07/29/2022 - Update: The (Completed) 4th Album

Hi!

I’m happy to say that I’m feeling much better, and my fourth Decimate Our Kind album is now completed. 

Firstly, I’m going to clarify/correct some things I mentioned in the previous post. 

I said that there was no grand concept in this album. That is now only partially true. Yes, there is a small concept to this album. There are four songs that tell an original story put together. A very small concept when compared to what most people picture in their heads when the phrase “concept album” happens to come up, yes, but still a concept nonetheless. In addition, the nine songs from the last post have now been cut down to eight, and as such the album is now just over 40 minutes long. After experimenting heavily with the last two albums, I wanted to go the more traditional route this time around. 

Regardless, I know every artist says this right before releasing a new album, but this is easily the effort I am most proud of so far. This album is, admittedly, a pretty been-there-done-that traditional thrash metal album, but with my own unique twist and style and flair steering the wheel, of course. It’s got fast, thrashy, shreddy and technical guitar parts, but there’s also some slow and heavy songs as well. There’s (admittedly poorly executed) death growls as well as (even more awkwardly performed) harsh spoken word as well (what, I have to get my music out there somehow).

I maintain that this is easily my best-produced/best-sounding album ever, and it represents my composing, songwriting, and guitar playing skills higher than they ever were before (though that should be logically obvious). As far as releasing the album goes, I’m currently without a working computer (I made the album using entirely myiPad and smartphone, as I have always done) so release of the full album will have to wait a bit. However, the instrumental versions of two songs from the album are already published on my BandLab page (https://www.bandlab.com/71011ninjer) if you’d like to get a preview. Thanks for everything, everyone!

07/27/2022 - Update: The 4th Album

The fourth Decimate Our Kind album is almost complete.

There will be nine songs on the album, and it will be almost 50 minutes in length. This isn't going to be a colossal conceptual overly-ambitious album like "Plagues and Commandments", or an overly condensed extreme package like "Decency is Dead". This album will be closest perhaps to my first album. It's more of a traditional extreme-adjacent thrash metal album, nothing particularly groundbreaking. This album will definitely, at least according to me, have by far the best production out of anything I've produced so far. This is the first time I've triple-tracked all the rhythm guitar parts, and after mastering all but three tracks, the songs definitely have a powerful and resonating punch with the drums and the guitar beats. I'm definitely quite proud of this one.

All that's left to do is I still need to record vocals for three songs and then arrange (because the DAW I use doesn't allow for BPM changes mid-project) and master those same songs.

However, I don't know when I'll get around to doing that. I've recently been sick with a cough and sore throat (thank hell it's not COVID, I have immunity and vaccines exist so yeah), and yesterday morning something rather shocking happened within my personal life, so I need to take more time for my physical and mental health. I'm going to be okay, but I need time.

But the album is almost finished. It should be releasing before the end of the summer.

Just wanted to update on this. Thanks for reading.

07/19/2022 - First Post: What to Expect

Hello. Nice to meet you. Words simply can't describe how glad and happy I am that you came across this brand new blog of mine, but I'll try to make them - I feel like, with each additional person that's stumbling across my creations, my artistic works and projects, I feel more and more like I'm contributing something creative and artistic to the world, and thus I feel more like myself and my dreams (of which I might not even fully understand myself), whatever they are, are coming truer and truer.

Anyway, enough of that.

I thought about something like this for quite a while. I wanted to have a specific and particular kind of outlet for expressing things such as the current status of my artistic projects, Decimate Our Kind or otherwise, as well as other statements I feel are necessary for me to make under the Decimate Our Kind profile name. Admittedly I am writing this more for the satisfaction for myself, as opposed to my fellow metalheads (I don't want to use the word "fans" or any equivalent like "followers" because I really don't like calling people who like my work my fans/followers, for that implies a hierarchical relationship between myself and them. We are equals, the people who like my work are obviously people who enjoy the arts, and as for myself, the creator of my works, I'm just another person who enjoys the arts. Nothing more, nothing less), but I do hope that you enjoy what you're reading and I welcome you into an additional section of my nerdy, metal world.

I'm not intending on fully committing to this project in any way. My primary focuses are, obviously, on my music (Decimate Our Kind, and the bands I'm in, more on that in the future) and my other writing projects (short stories, a novel I'm working on, multiple memoirs and nonfiction book-length projects, several personal journals, and of course poetry and lyrics). Don't expect me to write posts here all that often. That being said, I will definitely not refuse the opportunity to write here when I deem it necessary. After all, although IRL I'm very much an introverted, shy nerdy metalhead, when given a pen (figuratively speaking, technically "keyboard" is a more accurate term), I have a lot to say.

As briefly mentioned before, the stuff I will be writing and posting here includes but it not limited to: updates on the current status of my projects, mostly Decimate Our Kind projects but probably other stuff too, written commentaries on already completed DOK projects, and my statements/takes on topics that relate to music, the arts, literature, politics, religion, etc.

Hopefully you find my totally unprofessional and perhaps laid-back and lazy-minded blog posts worth reading.  Thanks very much for everything.