Back in March 2025, I suddenly went dark. I deactivated my social media and abruptly halted my ongoing series of audio/visual releases called: prject headphnes.  A few people reached out to me to get the inside scoop, but I wanted to write out my reasoning here; in my safe space.

So, in the middle of finishing VIIBRANCY my mother suddenly passed away.  I powered through that project as a coping mechanism and probably as a distraction.  When it was done, I went hard into promoting it (ran Youtube ads, set up a Shopify store, and attempted to do a pre-sale on a limited run vinyl).  Then the reality hit. I wasn't able to hit my pre-sale numbers. So I cancelled it and refunded those few wonderful supporters.

With prject headphnes I had a vision to make very simple and slow, cinematic style lo-fi beats fused with ai generated videos. I was going to release a single every month accompanied by the visual. I made 2 (however I did finish the beats and they are available here)  But the caveat was, I was using my own graphic design skills to add unique flavor and then blending it all together.  The process was arduous and rather costly, and each 30 second video was taking nearly 2 weeks to render.

At the same time I think the death of my mother finally hit me, and it was overwhelming.  The beats were not fun, the sharing was not fun, and the lack of “numbers” was a bit soul crushing considering the effort involved.  If you know me, then you know I can ghost society in a moment, I've always been like this, so that's what I did.

I think the reason I am not known or successful in my music career is I tend to quit when I am on the cusp of reaching the next level. I did it with Ostrich Head right before the group moved to L.A.  I eventually came back, but in a managerial role with a small input on some of the later productions.  While living in L.A. I signed a big sync deal with MTV studios, and starting getting IMDB credits for indie films scores and sound design.  Then I quit that.

I wish that was the last instance of me “quitting” but it isn't, yet I won't go into more detail; you get the point.

This time, it was simply a break, and it's done. I did pull my music from streamers(aside from bandcamp), and packed up my gear and physically put it in storage, but I wasn't as melodramatic this time and sell everything off.  I did a little traveling, made peace with my mother's passing and relied on my life partner and dear friend for support and guidance.

I've been producing for over 30 years.  It's in my soul, I can't quit. It brings me purpose and joy. I still get excited finding a dope record to sample, and have constant thoughts about music creation and finding unique ways to create sound.  I want to continue to create and share. I have aspirations to do film score and video game soundtracks. I think I'm going to start doing live beat sets, and I'm planning on wrapping up another lyric based album soon.  I've been planning a recording session in Washington State for a year, that I'm excited for and have been working on the pre-production for that project.

Breaks are good and burn out is real. If you take anything from this, I hope it's a lesson you can learn from my past behavior. Don't quit, ever. Don't give up. Fame, numbers, algorithms, it's all fake shit. I listen to fantastic producers who have 5 follower's on Spotify. Don't let a number dictate what is good or bad.  It was never supposed to be like that anyway. Just.Keep.Creating.