums by hand. This was time consuming, so out of curiosity, I opened up one of the Session Drummer tracks in Logic to see if it would help and speed up the writing, and within 20 minutes, I'd used it to re-program my entire drum track and it sounded better too. I just recorded my parts and set the drummer track up to play along to my bass tracks to do the rest. After I got results I was satisfied with, I transferred the midi into 'Superior Drummer' and made the final adjustments.

Alongside the EP was a research project aimed at 'De-canonising traditional recording spaces and exploring DIY practices surrounding audio engineering'. The research I conducted and people I talked to led me to changed my outlook on the subject, showing me that DIY doesn't really exist. It's more of a buzz word for being self reliant and just doing the jobs yourself... and so, I shifted my research into finding out how and why some musicians become audio engineers and producers while others do not.  

I have interviewed several of my tutors and also explored my own creativity and processes. Throughout this research, I have found that studios are still a valuable part of many people's processes, however, they are not always necessary when it comes to creativity or producing professional results. Some people prefer a hybrid approach, doing 90% of the work by themselves at home, and then using a studio to finish off the last 10% of their work. Others find being on the clock in commercial studios and in unfamiliar environments to be stressful. The musicians I've spoken to that don't have a need or interest in recording or engineering, even on the most basic levels, may be following an equally valid but different path. Some might just want to play in covers bands and enjoy the thrill of the weekend gigs, while others may not think they're good enough or might be put off by the cost of the equipment but but still enjoy playing for themselves. 

Personally, its not about the console or the toys, it's more about having a dedicated space, and the right environment which allows me to work and be creative without hindrance or distraction. I read about an experiment on office spaces in another book recommended to me by one of my tutors called 'Messy', by Tim Harford, which talks about the effect being in control of your own work space has on your productivity. In short, the people allowed to rearrange and 'mess up' their office cubicles were far more productive than those who had to follow the rules and were not allowed to personalise them... it's obvious really, isn't it?
 

In my opinion, and based on my research, I believe self reliance can be boiled down into: creativity, control and cost, and they each weigh differently depending on the type of people and the project. 

Creativity and Control: these two go (more often than not) hand in hand. Creativity is often influenced by having 'control' over certain factors, other than the actual production of the work. Collaboration, or lack of it, can influence the output both positively and negatively, For example: Having 100% control over every detail of your art can be both good and bad. Working with a writing partner or other collaborators can push the work into unknown territory, which can be great for the song. On the other hand, not having that filter for the ideas to pass through can result in the song potentially being not as good as it could've been. Some partnerships can end up being one-sided, and it's possible to lose control of the project or creative freedom due to differences in personality or artistic vision. Some other people just like working alone or they may have struggled to find collaborators early in their careers and simply carried on by themselves. 

Cost: It's simply cheaper both financially and emotionally to work by yourself, there's little need to deal with people or hire places to work unless the project calls for it. Time wise, the cost varies depending on the project. Personal projects allow you to progress at your own pace, while projects involving others often require you to stick to deadlines and budgets. 
To wrap up, whether it's a home studio or a commercial studio, is irrelevant to some extent. People have been self reliant and 'home recording' since the days of Joe Meek and Les Paul in the 1950's, who both designed and built their own equipment for no other reason than they needed it or it didn't exist. More modern examples of self reliance include people such as Prince and Devin Townsend, both formidable musicians and equally as proficient as engineers and producers who are in full control of their musical vision.