This will be quite the rant, so hang in there or simply give zero fucks and go browse some other shit on the Internetz, ok?
You still here? Phew… let’s start then.
PART 1: The TPH DONATION EXPERIMENT 5.
It’s a success!
For the longest time I wasn’t sure I would even get to type that, to be honest. Let’s go over a few things here: I fired up this 5th edition on April 6th this year. Today it’s October 29th. That’s a span of 206 days.
None of the previous Experiments have taken this long to complete, which points to the fact that perhaps the interest of helping bands out this way is fading? Perhaps people think that donating for the cause of just getting music is just not worth it since there’s so much music out there anyways that you don’t need to pay for? I seriously have no idea, but I do know that this 5th procedure has been a fucken bitch to raise money for. Again, I’m sorry for the mass emails that have gone out to some of you more than once due to me not being computer savvy enough to make a proper mailing list. I think I got that covered now though. At 46 years of age no less! Yay fucken me!
Anyways, back to The Experiments.
Many years ago when I started the 1st one, I had zero faith in it being successful, but after that one reaching its goal you have proven to me over and over that this shit actually works. You have heard me say it too many times, but I can’t thank you enough and it wouldn’t be possible to do TPH as it is today without your monetary support.
Sure, I could do it with little to no cash actually. But that would mean I would have no vocals on there, the drums would be programmed and the actual mix and master wouldn’t be anything to write home about, among other things. Also, you would obviously never get to hear it.
That’s not the way I want it to be.
With you people raising the funds it makes it possible for me to actually create TPH as I want to create it, and I can also pay everyone involved for their efforts even if it’s not nearly enough to what these individuals are worth to me.
And “all” you people get in return is my musical vision, presented in the best way possible according to said vision.
The fact that quite a bunch of you who have donated for the 5th Experiment have done so more than once during these 206 days is also mind blowing. And even more mind blowing is seeing the bunch of people who obviously value the stuff I do so much they donate quite insane amounts of money so we can reach the goal.
I ask for 150 SEK and for that you’ll get all kinds of versions and formats when the album in question is done, and some of you donate hundreds and hundreds of dollars?! That is just so humbling.
I truly am so fucken (un)blessed to have people like you giving so many shits about TPH that you time and time again make sure another album can be recorded and released. And for that I am forever thankful.
So, how many people actually contributed this time around, you ask?
236.
Probably 30 or so of those donated more than once during the course of this process, but with the use of simple math that would be something like $42 per person. Goddamn, see now how impressive this shit is?
We’ll have to take that with a grain of salt though coz I did put the funds from the sales of the anniversary shirt and some digital TPH sales from CD Baby etc. into this Experiment, but you get the point. So few people involved and yet you have done so much. As said; humbling.
This year TPH celebrate 20 years. You getting this Experiment to the finish line is the best fucken anniversary gift I could wish for.
I raise my glass in your honor, TPH family (make that glass virtual coz it’s fucken Tuesday and I work during the weeks, you know).
PART 2: THE 13TH ALBUM.
I have kept you in the loop on the recording process for quite some time and the amount of hours and work I have put into this 13th recording can’t even be counted properly. I always planned to spend 2019 with this beast and get it out in (somewhat) early 2020, but the slow progress of the 5th Experiment really made me doubt it would happen. Safe to say, now I go back to those plans!
My personal work for this recording is more or less completed. Behind the scenes I have been balls deep in this shit. All the guitars have been put down. The bass is there. The orchestras and electronics? Check. The hundreds and hundreds of insane little details no one but me will notice? Yep, fucken there as well. And it sounds absolutely spectacular. I have never played better, nor have I ever worked harder on my material. It is TPH to a 100% and I am so incredibly satisfied with what this is turning into.
As you have noticed in some updates along the way, the plan was also to have everyone else’s complete efforts delivered to me by now. That hasn’t happened just yet due to regular life and whatnot getting in the way. Everything is in progress though, and once again; it sounds fucken spectacular.
Jörgen Sandström only has one song left to put down his grunts for. Ellinor Asp’s got quite a bit of work left, but then again the magical insanity she provides isn’t exactly something you fire up in a heartbeat. Dirk should have wrapped up his stuff within a month or so and Lasse nailed all of his solos a few weeks ago during one day inside The Dungeon. Some fantastic guest contributions are done as well, and I’m extra honored to have this one guy on there. In time you’ll know who it is.
To once again get to work with Jörgen Sandström, Ellinor Asp, Dirk Verbeuren, Lasse Johansson, the guests and (when it’s time to mix and master) Dan Swanö is such a privilege. You guys and gal are simply the best. I’m also extremely happy that you all get to work with a genius like myself. Boom!
PART 3: I DIDN’T PARTICIPATE IN THE 5TH EXPERIMENT BUT I WANT THE ALBUM WHEN IT’S COMPLETED, AND I ACTUALLY FEEL LIKE PAYING FOR IT.
Oh, so you’re one of those rare ones? Yeah, hand me that cash so I can spend it on beer, software and other crucial shit! Simply PayPal 150 SEK to theprojecthate@gmail.com and you’ll get the album digitally as soon as it’s done.
PART 4: SO WHAT THE FUCK HAPPENS NOW THEN?
Well, I will keep on working small details while I wait for everyone’s stuff to come in, to make sure this 13th album is nothing short of a perfect display of TPH. There’s, as mentioned, still quite some work to be done before we will enter the final phase, which is the mix and master, but I will keep you all up-to-date as we move forward now when something happens in the recording process that I believe is of value to you all. So, expect a little more activity on out social media platforms (just don’t expect a lot coz I, as you know, rather spend time creating music).
Last off; as I said in the beginning: YOU GUYS FUCKEN DID IT! You have made sure we can record and release this 13th album.
Thank you so much, all 236 of you.
Cheers!
Earlier today (haven’t been able to inform you until now, sorry about that!) we reached 9000$ of the $10000 goal needed to be able to do our 13th album! It blows my mind that it obviously might work yet another time this TPH Donation Experiment thing, even though it’s never taken this long to make it a success.
210 of you goddamn heroes (along with some digital sales of previous albums and the anniversary shirt sales) have brought us to exactly $9003,09 at this very moment. Only $1000 more to go and then we’re home free, goddamnit!
In between these updates which appear only when there’s something of importance to announce, be sure we are working our fucken asses off on this planned 13th TPH creation. There’s still quite a lot of work to be done, but if everything works out, and we reach the target in a not too distant future, I hope we can get this absolute beast out to you who have helped us finance it come sometime early 2020. I will, of course keep you updated as we go along.
Again, I thank all of you who have helped us get this far. I appreciate it more than you’ll ever know.
Have a great weekend, Haters! You just made mine exactly that.
As I mentioned earlier today, we’ll talk when there’s something of value to report as I rather spend my time working on our planned 13th album than being on the Internet, doing useless things.
Well, safe to say this is certainly one of those important updates so I had to return sooner than expected.
In my previous post you found out that we were at exactly $7509,43, made possible by 197 Haters together with the anniversary shirt sales, digital purchases of previous albums through Bandcamp and CD Baby as well as quite a few of you ladies and gents donating again.
Well…
You people now tally up to 198 and this last Hater obviously donated… yeah… FIVE HUNDRED MUTHAFUCKEN DOLLARS!? And with that, including the mentioned digital sales as of late, we are now at the $8000 level ($8032,91 to be exact), goddamnit!
500 dollars, huh?!
I really don’t know what to say coz that is a shitload of money. I’m not mentioning this hero’s name in case he wants it to be kept under wraps, but lemme tell you that this is the third time he does this during the course of The Experiments. There are a couple of other people who have done this as well throughout the years and… it fucken blows my mind, to put it mildly.
Huge thanx, sir, for once again making us take a huge step forward towards the $10000 goal.
As said… mind fucken blowing.
Keep on spreading the word, it looks like this 13th album will actually happen eventually. All info you need is found in the post below this one.
Last off by the way, thanx for the mails and text messages for my birthday. I appreciate it. Reaching $8000 is the best present I could possibly have gotten.
Now, be well, Haters. We’ll talk eventually.
Haters,
Once again it’s been a while since we last spoke, simply becoz there’s not much to report. Let’s get this shit out of the way.
On September 20th we were at exactly $7255,06 of the $10000 goal needed to complete our 13th album. 193 people (as well as a few purchases through Bandcamp and CD Baby, the sales of the anniversary shirt and multiple people donating more than once) got us that far.
Since then, 4 (FOUR!) more people have contributed, so we’re now at $7509,43 (digital sales from the just mentioned services once again included)! Yeah, it’s slow but it’s going in the right direction at least.
So, today is October 3rd. That’s my birthday, you know. You can celebrate this fantastic event by telling your friends and enemies to help us get to $10000 rather sooner than later. Or all of you who already donated can donate AGAIN on this special day becoz I am fucken downright amazing! How about that?
Seriously though, for the millionth time; all the info anyone need to be able to help us out is found here. Spread the word. Share this post. Whatever you see fit.
With that said, I will not be very fucken active (meaning, even less than I am now) on either Facebook or Instagram until there’s something major to announce (such as reaching the remaining $8000, $9000 and $10000 levels and/or when the recordings have moved forward big time). I’m sure you are as tired of hearing me bitch about the slow donation progress as I am to point it out every now and then, so… fuck that noise completely.
Anyways, the following might be of interest to you who give a shit about TPH:
Candlemass lead guitar hero Lasse Johansson put down all of his work last weekend, and I don’t really have to tell you it sounds spectacular.
Jörgen Sandström has one more song to put down vocals for, which should happen shortly.
Ellinor Asp’s plans are to have her work completed by the end of October.
Drumming phenomenon Dirk Verbeuren has tracked half the album, so he should also be done by the end of October, if all goes as planned.
Graphics artist Marko Saarelainen will make his return album cover art wise for this one, which is something I am extremely happy about! Marko’s been with us since pretty much the beginning and has handled the majority of our album covers over the years. Then kids, work and bla bla bla craved all of his attention so he’s passed on doing the last 2 covers (but he did everything else packaging wise for those albums). Now he once again has the time to create some majestic artwork and it feels fantastic as we’re having our 20 year anniversary with the planned 13th piece of our discography. Welcome back, brother!
I am working my balls off every day with everything else regarding this beast.
That’s that.
Basically, all we can do now is finalize this as far as we can and then wait for the budget to be reached so we can mix and master the damn thing once again with the mighty Dan Swanö at Unisound. Hopefully it will be done in early 2020, but that’s out of my hands to decide. It all depends on when we reach the monetary target, obviously.
Until next time, huge “thank you!” to all of you 197 beautiful donating muthafuckers who have chipped in to get us this far. The same goes out to you people who bought the anniversary shirt and/or have supported the cause of us reaching the budget by paying for some of our music through the available digital services.
I’m very grateful for it.
Cheers!
First and foremost; we’re getting closer to the $10000 goal needed so we can complete our 13th album, which feels absolutely fantastic. A handful of people (6 of them to be exact) have taken us from $6376,81 (which was the last update) to the sum you see today (which is exactly $7009, 23). It’s mind blowing to see quite a bunch of you heroes donate AGAIN each and every month as your paycheck comes in. I can’t thank you enough, as always.
With some digital sales through Bandcamp and CD Baby, a few purchases of the digipak of our 2017 album “Of Chaos And Carnal Pleasures”, the sales of the anniversary shirt a few months ago together with you people’s input we are now at this point. Just about $3000 left and our 13th album will be a real thing!
Second; with this being the absolutely slowest Experiment yet, and by far with the fewest contributors, I’m not even sure this formula is working as one would wish anymore. After 20 years of existence we can’t even get more than slightly 200 people (last album had 211 backers if I’m not mistaken) to help us out funding the new album? I know that “likes” on Facebook is in no way (obviously) representative of pretty much anything. I mean, if everyone who actually liked our page donated 2 bucks we would have met the $10000 goal in an instant, dammit. But it doesn’t work like that. These are the times we’re in.
When/if we get to the goal this time I have no idea if I’m up for struggling with this again; printing merch to raise recording funds, nagging about everything going slowly donation wise etc etc… I might change my mind down the line, I might not.
What I will do, though, is create TPH. No matter if it’s music that will stay with me and me only in the future, I have to fucken do this. It’s in my blood. But these thoughts are irrelevant now (and still they had to be shared, haha) coz all that matters at this very moment is to be able to complete our planned next album. It HAS to be completed. It’s necessary.
What reaching this $7000 level means is that now we can continue to record everything as far as we possibly can, and I can pay everyone involved for their efforts and whatnot… What it also means is that we simply can’t finish it and release it without those last $3000. So all we do now is… wait. And see what happens. I might sit here with an almost complete 13th album, just waiting to be mixed and mastered, for a long ass time. Goddamn it.
There’s no bitterness here though. A little frustration, yeah, but no bitterness. Fuck bitterness. I can’t possibly be bitter when fucken close to 200 people have made it possible to raise enough money to be able to at least record the majority of this 13th album, even if it can’t be finalized just yet.
With all this said, I once again wanna hand out a huge “thank you” to all of you who have helped us get this far. Either by donating and/or by purchasing merch/cd’s or whatever. You are keeping the darkness intact.
That’s all. We’ll talk eventually as soon as something important needs to be shared. In the meantime we are all working our asses off with making this recording yet another display of sheer diabolical excellence.
Spread the word if you feel like it!
Be well, Haters.
