April 20, 2018
Five years ago today, I decided I wanted to be a music producer. One year ago today, I quit my day job. Now I’ll provide you with an update on my reality. I’ll be as honest as I can. No sugar coating, just an honest assessment of the last 12 months. Here goes.
Overall, the experience of being a full-time music producer has been way more up-and-down than I was able to truly anticipate. The highs I get from making a universe out of nothing are incredible, when they happen. It is beautiful. In each song I make, I try to create a whole world. I dive in as deep as I can go, becoming the God of Trazer land, bringing to light hidden corners my imagination. That is what I love about making music, the pure creation of it. Making something beautiful out of nothing.
But interspersed between these highs are some pretty devastating lows. I sometimes get quite depressed, where I just feel like everything I’m doing is for nothing, and that my life is a joke, that I’m so delusional to think that I am a “great” musician. Trying to make it as a musician is like pushing against a brick wall, and everything I do makes no difference. I have fans who occasionally tell me to keep at it and never stop making music, etc., and that truly helps. But some days it’s not enough.
I don’t have a lot to show for this past year. I’ve released a few tracks, but it’s not the prolific outpouring I had imagined. I have SO many tracks in progress, but it feels impossible to finish them. I can see my music progressing, in terms of technical production quality. But the better I get, the higher my standards, the longer it takes. And since my standards increase at a rate faster than I can release the music, I simply end up working on tracks forever, slowly tweaking and improving over months and years. Progress is slow, and you can’t force creativity.
It can also be really hard to motivate myself when I’m not accountable to anyone. I’m my own boss, and that means flexibility and freedom. But maybe too much of it. Some days are spent trying to be productive, but having no idea what that even looks like. I can always start another song, but I have too many in progress anyway. I can write a blog post, or work on my website, or some other administrative task. Really, one of the hardest things about this last year is that it’s been really hard to relax. In other words, I always feel like I SHOULD be working, so I feel anxious when I’m not. That creates a kind of feedback loop that makes me more and more anxious, which is terrible for creativity and productivity. So I have all of this “free” time to make music, but I feel an overwhelming pressure to do it, which makes it less inspiring and less fun. That’s essentially what it boils down to: music is becoming a source of stress, and it’s not as fun as it used to be. That is terrifying.
My whole life, I’ve acknowledged that people tend to externalize their existential discomfort. They say things like, “Once I have so-and-so, I’ll be happy,” or “Once I’m married and have kids, I’ll be happy,” or “once I’m a full-time musician, I’ll be happy.” Basically, people tend to blame the world for their unhappiness. I’d be happy except that [FILL IN THE BLANK]. And so people never have to face their own demons because they refuse to believe that their suffering is their own doing.
I’ve never fully appreciated this aspect of the human condition until this year. Before I quit my day job, I suffered from what I’ll call, I’ll-be-happy-when-I-quit-my-day-job syndrome. So I quit my job and moved to California. Suddenly I had everything I ever wanted. Free time to make lots of music, a beautiful wife to love and support me, closer proximity to my family, a bunch of friends who are nothing but encouraging. But even with all that, have I been happy? At first, I was. But lately, not exactly. And this fact really drives home the point. There’s no thing that can make me happy. I have to make myself happy, from the inside out. Really, with all of this “free” time, I’ve been experiencing a sort of existential crisis.
Of course, MONEY is a big thing. I must soon start making money, to be able to live and retire comfortably. Can I do that by making music? Maybe, but not yet. With both my wife and I living on her income, I feel guilty when I spend money, and yet music stuff is fucking expensive.
Ultimately, the last year has made me realize that I am responsible for taking care of my self and my happiness. It may sound obvious, but it’s not. YOU are responsible for making YOU happy. How do you do that? I don’t know, but the people in your life make all the difference. Friends and family are everything. Love is the most important thing.
In some ways, it’s a weight off my chest just to admit that I’m not entirely happy making music full time. I’ve tried it a number of ways, and it’s messy. It’s up-and-down. It’s beautiful. It’s inspiring. It’s depressing. It’s anxiety-provoking. It’s a lot of things. But I’m almost ready to try something else. I think it’s about time I started thinking about going back to work as an engineer.
I haven’t made any decisions one way or another, but I think I’ll probably go back to a day job in the next couple of months.
Thanks for listening. I love you.
<3
Anthony / Trazer
P.S. All that said, I’m still super excited about several tracks I’m working on, and I will release them as soon as I can. Stay tuned.
P.P.S. Don’t worry, I don’t plan to ever stop making music completely. Part of me is optimistic that getting a day job would re-inspire me, not to mention the extra cash I could spend on music equipment.
P.P.P.S. Happy 4/20 😉
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