Age 40 - 1985

Age: 40 - 1985 is a project that's been in development for 2-3 years. On my teleworking days I'd head to my makeshift studio to write parts of songs. Drums are scripted when I'm on site working when I have an hour or only 15 minutes to kill in between assignements. And during these recordings I found myself completely lost as to what I wanted from the project, however, I knew there was something in these songs leading me to believe that it was special. I had to keep going and see it all the way through. This was the hardest project to complete in my years of writing and composing music.

The title "Age 40 - 1985" is an explanation of itself; I turn 40 years old on the release of this record. It signifies how long I've been working on this project and how much I've grown from all the releases that I've created. It also notes that this is the first time I attempt to write a full length record and release it with the intention of celebrating an important time in my life. From the years I've been through a lot I focused on writing through this record to keep this spirit of practice alive and not neglect what I have that is considered a gift. I get to make art without anyone telling me if its wrong or right. I get to celebrate this record the way I want. This project is me at 40yo, free and happy to be alive all the time. Happy because finally things are where they should be for me and where I want them to be.

I must admit that this record is pretty out of control lol. So many blemishes can be found on this album and I decided that I wanted to keep those in there. With Ai being a huge killer in the music industry as of right now I am realizing that humanizing these mistakes and making them be realized are essential to how I'll be continuing this feat in recording. Already the drums are digitally programmed and having to figure out how to make them a bit more natural can be tough. I wish I could play drums the way I program them or have an actual drummer perform these songs, but since this is an at home project I can only use the tools that I have available to make happen.

I hope you all enjoy this record. One day I'll be able to perform this project. For now lets celebrate.


- LST LVS (Art)

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Actually Went to a Concert The Other Day

My former Supervisor / turned music nerd friend invited me to watch LCD Soundsystem play in New Haven last Friday. This was planned a bit ago, but had anticipated it during the week of. I listed to a couple of records of theirs and was sort of digging what was on recorcing, but I think the full experience was realized during the show (which should be the thing). The lead singers' vocals was just incredible and the instrumentation of the band was by far solid and catchy. I don't find myself listenting to much work like this, but with opportunities like these they tend to be a curiousity for me to expand. Sometimes you gotta jump in the pool not knowing how deep the water is.

And of course I enjoyed it. I danced all night like a white girl lol. I haven't moved like that in years, but it was also kinda interesting that my body didn't necessarily feel sore. I have to thank Muay Thai for all the stretching and cardio I intensly do during the 45 to an hour I'm there. I also blame all the biking I try to do when I'm tellaworking.

Check this band out if you haven't yet. I gave it a chance and had a great time!


- Concert Goer Bueno

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Social Media Experiment

@lst_lvs This is Day 2 promoting my full length album “Age 40 - 1985”. Follow me on this journey!! #mathrock #midwestemo #emo #lstlvs ♬ original sound - LST LVS

For the roll out of this project I'm conducting an experiment for this record. Recently I had downloaded the Tik Tok app and made a good amount of videos to start the roll out from September 1st to 29th. As of late the landscape as an artist is pretty cruel and everyone wants to be on top of the game. I for one don't give a shit, but curious to know how one could get engagement for a record.

The plan was to use my old school digital video camera to shoot some stuff and have a template ready so that videos are easy to render on Adobe Premier. These can be simple videos made merely of me doing a video self portrait or a video of me doing simple things. The roll out had already begun and it's been interesting to say the least.

I'm doing this because I want to celebrate two things:

1. Turning 40
2. Releasing my *first* official full length record

After that I'm not sure what the hell I'm going to do lol. If anything I'll just keep it there for the archive. Doing this promo stuff is exhausting and I'm not really good at PR, but I need to learn how to exercise those muscles. Probably on the next promo I'll be doing the same thing where I'm just promoting other work and stuff with the templates in mind.

What's been fun is using my FlipCamera to shoot some of these types of vids and I'm kinda glad that I got this thing. It's so crappy hahahahaha. But when you're doing home movies that's what you should expect. It's giving me some ideas on how I can make other videos in the next few months just based on how I process certain things. Other than that I think that I'll keep at it with the posting and see what happens from there. I'm not very optimistic about the roll out, but we'll see what happens towards the end of the series. After that who knows?

- Arthur (the Artist)

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