AFTER the release?

[FreakAnimalFinland]

I was reading ROCKER #3 zine and Joe Colley interview has a moment where Crumer says that "As I've gotten older, I've noticed once I finish a record, it's no longer a joyous experience".

Colley agrees and mentions sometimes it is "relief, sometimes sadness", and that spectrum of emotions may vary from liking a lot what came out to "there's shit on here I'm gonna have to live with".

Latter referring to moment where recording one been working on is at the point where you just have to let go, and stop tweaking or it will never be "ready".

question is interesting, since I would suppose in "youth culture", there is sort of expectation that something you do, should be exciting and fun. Perhaps bound into that moment when as youngster you realize one can actually make a zine. Or form a band. Press a release. And the excitement of holding your very own record in hand for the first time. That I would assume is very expected emotion, and therefore becomes quite interesting question, what exactly noise maker at his 40's or 50's feels when completing his 134th release? Plus, is it mandatory that putting out a release causes emotion?

And furthermore, even if emotion is merely "this didn't turn out quite like I envisioned", it may be exactly the drive why you start the next one. But one needs that moment of completion to move on, and I would assume the feeling of wanting to explore further may be even more important.

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From my own perspective, it is hard to say what exactly qualifies as joy an excitement, but there is of course satisfaction of something being done. Task or goal or long process that finally is ready, and completing recording does not give me that yet. Usually. Most often, the physical item in my hand is the completion. No more just half finished random things cluttering every place, but concrete manifestation of something getting done. Is it joy and excitement? Perhaps often it is not, but satisfaction for sure. It is curious difference would one aim to do something fun, or something meaningful.

Last time you felt "excited" of own release, or if not, what you're looking for, if anything?

[Stipsi]

For me personally (I'm 42) the most satisfying thing, after like 20 years of noise making, is a label that likes your finished album and wants to publish it. And it's even better when a label is searching you because it loves your stuff
This gives me the will to say "yeah, I'm still good to do it, because someone believes in it".
This is the most exciting part that gives me the best feeling ever during a release.
Everything before is a mixed feelings of "fuck yeah!", frustration, stress, relief, joy, happiness (because i love making noise) and fuck off.
I totally understand the "tweaking part" because I have always the feeling the record is incomplete or i can do better.

[perkust]

Most satisfying thing is when everything is in a right place (cover art, sounds)and a whole release is finished. It's a relief and uplifting experience every time. But soon after that hunger again rises and have to start do another one. That's a very basic circle of my doings. Some releases are better and some are not that good, but all are basicly reflections of yourself and what are your surroundings and thoughts during the process.

[Cranial Blast]

I think probably the most satisfying aspect about any release personally for me is that it feels like your giving back to what you love in the best way you can by trying contribute a building block to the foundation with your own expression of it. It's a good feeling to feel like your giving back by participating to something that's always been there for you, no matter what. So many things in life come and go, but music has never gone away and so it feels good to give back to something that will be with you until the grave and beyond that, possibly be remembered even after death.

[Phenol]

I guess for me there is no real aftermath, although it's nice to get some positive comments and messages from strangers who liked what they heard. For me making and releasing music is a continous process that's punctuated by releases. Because of the time that passes between the moment when I finish an album and its release, I've already moved on by the time it finally hits the streets. That being said, I still get a childish kick out of holding something I made with the stamp of an actual real label on it in my hands.

[Commander15]

Interesting topic! Haven't really thought this out before, but besides the satisfaction of actually creating something tangible and concrete, I think that the greatest "fulfillment" of releasing something would be the idea of contributing something to the noise scene itself and bringing the artwork into the realm of relevant discussion.

[Phenol]

I'd like to hear the label experience. What do you do? How much do you promote and where, do you set up interviews, facilitate live shows etc.? I mean, how much do labels act like labels these days, compared to back when being "signed" meant certain expectations both ways, and was it even ever like that in "our" scene compared to f.ex. the metal scene where there's a much bigger audience and therefore more money going around?

[Atrophist]

Typically I feel a quiet sense of satisfaction once I have the actual release in my hand. Recording and editing isn't "fun" as such, but that too can be a rewarding process, in its own way.

If something seems difficult or doesn't seem to be going anywhere, I just leave it, and then maybe pick it up again later. Or maybe not. I don't really struggle with finishing things, there's a sense that, "okay, this is ready now". I just keep tweaking things until I get it. I try to be humble in the sense that if something just isn't good, I'll be able to admit it. Why try polishing a turd when you could just flush it.

I'm reasonably content with all my releases. There's only one that I wish I hadn't released at all. But even the ones I do like contain bits I now wish weren't there, or I that I would do differently if I were creating it now. That is all right too, since it's all a learning process and you have to pay your dues.

I'm actually in the process of making a change in my recording and editing process, from "one or two hrs every day" to devoting one full day a week to it. Hopefully my attention span can handle it.

[tisbor]

In my case it's mostly relief now, like getting stuff out of my head and giving it physical form. Until i actually have the finished product in my hands, or at least have all the tracks ready, I think about how it should sound and look way too much.

[Into_The_Void]

Interesting thread, personally I've become way less productive (due to several facts, in primis the parenthood and consequent lack of time) than a few years ago, when I was in the very deep "boom" of productivity. Back then, I think I felt the urgency to give physical shape (as tisbor said) to emotions, reflections, feelings and struggles I had within myself. I used - especially in my last releases ("Rituals" and "Mahakala") to operate a very focused sound research on the music paired and parallel with the conceptual research, which I think is appreciable in the listening and made me (and many other people who gave me positive feedbacks) satisfied of what I did.

Nowadays I am slowly going back on the music-making again in order to complete some stuff, and will surely record new music in the future, however I channel now my musical contents in other ways as well (mainly meditations / study / research) besides music, which still remains an important "personal media", let's say, although I don't feel the same "communicative urgency" I used to feel before.
Having lost a bit of interest in the musical scene and its characters also played a significant role.

[AJK]

The reaction depends on many things in my case. If the release is a wider sidestep from my "basic" material, the whole process feels more meaningful and therefore I feel a certain pride more than when it's another "normal" release. And in these cases I am more interested in listeners' reactions too.
Another thing is when the actual physical release comes out after the actual recording. If it takes several months or even years, the afterglow has maybe died away and the feeling is quite mild, like "oh, it's finally out, ok". On the other hand, this time between recording and the release can become crucial what comes to my own views how I see it. I have maybe forgotten the whole album and when I come back to the crime scene, I observe my doings in a new light and the music shows totally new sides of it. This has happened many times with my other band Circle Of Ouroborus. For example one of our album "Thurisa" was released over ten years before the actual physical release saw the daylight. The feelings were very weird and mixed, to put it mildly, heh.

[mag-maa]

It's always nice to keep the final result in hands, and to realize that here it is now, finally made - and now it's possible to move on... and start to work with all those albums which are not yet released (over 10 at the moment, maybe more like nearly 20!).

Of course the excitement was different in the early days, than now after 20 years of production. If and when I release by myself, it's a different type of "joy" to see the result, than if the stuff was released by the label. With labels there are often some unexpected (or even expected) changed to the original idea; but mostly the final result is anyway over 80% of what it should have been (physically), but as the label has the marketing/promotion/dealing, which I don't personally have (no idea how to do it properly, or just lazy to even think about it properly) - the final result goes anyways over 90%.
Self released stuff are nice, until finding out that no-one likes to get the stuff directly from me, as they prefer REAL labels and distros, where they can buy other stuff at the same time.
 
It's not often possible to find a real label to release my stuff (because I produce too much, and I don't like to spend time to send demo-emails), so I end up releasing alone small editions or just digitally. Both are fine, but not the ideal way (but still better than sending those demo-emails forever and begging labels to help). Even if the edition is just small or just digital, it's anyway out/available.  Some recent stuff what I released digitally, has been heard only very few people - and of course that's not what I am looking for, but one day someone might think it would be good to have those more widely available and in a proper format (maybe, who knows).

It's always nice to have the release packed (in a way or another), because it's the end of production and can move on. Creation can roll on. Suffering comes often when thinking about all those unreleased tracks in a messy order somewhere in the folders - so it's always a goal to have that mess organized and packed into album form; ready to the world, where it can start to live in another level.
Is it "joyful"? In that sense yes, that it's literally released. Relief. Promotion is the next step, a boring but necessary step. Sometimes it leads into frustration, sometimes less. Why people still like to buy the latest Madonna and not the latest Yksi tape? Something is wrong, and cannot change that (but oh yes, I have still those unreleased recordings waiting to be released, so I didn't finish my total work yet...)

Not sure if I will ever make a release and then finding out that "that's it, no need to do more, at all"

[Leewar]

Interesting topic.

Certainly i have in the past fallen into the habit of 'tweaking' too much, maybe due to some strange notion of not wanting the creative process to be over. But when it is  and im holding the physical copy in my hands then it becomes something else, leading to ideas about the next one, new techniques, new sounds, new ideas and themes. And theres certainly always that "I can make the next one even better" thought.

In regards to feedback on the finished work, then i do enjoy hearing other peoples opinions. I have a certain concept in my head about the 'vibe' of a track and im always fascinated to hear what other people pick up on, if they 'get it'.

Label wise its a mixed bag. I was happy with the last release as we had physical copies, reviews etc etc... But i get REALLY tired of a endless stream of 'curated' Bandcamp 'labels' offering to 'release' your finished work via uploading it to Bandcamp and doing nothing else.

[Spectral_Hiss]

My best albums, or at least the ones I prefer, are the ones that weren't premeditated, that sort of built themselves up over time and by chance. And I can find meaning, a complete exegesis, in albums whose content is half improvisation, half scraping from the bottom of a drawer. Letting things be born by themselves and discovering that they have their own logic that I can understand afterwards, is what makes music still exciting. If I had to work hard and control everything in my creative process, making music would just be one more "job" and not an intimate adventure.

[MALAISE57]

For me, it depends on the release. Sometimes there are times when i want to just release something out of the way because of some mental neccesity to just do something, it satisfies me and thats it. Not any long lasting joy or anything but just content that i did something. Thats usually just smaller releases and recordings where i experiment and shape up my stuff more.

And then there's the other side, Where i pour my thoughts and soul in to. Those are always satisfying and somewhat peace-bringing, not that i need peace from something but it just is.