The Post-Release Depressive Death Spiral

I wanted to talk about the Post-Release Depressive Death Spiral, something which I feel a lot of new and seasoned composers struggle with. What do I mean by the Post-Release Depressive Death Spiral? Read on.

I think when we’re composing music we build it up in our minds. Sometimes, we build it up to a point where we think, “This is going to be the track that defines me”. We’ve worked so hard on it, often for days, weeks or even months and we build up this track to be something extraordinary.

When we release it, there’s an expectation there for some of us, that it’s going to change everything. There’s an expectation that we’re going to be flooded with comments, likes, retweets, shares… This is going to be the one that is going to break us through some kind of ceiling.

Is it realistic? Unfortunately no. It’s probably not realistic. In reality it’s probably going to be very similar to other music that we’ve produced. We build it up in our own mind and we think it’s going to be something fantastic because we know something about that piece of music that nobody else does. In fact, we know, many things about that piece of music that nobody else does.

Take, for instance, the latest track that I released: “The Fall of Weyn”. I knew that this was the first track that I had ever mixed as a separate process. Every other track that I done prior to that had been mixed as I went along. I knew that this was the first track where I had used two string sections playing at once; one playing some staccato and another some legato. I knew that that was the first track where I had actually paid attention during the mastering process and made alterations, not just using the defaults. I knew that this was the first track where I had applied properly compression to the drums and actually not just that, but had split out the snare to a separate channel and sent more snare to the reverb than the rest of the kit. I knew all of these things and more.

So in my mind, this track represented such phenomenal growth for me as a composer and a producer and in some way I’m expecting everybody else to recognise that. And I mean, everybody. Now, it may very well be that some people do recognise parts of this. It may very well be that they see that piece of music as a level up for me. But the chances are that they’re not going to see it as as much of a pivotal moment as I have.

This means that our expectation versus reality is very different and can lead us to get very disappointed. Why don’t people like our stuff? Why aren’t they sharing it with everyone they know? The truth is, they do like our stuff, and we shouldn’t measure our growth in likes and comments, but instead in the deeper things.

Sometimes, I think there’s also another issue with us believing that people are going to somehow go above and beyond for us when we release out masterpiece. When I think about it, what is it I am expecting people to do? Well, I want people to share it of course. I want it to be so good that people can’t help but share it with others. The likelihood of that happening, given the genre, given my visibility, given my pervasiveness as a composer in the scene; is incredibly small.

It then becomes very difficult for us to see how releasing this track has changed anything for us and that can be incredibly damaging to us as composers and as artists. Art is there to be appreciated or to be consumed by another and to be appreciated. And when that doesn’t happen, that can lead to us feeling like there is no point.

The key I beg you to remember is how much you know you have grown in writing and producing that piece. The key thing for us is to recognise and understand that each piece represents phenomenal growth for us as composers. And that even just a single share by someone should mean so so much to us.

It doesn’t matter that we don’t get the number of likes or responses or retweets or quote tweaks that we wanted. What matters is that it represents a milestone of growth and for that it should be greatly celebrated. Any comment we get, and it bears repeating, any comment we get where someone expresses they enjoyed our track, any share, any retweet means our job as a composer is complete. We have made a connection. We have made art.

Now, go make some more :)