Produced, mixed, and mastered by me!

During the making of this EP, a common theme/reoccurrence over the course of the project was my fear of death. I think existentially every day and sometimes it's good, but most of the time it really scares me. I constantly worry that I'm not doing everything I need to do to maintain a fulfilled life,  but what is a fulfilled life? It's a subjective matter, so there's no concrete answer. You decide what's fulfilling to you and that's just part of growing and learning more about yourself.   For me, that process meant having anxiety attacks one after another thinking about this physical world being all we have to experience and the constant stress of not accomplishing every goal I've set for myself yet. One constant that has always made me feel like there's more to this than we'll ever be able to comprehend is music. When my father passed in my middle school years, music was all I ever used for an outlet. No one that I knew understood what it was like to see your friends with their dad and think about how blessed they are to be able to hug them, call them their hero, and hear their voice. It was fucking difficult to process and every once in awhile (as I'm writing this, cool) it still is. But when I sit down and make noises on a laptop, everything goes away. I don't  think about death, I don't think about what I haven't done yet, I don't even think about my food getting cold right in front of me. I get so caught up in the moment that I can't be anywhere but the present. It's a beautiful feeling. In those moments, I feel like the person I'm supposed to be just comes to visit for awhile to remind me this is where I'm going to be as long as I'm patient and persistent. This project is titled "After This" because I'm finding more peace with not knowing what's going to happen. I'm just here and all I can worry about is right now, not what hasn't happened yet. I've learned to be more thankful for the walks with my dog and my girlfriend in the morning, hearing from my mother, hugging my little brothers, and the quality time I get with my friends. This is me finding my peace. I hope you enjoy this project. I feel blessed if you even read this far and even more blessed that you took the time out of your life to step into my acoustic world. Thank you. 

- J

After This

Inspired by “Welcome to Forever” and “Under Pressure” Logic. Those boom bap beats and some piano? Yup. Make a boom bap beat and add some upbeat synths and the product is ultimate happiness until you get to the mixdown. 

I named this track 9-5 because it reminds me of working an hourly job Monday- Friday and the amazing feeling of waking up on a Saturday knowing you don’t have to do a damn thing. Mini vacation mode initiated. 

This track is just happy. Idk.  Think about good stuff when you listen to it. You’re awesome. Think about how awesome you are. Think about how awesome your friends or family are. 

Awesome.

Nine2Five

Ahhh probably my favorite beat on this EP. I actually made the harmony for this probably 8 months before I ever did anything with it. It was just the harmony at the intro on an 8 bar loop. Eventually I made it into a hip hop beat, because I got BIG old school Wiz vibes from it. My girlfriend and I got drunk one night and we were sifting through older beats of mine and this popped up. It just had the date I made it for the name (I hate naming projects). We played the beat and after probably 5-10 minutes of drunken freestyling (we’re lame, but we’re fun. Judge me), I was like “maybe I should try to make an actual track out of this” and the next day I had the basics of the track finished. I didn’t look away from my laptop for probably 14 hours that day. The nostalgic energy in this track trapped me at my desk until I had every idea out. One of my biggest fears is death because I honestly don’t have a concrete answer for what happens after this. Everyone has their opinions, but no one actually knows. Sometimes it really haunts me. That being said, the nostalgia in this beat made me reflect on everything, good and bad. It was one of those times where you slip out of reality and REALLY think about everything you’ve gone through. That being said, this track makes me feel released. I felt so much peace when I finished this that I cried and hugged myself listening to it in my car. I’ve made tracks so much more complicated but this one hit me hard. I imagine that after my time has passed, this will be what I I hear as I slip into the abyss of nothingness I and I’d be 100% okay with that. That being said, I hope you love it & thank you for listening to this. It means more to me than you could ever imagine.

Afterlife

I don't really like making hard tracks, but this one was just for fun. All I listen to is harder music whether it be hip hop or experimental bass genres and it was actually cool feeling like I was part of that squad for a whopping 3 minutes and 12 seconds. Back to making pretty music

TriplePack

Now I’m ballin. Not really. This track was the bane of my existence. I couldn’t figure out how to mix this down for my life but I finally figured it out.. I think. Either way this was actually a track I made because I was bored and I loved the space in the harmony so I just took it and ran with it. In the prechorus I hear “nothing special” even though that’s not what she says. But I like it because it reminds me to not let my ego get in the way of anything. I’m never too good or too bad for anything. I’m just here, traveling through this weird ass plane of existence trying to make this experience worth something. On the other hand, the energy in this track makes me feel like I’m about to go accomplish something great. Whether it’s getting great savings at your local grocer, doing something new, taking chances, listen to this and let it make you feel like the awesome human you are before you make this world yours :)

Nothing Special

When I first started dipping in sound design, this track was sort of a break through for me. I felt like I found the sound I was looking for after months and months of sitting there staring lifeless at my screen trying to figure something, literally anything out. I’ve always been very self conscious of my art, but before I even finished the mix down I fell in love with the nostalgia and dissociative elements of this song. Half the time I’m living in the past, but this one made me feel like I can still love/romanticize/think about  the past, but the be best I can be in the present.

Need You Again

This one was fun to make, mix, and share with my close friends. I rarely mess with vocals and don’t really know anyone that’s a great singer, so I started taking advantage of my splice membership and began digging until I came across this gem. Once I heard that sample, boom it was 10 hours later and I was sitting with a track that was 90% complete. For the most part I listen to harder music, but I can’t help my love making chill, pretty beats. This one moves slower than what I normally prefer, so I had to switch it up at the end. I love pop punk so I had my cousin send me some guitar chugs (you’re the best, Zach) and I actually ended up making the guitar solo at the end myself. I have no clue how to play a guitar, so I went into my synth, made a guitar sound, and added some processing on it (Ableton plug-ins are top tier) and boom I had the solo ripped out. I still feel like a noob when it comes to sound design, so that was a really cool moment for me. I'm sure it's really not that impressive in the producer world, but that was one of those problem solving moments where I was like "I can make a sound do whatever I want. This is SWEET" It definitely veers away from the initial sound and emotion the track conveys, but music has no rules and I love the idea of rocking out after going through a lovey dovey moment. Middle school me appreciates the hell out of this outro. I hope you do too.

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