I'm Still Alive! and also featured in a rhythm game again!

I routinely wake up to at least 3 more comments every single day of people either writing obituaries, asking whether or not they should, or desperately wishing for me to come back. I will, I hope, I really hope, but in the meanwhile I've been working! I'll have another feature track coming out soon enough, and another exciting project or two lined up, as well as an older original of mine confirmed to appear in another fresh rhythm game rather soon! Please look forwards to that too.

The price to pay for being successful enough to get work is that I have to do work... And to be honest the spark in me that made me tool around with fun projects of my own has been struggling to stay lit. Well, that is, if it's been alight at all the past couple of years or so.

I have a lot on my mind that I don't know if I can really put to words. Whatever the state of mind was that originally triggered me to make the music I used to just doesn't seem to be there anymore, but I really don't want to give up on it just like that. Then again, it just doesn't feel right to keep saying "oh I'll come back" fully thinking I will, but never really being able to. I do have a couple remixes in the works, new SRB theme, Umamusume stuff, things I started when I wasn't chasing deadlines, but now once again, I've got the sort of project proposals I just can't refuse given how little I've been able to make for myself.

It's hard to call it burnout, when I still manage to make music whenever I'm commissioned to do so, but I really don't know what else it would be. Right? Utterly clueless as to what the play here is. Maybe I should just get a real job. "Giving it time" clearly doesn't seem to be working, although I haven't exactly ever gone very long without a deadline knocking on my door the past two years...

I think the biggest headache here is that the longer I go without making anything, the harder it seems to be to get back into it. I'm sure anyone who's ever done anything in their lives knows exactly what I'm talking about. The more you delay, the more you need to make up for the delay. The longer you go, the less able you become, yet the pressure gets much worse. That sorta thing. Shit, man. I'm finally able to do what I've kinda always aimed for, so now it feels a bit like I've no further to go, yet nevertheless it feels like I'm just actively betraying you guys, the audience. Worst part of that is that that just doesn't seem to ignite that primordial motivation to just make shit in me the way striving for something higher did. I'm really sorry. Feels just tremendously selfish.

To end on a higher note, the next commission going live I might not be able to post at all. I've been commissioned to return to my roots pre-eurobeat to procure a CD exclusive track. Which, by the way, I think is genuinely one of my best works in years. I'm really truly happy how it came out. One of the very few "wins" I've really had in a looooong while. I also got to play a bigger part than a guy like me should in pulling some strings behind the scenes. More info when I'll be able to provide more info!

Thanks for reading, really. And if any of you have any nuggets of some real proper advice on how to deal with ruts of this scale, do share. I'd appreciate that.