Sockpuppet.

VRelium: Horizons: Music Beyond the Universe

I performed at VRelium for Horizons: Music Beyond the Universe, on what happened to be my birthday!

Happy 10th, Refactor

10 years ago to this day, on my 37th birthday, I released Refactor, which I still consider to be my definitive album.

You can still access its old microsite. (Be sure to click the “play” button in the corner.)

Happy birthday!

Furality is gonna be amazing!

Furality is an annual virtual furry conference that takes place entirely in VRChat. I have a dealer’s den booth this year, booth 816 (second level of the 2D Art + Miscellaneous) section, and I’m super excited!

Last night Furality opened up a dealer’s den preview so that we could check that our booths are set up correctly, and as a treat we got to see a decent chunk of the world and the overall style of the show, and I gotta say, it’s incredible. The Furality team have knocked it out of the park this year, and have really outdone themselves. From what I’ve seen this isn’t just going to be an incredible con, it’s going to be an amazing VRChat experience, and I am absolutely thrilled to be a part of it.

If you’re at all in VRChat (even if you aren’t at all interested in furry stuff), or heck, even if you’ve been thinking of trying VRChat out, I highly recommend coming to Furality Somna so that you can experience the joy. Also, you don’t need a VR setup to use VRChat! it just helps with the immersion (although just a warning, if you play it on desktop or cellphone you’ll probably end up really wanting to get a headset anyway).

Also, I plan on doing various impromptu shows at various places throughout the con, and if you see me wandering around, feel free to come up and say “hi!”

elasticStage: A brief review

Back in April I learned about elasticStage, an on-demand vinyl production company that makes it easy for musicians to get their music on vinyl without any up-front costs. I ended up setting up Transitions and Refactor for manufacturing, and ordered some test copies.

My lead time at the time was around 6 weeks, and I was told the records would ship on May 14. They ended up shipping a couple days later than expected, but I still ended up receiving them today, which isn’t too much further after the original estimate.

Anyway, here’s my review of how the product turned out.

UPDATE: elasticStage have responded to my review by sending me updated copies. Definitely check out what’s new!

Some thoughts on Bandcamp Friday

Bandcamp Friday is a thing that Bandcamp started in the midst of the 2020 pandemic, primarily to help out performing musicians who no longer had access to live performance venues due to the COVID lockdowns. It was a very nice gesture on their part, to help offset some of the suck of the world affecting musicians by waiving their cut of the purchase price.

As someone who wasn’t a performing musician at the time, I still benefitted from it, as it gave me an occasional tiny boost to my (already tiny) music income.

But at this point it’s an entrenched tradition and it’s actually causing more harm than good. It might be time for it to end, or at least be reconsidered.

Bandcamp Friday, May 2025 edition

Hey y'all! It is Bandcamp Friday once again. Today is the best day to support musicians on Bandcamp (including myself) as Bandcamp waives their cut of the sale price of all music for this day only.

Bandcamp have recently made some default pricing changes and based on their reasoning I have opted to change my own pricing strategy (as hinted at previously). Previously I had a kind of complicated and largely vibes-based approach to pricing, but it was doing me no favors. From now on, all of my albums will be $1/track up to $9, and individual songs will be $1.50/track, with occasional exceptions for certain considerations.

Anyway, for this Bandcamp Friday, you can get 25% off anything in my catalog (including my full discography, which is also always discounted) with the discount code “MAYDAY25.”

Also, as usual, here’s some of the stuff I’ll be buying this month:

• The music of Alex Graey
• The music of YonKagOr
• Deadnames by PER INK (not to be confused with my album of the same name, gee it’s like we’re both trans or something)

And here’s some of my other recommendations for things I already own:

• Baby Trans by Kookie
• Tiger Pop Ten by John Brodeur
• Birthday Cake and MEEMS by Miracles of Modern Science
• Expert in a Dying Field by The Beths
• Things Take Time, Take Time by Courtney Barnett

Upcoming shows and appearances

Hey y'all, I’m a very busy bee, with a lot of stuff happening all at once over the next couple months.

This weekend, on Saturay, May 3, my real-life choir is doing a fundraiser show. I will be performing in two pieces, singing tenor in a rendition of Vienna Teng’s The Hymn of Axciom and doing a minimal jazz piano rendition of my own song Repair My Heart.

Then in June, I have a whole bunch of stuff going on:

• Furality is taking place from June 5-8, and I have a booth in the dealer’s den, where I plan on having some small impromptu performances; you might also find me out and about throughout the rest of the convention, in which case, feel free to come by and say “hi!”
• My choir will be performing with Rainbow City on June 6 (which I may or may not be a part of, depending on how badly this conflicts with Furality)
• I will be performing a Pride show with Refraction VR on June 7 May 31!
• The choir will be doing a preview of our pride show on Vashon Island on June 13 (which I will be a part of)
• We are also doing our full pride show on June 20 and 21 in Seattle

And I may have another concert happening in June as well! Watch this space! (or better yet, my show calendar)