War And Nuclear Love Finalised, Poetry Night, Knutsford

Two full days. Finalised all album admin yesterday; War And Nuclear Love is now scheduled for release on 3 July 2026. Then started work on some full frame videos, incorporating the subtitles. This stage is complete.

In the evening attended the Creative Crewe Poetry Night. Carol is always a joy to meet and full of enthusiasm. If the aim of a performance evening is excitement, showmanship, and pzazz, this had none - it was as dreary as a Catholic funeral, and about half of the poems were poor simple rhymes by simple folk. No amplification meant that the poets were too quiet, many completely inaudible. Despite this, several of the poems and performances were very good. One highlight was a prose poem by Iain Chalmers who with great brilliance described a vehicle crash of books, with each genre of book; limericks, 'chic lit', medical encyclopediae; affecting the description of the event. The inability to hear the poems, and the incredible slowness and poor organisation of the night, which overran by 30 minutes, were downsides, but the warm company and meeting friends there a highlight, and perhaps this is the main reason for such events anyway.

Today, a visit to the Oil Art Advisory, which is always a joy. Delivered 6 paintings to them and collected 4 frames to fill with something.

I also realised that my 'Monsters of Spring' painting on BlueSky was flagged as a sexually explicit image, and hid it, which I found annoying. Some slight 'nudity' of a computer model true. Such labels may harm my reputation on there, I'd have happily deleted the image instantly if I'd have noticed this label. I'll avoid any hints of nudity from now on.

One small job today, updated Prometheus to allow floating point beats-per-minute. Of course the program uses floating point speed internally anyway. There are occasions when this setting may be useful, for example if you need to half the tempo of a song which is 135 BPM. This change was pretty simple to implement but isn't fully tested.

WANL Album Admin

A satisfying and full day of work on War And Nuclear Love. First assembled the sheet music for publication and finalised the lyrics booklets, then made a slight lyric change. Some words in the title track were:

I take my fuse
And masturbate as I muse on

I changed this to:

I take my fuse
And I think of God as I muse on

The word 'masturbate' would label the song, and therefore album, as 'explicit' and would limit the scope of its release, which was something of a factor in my deciding to change it, but the primary reason is that the word was a distraction in the song, overly strong. The more subtle (yet still implied) second version is a better lyric.

This change meant re-singing that line, which I did today, and invisibly blended it with the older take. With this, the music was complete. The album was listed in draft on Bandcamp, sent for release, and updated on my website. Also added more artwork pages, so now the iTunes booklet will include the lyrics. Filed and deleted the temporary files, the vocal recordings etc., created the MP3 stub files (if I ever need MP3 versions), proofed the music, burned an archive CD, and lots of other important admin work.

Most of the album is now complete, but I still need to create Spotify Canvas animations, full screen animations for YouTube, and register the music with more music authorities. I can do that when the release is approved.

This evening, made some preparations and announcements for the sale on Steam.

War And Nuclear Love Work

Final day of sheet music for War And Nuclear Love. At times I think that nobody will ever play any of this, and that my days, week, years of working on this tedious and difficult sheet music is pointless - but this is not certainly true; there are two main reasons. First, that nobody else bothers, and second, that data integrity has been shown to be an important driver of success and civilisation. I file and record my work in great details because such work is part of the purpose of life itself. Either way, if I'm ever to play these live I really find this useful, so a couple of days work to transcribe an album isn't so bad. I managed to transcribe the complex guitar parts in 'After The Battle' today, and the music for 'Post-Apocalyptic Playground'.

By 3pm the draft scores were complete, but I had lots more art to create, at least for the booklet and iTunes booklet, so I really needed to make a few more full CD booklet pages, and a CD surface while I'm at it, although there are no plans for a CD at the moment.

One other job today was launch the Goodreads Giveaway for The Many Beautiful Worlds of Death. This week-long promotion give away a free copy of the Kindle book, with kind requests for a review from the winners of this lottery.

War ANL Sheet Music Day 1

A full day working on the sheet music for War And Nuclear Love. Started with the more difficult tracks, first 'Radioactive', then 'Remembering Hans Blix', which required hand transcription, then the long songs 'Written on Rice', and the title track. More tomorrow.

More War ANL

A full day and evening of work on War And Nuclear Love. The tracks needed some essential final changes to the start and end parts of each track. This morning I extended the start to the title track to blend it with the prior 'Radioactive'. This won't be the case on the stream version though, only a future (and perhaps unlikely) CD version.

I then went into the garden and recorded the old rusty luggage trolley, which can fold out. Flexing this resulted in a suitably creepy metal swing sound, perfect for the zombie park on Post-Apocalyptic Playground. Then, finally recorded the vocals for the title track. I've changed some of the words. Verse 2 now reads:

Look at the switches
The flashing lights
There's something of a Christmas morning here

Handsome generals
Encourage me to play
And I've nothing better to do today

I pray and hide
God tells me he's on the side of

War and nuclear love etc.

Added the new vocals to the song this afternoon, and added some harmonies for the 3rd lines of these verses (though not the Christmas line, this sounds better without the harmony, it's more conversational than musical). The final step was the 'solo' for this song, which I'd forgotten about. I grabbed the guitar and spent an hour experimenting. Playing chords to the part seemed to sound better somehow, but nothing was quite right. I took a break at 3pm, then decided to record power chords for the final chorus (easy to play now the key is up, simply E-min, C-Maj, A-Maj, E-Maj/Emin). Then played a simple lead solo in an instant for the proper solo part. Thus, the song is complete.

I've noticed that many tracks have a slight tendency to be stronger on the left, perhaps due to my preference for that ear. I've adjusted Post-Apocalypse to match.

Overall, I'm happy with this EP, particularly the new tracks. My singing and production skills have never been better, nor has my keyboard and guitar playing, not that I've ever been much of a guitar player. So, this is a good time to at least create some music, and I am keen to get that old song of 'Written on Rice' out there; and the war theme seems to be culturally appropriate...

Some slight cover changes:

Tomorrow I'll charge into the sheet music, this may take two days.

War And Nuclear Love Progress, Purpose of Music

A busy 24 hours working on the new album. Last night I had to decide whether to work on a full album, or an EP. An EP would mean 6 tracks or fewer, but there is little time for an album; that would probably take up at least another full month and I'm already getting bored with the project. My key motivation was to produce something to enhance and match the Radioactive theme and 'Written on Rice', good tracks that are ageing away and ready and ripe for release. The 6 track limit has been reached, so I decided to call it an EP, and ditch the possible additional tracks. One called 'Einstein', which was in the earliest of stages is now filed, along with a heavily electronic pop song currently called 'Every Day and a Day', which is largely complete apart from the lyrics. The gentle track called 'At the End of Life There's Hope' is again filed away for the future.

It also means there will be no room for the original mix of Radioactive from the game itself. The version on here is a new recording made in Prometheus rather than Noise Station. The bass and high squeals are a little more under control in the new recording.

So the track list will be:

1. Radioactive
2. War and Nuclear Love
3. After the Battle
4. Post-Apocalyptic Playground
5. Remembering Hans Blix
6. Written on Rice

This morning, extended the Hans Blix song, and have extended the intro to 'After the Battle' too, then got to work on the cover art, starting with new photographs. The result looks rather like that Albrecht Durer painting, quite unintentionally.

I need to finalise the music as soon as possible, but 'War and Nuclear Love' still needs the final vocals. I'll have to work on the sheet music and Spotify Canvases as quickly as possible, all to be ready for my self-imposed deadline of next Saturday. It won't be released for some months though, until after The Myth Of Sisyphus has run its course, so I can defer this work.

In other news I've sold my first works at the Oil Art Advisory, and have sold my first copy of the new Many Beautiful Worlds of Death audiobook, both sales welcome and needed. My music remains an obscure backwater in my oeuvre, but this is the case for most artists today. This won't stop me trying my best in this artform (though I will of course continue to do my best in painting and writing too, and soon).

I was asked on Bluesky what I aimed to achieve with my music - a pertinent question, and not something I'd even considered. Art is, for me, a goal in itself, so my key aim is to represent something meaningful, do my creative best, that which is a bit better and hopefully a bit different from what has come before. My goals can't be social, as my music is largely, but not wholly, ignored by the world and I'm unlikely to ever to receive money or recognition, but I know that this was often the case for many living artists of the past. There are many obscure but brilliant artists that I wish had made more art while they could. I don't want to be like them, so while I have health, eyes, ears, it is something of a duty for me to create at my best.

War And Nuclear Love Vocals

Okay, two slow slow, but progressive days working on the War And Nuclear Love album. Found space to record vocals for 4 tracks yesterday. This always takes a bit longer for new tracks compared to re-recording vocals for older songs, as no matter how much is planned there's always a degree of experimenting with layers.

'After The Battle', and 'Rememebering Hans Blix' are pretty much complete.

I found 'Post Apocalyptic Playground' a little annoying as it hovers around E3 to A3, rather low for my range. In mood, and range, it's a bit like 'The Cat Phone Song', so I reminded myself of this. It also has elements of Bing Crosby's range, so I listened to some Bing while I thought about how to do it. An amusing and light tone is just right for this ironic song, which on the face of it is a romantic walk through the park, but the title and the somewhat zombie-like thumped piano solo taints it all with something darker. After recording these simple vocals, they seem perfect. I've added a harmony layer for the chorus, and some fill vocals here and there.

The vocals for 'War and Nuclear Love' are more complex to work on. I was reminded today just how hugely Jean-Michel Jarre's album structures loom large over my music. He tended to start with quiet, or at least long intro tracks, then at some point added one 'single', a highly melodic tune which seemed to be designed exactly as a single release, then obscure ones which were almost an opposite. I seem to have one pop-type, single-type, hit-type song, which leads into others which have less of that feel. Here, the single is 'War and Nuclear Love'. In production terms it reminds me of 'We Built This City' by Starship from 1985. The backing is very synthetic, and the verses are spartan apart from a bass and pumping synth stabs. My track is loaded with more energy. It may be finished with these first take vocals, but I'm unsure. They certainly sound thin and lonely compared to the fat and rich vocals in the Starship song, yet, mine seem to say enough. I've layered up the chorus with harmonies, and a planned vocoder.

Anyway, the Hans Blix song in particular seems to bend this album towards the present, so I feel I must rush to finish it, though I constantly wonder why I push myself so hard for this.

Onwards we charge like a rocket!

After The Battle

A day of work on this war music. At times I'm unsure why I'm doing it, perhaps over-pushing to work on this music despite the lack of a muse. The key factor is that it must be sufficiently new, sufficiently different from before, and ideally a tiny bit better too. My motivation, the original reason I started any of it was that the Radioactive theme (titled 'Radiation' since I wrote it in 2001) and the old song 'Written on Rice' are complete and worthy of a proper release, so I needed to make something to unify the release.

Yet, I underestimate the work of such an endeavour. I'm now keen to get all of this music done as quickly as possible, but with that caveat of originality or quality. Both are difficult.

Much of today, like yesterday, was spent on 'After The Battle'. Today I added a new synth guitar solo, this time recording the MIDI - I needed to redo this as yesterday's part only covered the first half. This gives the song much more feeling. Then I added some synth strings, here influenced by 'Running Up That Hill', as my constant chords and incessant beat made me think that song and I was interested in how energy, drama, contrast can be added by backing which seems to be mellow and regular. Kate's music is always more dramatic in my head than the plain written music seems. Here are my words so far:

After The Battle

The ash of my parents
Flavours the breeze
Over the dawn of winter's weeds

The guilt of the damage
Shakes me cold
The moon, cruel and new
Says goodbye to the old

To whom now can my love and loss be told?

Fragments of people
Seeking out fire
Can any stranger see my mood?

Life goes on
Says the sun
And the moss, four billion years
But little is lost

Unsure of it all at the moment. I must keep working and doing my best, by analysis. What does it need? More drama, more imagery, more emotion, stronger everything. Analysis analysis; but as I keep saying, time is short. I should be making things of depth and power, of brilliance. Can I do this here? I'm keen, by April, to move towards new visual art.

War Music, CDA Digialbums

Slow, slow day, but one at least focused on attacking music. I've written a one minute sequence called 'After The Battle' which is little more than an A-minor trawl, the aim that it was like an ending of the 'Radiation' tune, now tagged onto the end of 'Love and Nuclear War'. This evening I've added a purely synthetic electric guitar too it, which sounds much better than any other synth guitar I've added so far. I recorded this live, so don't have the MIDI. I always regret this, but it is much faster to add it to the song this way.

I digress. The tune sounds rather like a Flatspace or Taskforce tune.

In the first half of the day I thought about an old Amiga tune I wrote in around 1991 called 'Metropolis'. I didn't seem to have the mod file, so I looked online and found a few of my old Amiga modules, which I thought I'd lost forever. I did have most of them on virtual Amiga (dms) discs, but there were certainly a few mods there that I didn't have, including a sort of cover version of 'Wanted' by The Dooleys, which I have absolutely NO memory of ever writing - but it sounds like one of mine, and that (rare) song is one of my favourites, so it is something I may well have written.

My music back then was crude to say the least, poor in quality by even by the audio standards of the Amiga. This was literally the first music I ever wrote. I loved it, it was a hugely exciting discovery that I could actually create music. I had a very limited range of samples for instruments and percussion. My later music, by the mid-90s was better. These early tunes were often melodic, but with very little expression or delicacy, often a blasted out melody next to a blasted out bass line and blasted out drums, but a few of those tunes, even today, stick in my mind, like 'Metropolis', and 'Starfoce Nova'...

Reviews of the time were extraordinarily kind:

I made several CDA 'Digialbums'. They were not really Amiga demos, but like an album of mod files on on disc. Alas, at least 4 of these albums (and all of the music) are lost, almost certainly forever. Here's a complete list:

These exist online:

Reflections: Reflections, Warz, Overlord, Robot Revolution, Lightforce, Metropolis, Latham
Limelight: Digitania, Isometrica, The Visitor, Dictator, Chopsticks Revenge, Genesis
Hypnosis Cycledemo: Hypnosis, Hypnosis 2

These are lost and exist only in my memory:

Iris: Starforce Nova, Samba, Megalomania Pt II, Roborock, Imp, Dance of the Hydra
Tesselations: Dreamscape, Revelation, Atomic Solutions, Cyclotron, Speed Metal, Echoes I, Echoes II
Phase IV: Phase IV, Total Recoil, The Matrix, Dreamscape, Contours, Megalomania Pt I, Technorock
After the Battle: Theme from Crustacea, Quadrillion, Solaris, RXD-PIN, Aquanaut, M+S, Cybernaut

Plus Xmas Demo, which wasn't a CDA Digialbum but a techno version of jingle bells with a house picture which flashed the windows to the beat, and Nemesis Games Music which I don't think was a Digialbum either but included Cosmic Fantasy, Nemesis, Shadows Intro.

Interestingly Iris was reviewed in CU Amiga magazine, but doesn't seem to have ever been distributed by any PD library.

Hans Blix Work

More work on 'Hans Blix' today. The initial piano backing was one take to sing to, but I decided to split this into two separate parts for verse and chorus, to give me more control over the pause between, and record a new intro. Work on all of this album seems somehow tight. I must work harder to add more imagery, more drama and power, more generally.

I feel weary, full of anxiety aches and in need of a reset and refocus. My approximate plan is to work on this music until the 21st, then charge into painting. The music work, in my plan, is supposed to be gentle, restful, pleasurable; a break - but it hasn't been any of that so far and probably won't be. I find doing less far more stressful than being frantically busy. It is as though I have a fixed minimum of energy, which is always a vast amount, and any not channelled into work jumps into my body to create mischief.

Onwards I must move, forwards. The heavy rock has been waiting while I've stared at the sun, while I've railed at the gods, eyes wide, long white beard flailing. Now, we must try with care, love and strategic aim, to roll back to our assigned track.

Tooth Problems Persist, Hans Blix

My tooth problems persist, though differently. On Saturday my tooth became loose and wobbled for a day before, today, settling in a new position, where it aches slightly.

While trying to forget all of this annoyance, a generally good day today. Started by trying to get an phone-only app to run on PC with an emulator, but it was tricky to set up, so I gave up. I helped fix the carpet downstairs and ordered a cover for the greenhouse for my mother.

Then, worked on the music for a new song called 'Remembering Hans Blix', for the nuclear album, now to be called War And Nuclear Love (note that I capitalise all first letters of album titles). Music for 'Post-Apocalyptic Playground' is just about done too. Much done today.

Here are the words to Blix:

Remembering Hans Blix

Hands up if you remember Hans Blix
Wonder if he is still around in twenty twenty six
We really need to find him and his magic box of tricks
We've many invisible weapon problems he can fix

We need Hans
We need Hans
We need Hans
We need Hans

War And Nuclear Love

Weary today, but a first day of work on music, on being originally creative, in a while. Finalised the production of 'War and Nuclear Love'. The song is part of this war-themed album, themed because it's being developed to complement the Radioactive theme. The music is similar to that, very analogue-based electro-pop, in the mould of Yazoo or Erasure. Worked on a second song called Post-Apocalyptic Playground too. Here are the WANL words so far:

War and Nuclear Love

Here in my bunker
Surrounded by toys
Dreaming of the people I could conquer

Long blonde robots
Keep telling me I'm great
I'm feeling in the mood to procreate

I take my fuse
And masturbate as I muse on

War and nuclear love
War and nuclear love
War and nuclear love
War and nuclear
War and nuclear
War and nuclear love
War and nuclear love
War and nuclear love
War and nuclear love

There's something in my shattered past
That gives me a need to dominate
And if I can't attract a mate
I'll seek a rubber weakling and inflate

Look at the buttons
Awaiting a push
There's something of a Christmas morning here

Handsome generals
Encourage me to play
And I've nothing better to do today

I pray to God, grip my fuse
And he tells me that he approves of

War and nuclear love
War and nuclear love
War and nuclear love
War and nuclear
War and nuclear
War and nuclear love
War and nuclear love
War and nuclear love
War and nuclear love

Phantoms

A night of strange flowing face pains growing to a horrible peak, then falling away over the course of 8 hours. Now, this has been going on for some days, since Tuesday, and this morning I had a slight temperature of 37.7 degrees too. Yet, I suddenly became logical and sceptical, my personality instantly flipped. Pains only at night are more likely to be psychological, as diseases happen day and night; though of course we are distracted in the day, so at night all bodily senses are amplified.

I began to see everything in new terms. I'd not heard of Trigeminal Neuralgia until the doctor mentioned it, but much later realised that I had, having read a BBC News article about it only about a week earlier, not consciously noting the name. What if I'd unconsciously created the disease and it's symptoms for one day, and what if the pain had vanished because of the idea of taking pain medication? And the dangerous side effects appeared exactly because I was warned that they might?

The intense agony triggered by even a drop of warm liquid on Thursday was real, that's for certain, yet, the day before my mouth had been numbed by dental anaesthetic, so perhaps they became hyper-sensitive as a counter reaction. Since reading about TN, I've avoided eating with that side of my face or teeth, but perhaps I don't need to. Perhaps this disease was only there on Thursday?

My throat hurts, is this tension caused by gulping strangely, or something else? Have I raised my temperature to 37.7 by the power of will? I'm sure this can happen.

For the moment, art should be my focus. The external.

More Trigeminal Neuralgia, NHS Matters, and War ANL

Pain free yesterday due to the very effective Carbamazepine, but woke last night with a sweat and a raised, though not technically feverish, temperature, ranging from 36.2 to 37.3 degrees and feeling not-quite-well. Today, the glands in my throat on both sides are a little swollen and sensitive, swallowing notably a little painful.

Today I read that Trigeminal Neuralgia is more commonly missed than diagnosed by dentists; often the first point of call for sufferers. Perhaps dental surgeries need informational posters or leaflets about this.

In the late morning, I went to Crewe Market Hall with Deb where she was due to read some of her poems for tomorrow's International Women's Day. After that, I worked on the 'War and Nuclear Love' song for some more time. It's a very complex production, and for me will remind me of Duran Duran's 'Ordinary World'. Not necessarily because the song it musically related, but I watched a Rick Beato YouTube video about it and marvelled at the strange chords, which Duran Duran excel at.

Trigeminal Neuralgia

Well, I changed my mind and decided to see a doctor. I've been diagnosed with suspected Trigeminal Neuralgia, and after taking a look at the symptoms this matches how I feel. My teeth are so sensitive that even one drop of warm tea will explode with agony across my face. Rather than the short attacks common to many sufferers, my pain seems to last for longer periods, even hours. It ebbs and flows like a ghost, liquid pain, none to mild to severe and away.

The diagnosis is devastating, I'm coming to terms with it, but it gives me some useful clues. I don't need to worry about muscle relaxation, or tooth problems, or spasms from vocal muscles or saliva glands. The condition can vary per person and may go away, the excellent doctor said it would pass. It can even vanish completely, although on average it seems it gets worse over time. In retrospect, this is the pain (though far milder) I felt in November and December when first experiencing what I thought were tooth problems. It reappeared again last month, but only since Tuesday evening was the pain overwhelming.

I have been prescribed some pain relief medication. I have a few treatment ideas myself. For years I've been taking daily choline, 100mg. I've also recently started to take some lithium orotate after a positive study concerning memory improvement and the attenuation of neurological deterioration. Both supplements are useful as they assist myelin, this small dose of choline may have delayed the disease. More choline and more lithium is one treatment which may help with myelin healing (I expect this takes many months, nerves heal very slowly), if this works at all. These supplements are, at least, relatively harmless - this should always be the first question with an experimental supplement. If my teeth are the only point of sensitivity, perhaps a shield over them will stop it - does such a thing exist? I can drink with straws, now knowing that trying to 'train' my nerves to accept normal eating is probably futile - although it seems that after the initial agony, it does become possible to eat, so perhaps there are some elements of training.

I expect this will obsess me for a few days but now, at this moment, there is no pain and I've felt only dull pain since 2pm, so perhaps the medication is working.

Onwards.

War and Nuclear Love, and the Agony

Did some work on a song yesterday called 'War and Nuclear Love'. It's amazing that in a song almost any chord will do, so I'm trying to push out more boats here and let loose more.

The day, alas, was been dominated by my agonising jaw pain, spasms of some sort. Almost any food, even drinks slightly warm, slightly cold, that touch the senstive teeth at the far right side of my mouth starts a cascade of agony like a flow of some painful liquid. The pain can also grow from nothing without cause, jangling my front teeth, then running along right gums up and down, extending to ear, down to my Adam's apple; ebbing and flowing in intensity. Last night, the pain swelled and grew from about 8pm to 10pm and was the most agonising pain I've ever experienced. I capitulated and took some ibuprofen, which attenuated it completely for sleeping (such relief, despite the shivering terror of it returning).

I'm unsure of the cause. This started on Tuesday night. I'd been reading audiobooks for many hours for about two weeks, so perhaps there are some effects there (unusually high levels of vocal muscle use, salivation changes). I doubt this. Perhaps more likely is the long running teeth problems, which led me to avoid using the right side of my mouth. Now those teeth are largely fine, and have been ground a little to change my bite. This change perhaps, and aiming to once again chew with the right side more, I suspect is messing around with the jaw alignment. I can't be sure though. The pain is so intense, and triggered by a nerve reception that it may be a nerve problem. If it were only muscular, why is it triggered, as it certainly is, by the sensitive tooth?

Anyway, I've decided to avoid doctors for now while I experiment with jaw exercises and strategies. The pain is at times intolerable to the extent of wanting to kill myself to avoid it (that bad), but perhaps this is a release of months of tension, or something along the lines of an adjustment to my life-long jaw alignment which will normalise in a few days. Perhaps there is hope.

Agony and Wars

A good day at the Good Vibrations event yesterday but the last couple of days and nights have been dominated by agonising jaw and gum pain, caused by muscle spasms and cramps. What I'd considered tooth sensitivity for the last few months was unusually painful because of this. In such attacks my jaw and gums flow with awful spasm pain which can endure for hours without respite. The tension seems to spread from or to my throat too, so perhaps it is related to the (highly unusual) many hours of speaking I've recently been doing during audiobook recording. The pain feels like being held hostage by a gaggle of spectral ant-torturers, as the pain glides and flows like water. Pushed by massage from one area to flow to another in a never-ending spiral.

A drink of alcohol causes a similar painful spasm, normally just one that tends to last a few seconds. Now, I find that eating or drinking anything seems to trigger this, in particular an over-reaction by the sensitive tooth, and that it can last hours.

The upside is that this finally resolves the mystery of months of mouth pain, and with hope this is the last gasp of these symptoms, the tangible effects of months of worry (worry mostly about this actual problem) evaporating. At least I know the very painful, but not damaging, cause.

Today and yesterday this is dominating every act. I've decided to rest today. The audiobooks are now complete. I think next I'll work a little on music, the album/EP with the (appropriate) war theme. It's difficult to create something that can even approach the enormity of this subject. The songs I'm working on seem trite and light somehow, but I must work and do my best, not over-think to the extent of a project dragging on for too long. Much of The Beatles output was trite and light, short, unstructured.

Burning Circus Audiobook Complete

Completed The Burning Circus audiobook today. Unsure what to do next. I've been sketching works for the long paused album on war, which seems chillingly appropriate.

Blake and Burning Circus Audiobooks

Two days of work on the Songs of Innocence And of Experience, and The Burning Circus audiobooks. Slight work yesterday, designing the cover art, and preparing the track names, filenames. With over 40 tracks per book, the task of typing these filenames 4 times (in different places) is quite time consuming.

Today, recorded all of the Blake poems, and processed these too, so the book is now complete. I'll work on The Burning Circus tomorrow. I've also decided to pay for a Goodreads giveaway for The Many Beautiful Worlds of Death, a first stab at some promotion for this book, which I still love and rate, yet remains largely unknown to the world.

I'll hold off submission and publication of the audiobooks for a few weeks. I'm unsure if this makes any difference, but with Steam for example, releasing lots of new things at once floods potential customers, when one new release every month tends to have more effect. This will conclude my audiobook work for now. My next writing task will be finishing (well, writing...) my book on oil painting mastery.

My teeth and mouth still ache mildly and constantly, as has been the case since December. This, and the lack of an NHS dentist, constitute the primary bane of my life at the moment.