1)

[dear ---,

the stiff actors. the stiff self. the crumbling body. no joy anywhere. the words form an expansive farm where nothing grows. all the crops are blank pieces of paper. curling upwards and rotting.

i saw a girl today. she was floating on a lake. her hair formed ribboned streaks of blue and white. her black dress flowed in the wind and only lightly dampened in the water. she hummed a quiet tune.

i still

feel

nothing.]

sweet pastoral nothings

to think that we were just here, sitting together on the rocks of a river - a clear day. before us was the stream, the mountains, and infinity, all wrapped into a narrow passage carved out by thousands of years of currents. but now i'm still here and you're back home - three hundred hours away. and before we know it, this river will freeze over but both of us won't be here to see it in the winter. sure, we will be together again, but far away from this place. we won't have any means of getting here. and the nightmare begins, the thought that we might see this infinite backdrop in the summer again, but never in the winter.

and the water of the river folds and refolds itself - over and over again.

what june was like

"trevor's doing the right thing... he's got his hand over his heart."

my mom's watching the local high school's class of 2012 graduate for the fourth or fifth time on public access. melissa sings the national anthem, tyler makes a speech, and so on...

i've started a new job. part-time sales associate at old navy. it's not that bad -- the people are friendly and helpful, the work is simple but enjoyable, and i'm not isolated from the rest of the world as i earn money, unlike my last job as a custodian at a storage place.

she's changed the program to i love lucy. my mother's calling her mother. 

i wish i had a blank CD. but i used them all up. to make + sell compilation discs for the shows i've been playing. the shows were great, by the way. finally capturing a lot of energy in my live performance, primarily thanks to nick, my drummer friend. but due to a lack of transportation, i don't know if i'll be doing anymore this summer, which is sad.

just about an hour ago, i released a new split EP with my friend Eliot (Bloodsport). we made ambient/noise/experimental songs for this release. it's harsh and difficult at points, but it's balanced out with quiet and peaceful bits. give it a shot by clicking the album art below:

the cool part is that we're selling this on cassette. if you're interested, let me know somehow and i'll let you know when the tapes are ready.

and that's been June for me.

i'm going.

goodnight.

goodnight.

Black Rice (Women cover)

Posted a cover. One of my favorite songs right now. Word up.




Black Rice (Women cover)

[pictures from today]

PLUS

another new song.

thx <3

[New Song: Dried Out]

We uploaded a new song with the hopes that some people might listen to it. It's a 3-minute indie-folk-rock-thing about desertion.

It'll be on the album that we hope to release at some point before the fall.

You can listen and download below for free. Because we believe in that kind of thing.

Dried Out by videosforpictures

<3

~-~

A music rant. It's been awhile.

Over this two-week (!) spring break, I've been sleeping between 4 and 5AM each morning and waking up between 1 and 2PM. It's an awful sleep schedule, but I've accepted it as unavoidable. Day in and day out, I'm finding myself either recording, producing, writing, buying, or discovering music. Nothing more, nothing less. Everything's revolving around music, and I'm getting loads done as a result. By the same hand, it's driving me remotely insane. In a good way.

I've been forgoing sleep and constantly musicing because I know that time is of the essence when I'm home. Time is the medium I'm working in when I make music, and I know that I don't have very much of it before I have to go back to school for another 9 weeks. Once I'm back at school, there'll be no time for this stuff. I have to get as much done as musically possible now. I'm not rushing this full-length album at all, and neither is Jeremy. But it's giving the whole project a sense of urgency, spontaneity, and immediacy, which is something I've long desired to capture in a recording anyways.

So fuck sleep, and long live pursuing a passion like it's your last day on Earth, I guess.

---

These are songs and the order that we're thinking of placing them in:

1. Dried Out
2. Unclothed, Uninvited
3. The Drop (pt. 1)
4. Propeller
5. From A Line
6. Interlude
7. T.V. Snow
8. +

Bits have been recorded for all eight of these songs. Over the next couple of days, I'm going to be focusing solely on recording the remaining parts. I'll worry about mixing over the summer. Mixing's going to take a while anyways - we're not just dealing with piano and vocals anymore. Now it's guitar, piano, cello, drums, banjo, vocals, and noises. Thank God Jeremy's here to finally push the project to expand its sound with an array of new instruments; we're looking at a much folkier release this time around. At the same time, there are some tracks that veer on post-rock and even shoegaze. It's still very much a diverse, do-whatever-the-fuck type project. But it's becoming a bit more focused, which I approve of a lot.

While we're back at school, we hope to complete the writing for this album. We're shooting for 10 or 11 tracks in total.

I'm most worried about promotion with this release. Now that I've finally given up the YouTube ghost, I'm wondering how I'm going to generate interest in what I make. I've been pursuing a couple of outlets (namely a couple of subcommunities on SoundCloud), but I need something more. Someone suggested that I try mutual promotion, like: a band pimps videosforpictures, videosforpictures pimps a band in return. This strategy would work to an extent, I'm sure, but I don't know how effective my attempts would be. Another idea came to mind that I'd compile a list of 100 music blogs and labels to send an e-mail out to in advance, saying "Hey - we've got a full-length here. Blah blah blah. Check it out." But I don't want to spam people's inboxes. I'm sure they get enough of that as is.

I guess part of the problem with the music world is that you have to be either ubiquitous or lucky. One path requires a lot of effort to get your name "out there," the other path requires almost no effort. If I could put on a proper live show, I would so try for ubiquity. But instead, videosforpictures is that project that will just have to keep working in the digital shadows until a big name comes through and says "Hey. We like what you do." And from there, the listeners start coming. I know that. But how the fuck do I get there?

It's a question that will either answer itself with time or will leave videosforpictures in a state of permanent obscurity. Either way, music is something that I really like to do, and I'll only give it up when I'm dead.

In other news, I still smell like smoke from the bonfire earlier today.

~-~

Never mind.

Remember when this blog was called 'A Day In The Life Of A Teen Musician?' Well. I'm still 19, and still technically a teen musician. And about 1800 days later, I can safely say that we made it. I started this blog when I was 14 with a few covers in mind and the beginnings of a few songs. And now, after 4 EPs and a 16-track compilation, I'm going to release my first proper full-length in the summer (with a friend, of course. videosforpictures has doubled in size). If I had known this was where I'd be 5 years ago, I'd be pretty shocked. I don't have a substantial fanbase at all, but I've put out a lot of music. 5 years ago, I thought recording in a studio was the only way to commit music to tape. I didn't think that I'd ever record more than a couple of songs. I've since put out 40 songs, and recorded probably close to 100. That's huge.

It's a personal legacy.

And I'm pretty proud of it.

And who knows what the next 5 years will bring?

Fuck it, maybe I won't take this blog down after all.

No. I'm going to start talking again. 

~-~

listless

for the last
few days i've felt listless.

going through
the motions living life day

in and day out

that i might trudge up to the fourth
floor even though i live on third
and as i realize

and as i realize my mistake
and start walking back down
the fire alarm goes off
and i can't even tell
if i pulled it.

day

in and day out

The End Of This Blog.

I'm shutting "A Day In The Life of A Teen Nightlight" down on March 20th, the 5-year anniversary of my first post here.

It's run its course: as a blog, as a site for my poetry, as everything else that I may have used it for.
It's served me well.
It's time for something else.

There's quite a bit of history running in the annals of this blog...
My first legitimate recording session.
The end of my piano lessons.
My first trip to NYC and how heavy that was.
Seeing Jeff Mangum live. Holy shit, seeing Jeff Mangum live.
Writing down every single song idea I had coursing through my veins in those first days where I figured I would try songwriting...
Talent shows.
How I never won a single talent show.
And how I still kind of resent that.
A lot of poetry.
And so many other assorted thoughts and pieces all rearranged into an organized space.

And I'm just going to throw it away.

I am what some people might call "temporally obsessed." I don't like looking back on things that I've done from a few years ago, because the past always feels like yesterday to me. As a result, I become aware of my present mortality and a mini-existential crisis ensues. It seems silly, because it is. But time genuinely bothers me. I think I've made that clear in many of the posts I've made here over the years... This blog is just always going to be here if I don't do something about it. I'm having similar feelings towards my YouTube channel right now. These things that I've created will sit and serve as pleasant nostalgia, but more prominently as a sign that I'm only getting older.

I just want to exist outside the context of the Internet. I really do. I want to start going places, networking with people, finding shows to play at, being creative with friends. To not have the fleeting thought of maintaining a *PRESENCE* linger over my head every time I visit a website.

Writing on here's done a lot for me. It's helped me document and track my progress into becoming a person who can write, record, produce, and release music, who can musically collaborate with others, who can jot his mind onto a piece of paper whenever he wants to. Who can, once in a while, dream big.

So it's time that I wrap things up and put it to sleep. I'll be blogging in a notebook from now on.

Thanks to everyone who's been following over the years, if there are any of you left at this point. I love you a lot.

~-~

Notes..---

Beats hour:

Burial  - Loner

Young Magic – Jam Karet

Lapalux – Moments

Fresh Arcade - ٩(•●)۶

Goth-Trad – Anti-Grid

Dream Consequence – B Free

Portico Quartet - Ruins

Ambient hour:

Grouper – Demona (Dead Moon cover)

Lotus Plaza – These Years

Lapalux – Face Down, Eyes Shut

Julianna Barwick – Never Change

Force Tranquille - Aelab

0318 – Fennesz + Sakamoto

/////All Life/////

I wish that I had more to say.
All life passes in this way.

The Drop (Parts One and Two)

There’s a hole in the middle

Of an abandoned, ghostly town

Where water sits and cement blocks

Bring half-dead people down.

At the hole, there’s a killer

A-waiting for the man

Who will come up to meet him

And shake his covered hand

And he’ll drag out the body

To the nearest blood-red light

And he will let a naked woman

Strip his soul all night

And he will have a family

And he will feel regret

And he will drown himself that night

And not surface again.

I’ve just the same lost to temptation

I have given up at last

And I’ve let the rings around my eyes

Grow dark and grey too fast

And I am next in line and waiting

To fall down through that hole

Because this song won’t fix my head or

All my endless dead-end goals

I know that no one’s listening

I know that no one’s listening

I know that no one’s listening

It’s just as well I give it up and drop.