On Hiatus, Reunions, and Looking Forward

Some 15 years passed by between these two photos

Well it's no secret that since we've decided to push forward with releasing new songs, we have been in constant collaborations with different artists to interpret our songs. And as had been told in this blog about our chief vocalists' hiatus as she prioritizes family life, I've finally found the time to travel to Cebu to meet up with Thrina. After 15 LONG YEARS. It was a good time to catch up and just swap stories about the years that went by. It still feels surreal to see Thrina with her family considering that we started this project when she was around 14 years old back then. I have a 14 year old son now, and somehow the reunion made me feel so old.

I think through the years, Thoughts And Notions had morphed into more than just a band. Along with Wilbert Tan, we've always tried to push the songs of Thoughts And Notions forward even when Thrina was in a hiatus. But somehow, it always felt different to continue on with this project without Thrina bringing life to our songs. That's why if you have been following closely with what was written in this blog since our comeback from 2022, I have always emphasized that Thrina continues to be a part of this project. Thrina has and is will always be the voice of Thoughts And Notions. And we are just here waiting for her to reclaim her spot. So yeah, we definitely talked some about it. But right now we can't disclose yet what's next for us. As we are just focusing on trying to improve our craft. 

I personally feel that my songwriting has fallen off compared to the old materials that we wrote. I was more comfortable writing songs knowing that Thrina was the one to interpret. After all, I had a security blanket of two full length albums of 21 songs all interpreted by her. So the recent releases proved to be a bit of a challenge for us music wise. Because we also had to consider who would be interpreting the songs. But I guess we were able to give it our best shot. Though not to say that I am not proud of the releases that we've made. Those were still some pretty good artists that we've worked with. I'm just not sure if I've did my part for their output to shine through. But early this year we also did decide to go on a hiatus ourselves. Just to recharge, recuperate, and better ourselves. Perhaps find new inspirations as we look to the future. Especially that I've decided to join our country's association of prestigious songwriters in FILSCAP. 

Last month I also experienced a reunion of some sort when my all-time favorite OPM band Rivermaya reunited for a live concert (not to mention that me and Wilbert reunited a week prior). Although I am not a part of the band, but I somehow also felt the emotions that the band must have went through. Especially that I continue to communicate with Rivermaya's drummer, Mark Escueta, through the years with regards to the band. It probably also didn't help that me and some of my high-school friends watched the show together (we even got Bamboo and Mark to greet us on video). To be reunited through the songs that we used to sang and enjoy when we were still young. To not know what the future holds as it was then, and as it is now. Sometimes nostalgia makes you long for the yesteryears when everything was at its beginning. When you started something filled with hope as you jump into the abyss of not knowing what the future holds. I think these past two months had me enveloped in a nostalgic feeling. Probably the after effects of being trapped in a bubble when the dreaded Covid pandemic hit us.      

This photo definitely needs an update

So I'm definitely looking forward to what this reunion would bring. Though I don't want to jump the gun at this early stage. But I am very hopeful to what the future brings. Whatever happens, I've come to accept that Thoughts And Notions is more than just about the music. It's a ministry and also a family when three individuals decided to write and sing songs to honor God. And while that was many years ago, we are here now with our own families. With our better halves and kids that might be the future of Thoughts And Notions. So I guess it is our responsibility to keep the songs alive. And hopefully one day would serve as our legacy of the friendship of three clueless individuals that didn't know what they got themselves into. And to preserve that legacy as we bequeath it to the next generation. 

But above all, Thoughts And Notions will always be a reminder that this project existed and continues to exist only because we seek to glorify and honor God. And hopefully to share it to the next generation about how God's grace brought everyone together for this project. I'm just thankful that this extended family that we've started with Thoughts And Notions continues to be blessed to this day even if everyone is miles apart from each other. That's one of the things that I've hoped and prayed for ever since we've been apart from each other. To see everyone who had been a part of our journey with Thoughts And Notions doing well with their respective families. Because God continues to bless us.

So whatever the future may hold, safe to say, this may be the beginning of our Countdown to Forever.     

Oh 2023, How we innovated and collaborated!

Whew! The year 2023 flew by so fast! And without moment to lose, here we are again, trying to recap the year that was. Well, 2023 was a very strange year for us. Strange not in a negative way, but it was a year where we seriously tried to stretch our songwriting capabilities and opened ourselves up to song collaborations with different artists. This is actually the second year of our digital music journey, and I believe we've finally held a good grasp of trying to understand how the music industry works nowadays. So, we tried a lot of stuffs, sometimes to a point where we departed from the type of music that mostly identifies with us. This phase allowed us to try a lot of things. Trying to offer new sounds to our signature lyrics. So allow me to share some of my thoughts on the year that was.

I actually opened the year with a non-Thoughts And Notions song by contributing one of my lyrics to a collaboration song with Songs by Namfi and produced by The Mox's main man Migs Llado. More details can be read here. That song filled in the gaps of an official Thoughts And Notions release, which we eventually dropped on the Lenten Season of March. Interpreted by Ben Oribe, "Mighty" is a song that puts us back to our tradition of releasing straightforward Christian songs like we used to do back in the day. And we had high hopes for the song to be featured on one of Spotify's editorial playlists. Unfortunately, it didn't make it. But lately, the song has been experiencing some resurgence as it is starting to gain a lot of listeners through Spotify's algorithmic playlists. So not making it to any editorial playlists didn't necessarily broke our spirits. We knew that it will eventually have its own perfect time to be heard. It currently sits as the number two most streamed song on our Artist Radio (Runaway Angel remains to be a tough song to unseat from the number one spot on our Radio).  

Two months later, we released another song, "BNR" which is a remix of our song "Brand New Reason". Now this one is truly off kilter when compared to the other songs in our catalogue. Because BNR ventured in a musical zone that doesn't sound like it belonged to our repertoire of Pop/Rock songs. Of course, credit goes to Dud Lemon for transforming BNR into a breezy, chill, summer, disco vibing song. And because Spotify is about playlisting and mixing and matching your songs with other similar songs, I reached out to different playlist curators and pitched the song to be added to their playlists. This effort helped the song in making it as the second most popular song on our whole catalogue. Again, the song didn't make it to any Spotify Editorial Playlists, but I've kinda given up by this point in trying to chase what would get the Spotify playlist editor's approval and focus instead on releasing songs that would represent us well. And while I do love the song, I think it hasn't resonated that well with our audience. As the algorithms has showed little to less interest from the listeners. But nevertheless, it's still a go to track that I love to listen to over and over again if I feel like chilling and relaxing.  

Oh, by the way, the month of August was huge for us, because we finally hit 1 million Streams in total for the whole of our catalogue on Spotify. And in celebration of that milestone, we shared our recipe in how we made the numbers through this post. Some artists can easily make that mark, but for independent artists like us, it's no easy feat. It took us years of understanding how to utilize Spotify to our advantage in making sure that our songs would reach the right audience. And finally, the hard work paid off. It is still crazy to think that our old songs from some 15 years ago are still being heard up to now. And we have God to thank for. So we just continue to follow his leading in this journey. This was also the month when we released our first ever BisRock (slang term for Bisaya Rock) song in collaboration with Oquilla. "Kusog nga gi Hinumdom" was the first ever Bisaya song that we have written, something that we are able to tick off on our bucket list. It also serves as a tribute to our Kagayanon roots, with the chosen language used. The song is a traditional BisRock song down to the production quality as we aimed to be able to make the listeners experience the feel of what a BisRock song is. We are also hopeful that we would be able to reach more Bisaya listeners with this song, especially the message that we wanted to share, about the story of where we draw our strength from in times of trouble.       

October then came in rolling, and with the month being recognized as "Depression" awareness month, we decided to finally release perhaps our darkest and heaviest song to date, the song Heartbeats. Written and drawn from my own personal battle with depression, Heartbeats is perhaps my most personal song yet. The song is so personal to the point that I haven't really blogged extensively about the song yet. But my personal story about how I was able to beat depression can be read on this post. The song is too dark and experimental when compared to the other songs in our catalogue, but I guess Wilbert felt that this was the only way to go with the lyrics that I supplied to him. The song is jarring but also cathartic to me. And it was greatly helped that Rochy Dadivas was the one who interpreted the song. To which she also can relate about the experience. But personally, my only hope for this song is that when people hear it, they would find the courage to combat depression by seeking inner peace. And to seek and find God amidst the noise and the clutter that this world is wrapping us with. 

Heartbeats was supposed to be the last song that we would be releasing for the year, but our start up record label Cre8Music was in the midst of compiling a Christmas Album, and we were one track short. So, we had to release one more song for the project. But since time was of the essence, we decided to just translate our Christmas song from last year (What Real Christmas Means to Me) to Filipino instead. We thought it was that easy, but it was easier said than done. Good thing that our handpicked artist to interpret the song is fluent with the Filipino language. Soleil Misalucha polished my Filipino translation and rewrote some of the words to make the final product more cohesive. Soleil herself is also a very talented singer songwriter. And it was an honor to have been able to work with her, especially that we just found out that she had been nominated for Female Acoustic Artist of the year in the 15th Philippine Movie Press Corp Star Awards for Music. We at Cre8Music Records are actually excited for her this year as we try to line up projects for her. So we ended our year by having two of our songs being included in Cre8Music's Christmas compilation album. It became two because we were one track short, so our Christmas song from last year was added in to this project so that we could come up with a 10 track album.

I think 2023 had been a blessed year for us. Because despite all of the challenges in being able to release new songs, we were able to pull it through. We were able to release five songs in total collaborating with various artists that we have met during this journey thus far. However, this experience had also made me think about what's next for our journey. And the year that went by also was the birth of Cre8Music Records, a fledgling independent record label that I'm building with some friends. And oh how we encountered some birth pains along the way. Experiencing some changes and departures as the year closed. This made me rethink about putting Thoughts And Notion on a hiatus. Or until I get our main vocalist Thrina back to sing our songs again. I think with the record label that we are building, it is only fair that I sacrifice my music and focus on our artists instead. So yes, for the year 2024, we "might" not be able to release some new songs. But we will still be very much involved with music. But this time it will be about helping other artists build their music careers. We are an old group that had been doing our music thing since 2006. And we have been blessed to be able to build and sustain it even when our contemporaries had taken long hiatus. It's been two years since we made our comeback from a very long hiatus. Working hard to understand the landscape of the digital music industry. It's time to make a sacrifice and help inspire and build a new generation of artists.

Thoughts And Notions will come back stronger. That's a promise. 

Only for God's greater Glory! 

Hope you guys' support Cre8Music Records!

You can check out Cre8Music's song catalogue on this playlist:

 https://open.spotify.com/playlist/5f7WUMTq2SleBEpbekTTix?si=4b37a1c130ac4fe1

Cre8 PASKO! A Christmas compilation album from Cre8Music Records

Compilation albums had always been a dime a dozen for record labels to release during the Christmas season. And Cre8Music Records (to which we are a part of) had finally threw our hat in the ring for this Christmas Season. It's a project that had been brewing since last year when our own released Christmas song "What Real Christmas Means to Me" made it to Spotify's Official New Music Friday playlist. Though we had a year to plan and finalize the compilation album, there were a lot of last minute submissions that tried to beat the deadline. Thankfully, we were able to accommodate all of the submissions for this project. This compilation album features artists signed under Cre8Music Records either as label artist or under the digital distribution agreement. Though this does not involved everyone on our roster, as some don't have a Christmas song planned for release. But more or less, these are the majority of the roster sans Melissa Corpus. Of course, Melissa will have her own release this month. Her debut album Serye, which is something that you guys shouldn't miss, will be premiering worldwide this December 15, 2023. 

 You can pre-save the album on this link: https://bfan.link/serye

Moving on, due to time constraints, we were not able to solicit the opinions of everyone involved in the album. No listening parties were held. And in order not to delay the release further, I decided to took it upon myself to come up with the track sequence. However, It's been awhile since I've worked on album releases. And arranging the right track sequence in the album is something that I used to enjoy doing. Though for this project, it wasn't as fun as I initially thought it would be. I guess it is always easier to do this type of work if you wrote most/all of the songs in the album. This compilation album felt like I was trying to build a puzzle. God knows how I spent a lot of time listening to different track sequences, until I finally found the right sequence that I believe will bring a more heartfelt and impactful listening experience (message wise) to the listeners. There were a lot of things to consider mind you, from the music, to the themes of the songs. But I have always been a lyric guy. And I am always attracted to the messaging of the song more than the music. So I finally decided to zero in on the message of the songs, and arrange them in such a way where I am able to weave different stories, and make it coherent in terms of delivering a message that we at Cre8Music wanted to deliver. And without much further ado, let me introduce to you the track sequence of the album along with a brief message of what the song is about and how it fits with the whole narrative of the album. 

 

1.) Feel Good Morning - Wile Lile

As the title itself suggests, the Christmas season is always filled with Good Mornings. And Feel Good Morning is an instrumental track that was performed by Thoughts And Notions other half Wilbert Tan's alter ego, Wile Lile. As the only instrumental track in the album, I decided to start off the compilation album with this track (as influenced by Rivermaya's Atomic Bomb album). I wanted to set the feel and mood of the listeners right off the bat when they come to listen to the album. And as the title suggests, the music just puts you on a very good mood to start the day with it's playful guitar solos that meshes well with the other musical instruments. Talk about harmony this Christmas!      

2.) Pasko Na Naman - Jonah Agas, Dud Lemon

Written and composed by Namfi Monzon, Pasko Na Naman comes next as we formally welcome the coming of the Christmas season. Interpreted and collaborated with by Jonah Agas and Dud Lemon, Pasko na naman is a synth pop laden Christmas song that officially welcomes the festive Christmas spirit for the season. The synth pop music just continues on with the mood established in the first track as it encourages the listeners to bop and dance to the synth tunes. With the song extolling about the joy of welcoming Christmas with a heart that is full of love and hope. As Jesus had been born to bring.

 

3.) Christmas Party - Nico Frayn

Of course Christmas celebrations won't be complete without the parties that we are invited to attend. Written and composed by Nico Frayn and produced by Miguel Llado. Christmas Party formally kick starts the celebration in this album. And the festive mood of the song is just the perfect continuation from the previous track. Filled with Pop sensibilities, the feel good track speaks about what makes Christmas parties great. And it's not even about being lavish, but just the simple joys of Christmas. Being with your love ones and the people that you value the most.

 

4.) Sentro ng Pasko - Thoughts And Notions, Soleil Misalucha

With all of the celebrations happening, one should not forget about who the central figure as to why we are celebrating Christmas in the first place. And that's what the next track is trying to offer. Actually, "Sentro ng Pasko" is the Filipino translation of our Christmas song "What Real Christmas Means to Me." done in Bossa Nova music. Soleil Misalucha greatly helped me in coming up with the right Filipino translation to the song as writing Filipino lyrics is a weak spot of mine. I had to put this song as the fourth track to prepare the listeners to what is coming next. So while this song will remind the listeners that Jesus Christ is the main reason why we are celebrating Christmas, there are others who might not be celebrating a joyous Christmas. 

 

5.) Kahilingan - Lostplate

And that's where Lostplate's song comes in. Lostplate's knack for writing emo music shone brightly in this track, especially if you know the back story of this song. While churning out emo music is Lostplate's staple, "Kahilingan" still comes out as hopeful. Especially when sequenced right after a song that reminds us of Jesus Christ. Because 'Kahilingan" can be easily transformed as a prayer/plea to God above to grant lonely hearts a respite from the sadness that Christmas brings to them. The heartfelt plea is a sign that even if it feels like all hope is lost, Faith remains steadfast that prayers are being answered. Kahilingan is the first of three songs in this compilation album that dwells on sad Christmases. 

 

6.) Ngayong Pasko - Forsomereason

And rightly so, Forsomereason continues with a sad Christmas song of their own. Which is ably produced by Miguel Llado. Ngayong Pasko is a simple sad ditty that just permeates the sadness that some people have to deal with. Especially when they are forced to celebrate Christmas alone, as they are separated from their love ones. The song just pulls in the listener with a heavy feeling of sadness. Just enough to remind us that while some of us are blessed to have a joyful and complete Christmas, there are others that needs a little cheering up. And if we can spend a little of our time with them too, then maybe we can help uplift their Christmas too.  

 

7.) Sana Kumpleto sa Pasko - Bimbo Simbulan

The sad Christmas song trilogy comes to an end with this song by Bimbo Simbulan. But while this song is still sad in nature, the overall feel of the song still exudes a certain ray of hope. Because Bimbo takes us into his time machine, of simpler Christmas times with our love ones. And while we are taken to reminisce of those times, we are also asked to accept the realities of life. And that we have to move on and continue to live our lives filled with hope. And the music certainly helps in that regard. As it isn't as sad and emotionally heavy as the previous song is. Rather, it is hopeful enough to lighten up the mood to prepare us for the next song.  

 

8.) Diwa ng Pasko - Danayah

And here it is again, just when all hope is lost, we are reminded once more of the true spirit of Christmas. And Danayah brings forth her song with Click Band that also talks about the resilience of the Filipino spirit. Inviting everyone to join a festive celebration in welcoming the coming of the Messiah, Jesus Christ. The song will certainly lift the spirits of the listeners with its choice inspirational lyrics. Coupled with feel good pop/rock music. The song fits nicely as the next one in line after a trilogy of sad emotive Christmas songs. It honors the legitimacy of the sad Christmases that some of us are experiencing, but also reminds us that the birth of Jesus also means the arrival of Hope. And we Filipinos had always been resilient when times are tough. With a Faith that cannot be shaken easily. 

9.) What Real Christmas Means to Me - Thoughts And Notions, Tirada, Elvis Rock, Wile Lile, AJ Alburo

This song makes a return as a release this year in this compilation album though it feels like an outlier. For it's the only English song in this compilation album. The song however had to be included because originally, this was supposed to be my only contribution for this project. But due to lack of content to make this album a 10 track album, I had to do a Filipino version of this song. The theme of the song once again reinforces the real meaning of Christmas. And the mishmash of different rock influenced music brings forth an energetic mood to celebrate Christmas. Full story about the song can be read on this link.    

10.) Christmas Reunion - dFather&dSon 

From the first track down to the ninth track, the listener is taken in with a bevy of emotions. A roller coaster of emotions from joy to sadness. From feel good to introspective. And I feel that the best way to end this album is by giving our listeners a Christmas song that has a dash of comedy and humor. Just to ensure that we all will be having a little laugh as the compilation album comes to a close. And there's no better way to end it by giving the listeners a trademark song by dFather&dSon. Known for their novelty songs, Christmas Reunion tells a story about a humorous reunion that some of us spend reminiscing of past mishaps and to some extent, grudges that we still hold. And though it is sung in a humorous way, the root of it all is still about forgiveness and just enjoying each other's company.

 

And that's the story of how I came up with the song sequence of the album. There might be other ways how to do it (of course, you can always create your own playlist to suit your mood), but that's how I feel this compilation album should be listened to. Especially after countless days of listening to the tracks in different sequences. As for the compilation album's title "Cre8 PASKO!", I opted for a shorter and catchy title so that it would be easier for people to remember. There were other suggested titles thrown in, but I feel that this title represents the album best. And there are two things that I want to highlight why I feel this suits the compilation album best. Firstly, the branding of Cre8Music is on the title itself, because it's a project by Cre8Music. Lastly, the word "Cre8 PASKO!" speaks about creating our different Christmases, which in a way makes all of our different ways of celebrating Christmas feel accessible and welcomed. By the expression itself, we all are entitled to create our Christmases in such a way that we are able to fully express ourselves. Without judgement and comparison. Making this compilation album truly an all-inclusive one!   

 

So ladies and gentlefolks! 

Let's Cre8 PASKO! this December 20, 2023 by pre-saving the link below:

 https://bfan.link/cre8-paskohttps://bfan.link/cre8-paskohttps://bfan.link/cre8-pasko

Kusog nga gihinumdom explained

For most of our song catalogue, we have been known for our English songs. But our latest release "Kusog nga gihinumdom" was something that was uncharacteristic for our regular listeners. To which there are those who can't understand our native tongue. Not meaning to alienate them, it was my intention to actually write this blog so that I can reinforce the message of the song. Using the English vocabulary (being the universal language) this time so that I can reach out to a wider audience. However, I can't do a straight translation of the song, as sometimes a word for word translation won't fit properly to the original meaning of the song. So, what I'll do instead is to explore what each part of the song means. By breaking them down part by part.

So let's break down the lyrics of the songs shall we?

Kusog nga gihinumdom

1st Stanza:

Gihinumdom nako ang akong kagahapon

Ang akong panglantaw nga sobra ka dag-um

Ingon ka, salig lang ko sa imo

Ihatag akong kasing-kasing para lang sa imo

Chorus:

Ginoo, tabangi ko sa akong kinabuhi

Tabangi ko nga sa kalisud dili mu buhi

Ang imong gugma akong paglaum

Ikaw akong kusog nga gihinumdom

2nd Stanza:

Sa mga panahon nga nalimtan taka

Imong kong gi pukaw para mu mata

Ang akong pagsalig dili dapat mag-bago

Himuon kini mas hugot pa kaysa kaniadto

Bridge:

Ang akong kinabuhi 

Ihatag para sa imo

Para sa imo lang

Ug wala nay lain pa

Wala nay lain pa...

Chorus:

Ginoo, tabangi ko sa akong kinabuhi

Tabangi ko nga sa kalisud dili mu buhi

Ang imong gugma akong paglaum

Ikaw akong kusog nga gihinumdom

Coda:

Ikaw akong kusog nga gihinumdom

1st Stanza

In the first stanza, I spoke about my gloomy past. When everything felt so hopeless. Those times before I truly embraced and accepted Jesus Christ in my life. I believe we all have these stories where we feel so hopeless. And we have no one to cling to because we thought that we only have ourselves to rely on. And by our own strength, skill, and knowledge, we believe that possessing them is enough to get us through the day. Then when the tough times comes, and we could no longer trust our self to survive, we begin to lose hope. Sometimes finding no more reason to keep on living. But then, when we come to know Jesus' love for us, and when we put our complete trust and faith in him, a change of perspective begins. Especially when we surrender and give all our heart to him. This is what the first stanza is talking about. From being hopeless and then to know Jesus, who asked us to put our faith in him. And then responding to his call by giving all our heart to him. Completing the process of metanoia.

Chorus:

The chorus is basically a prayer, a plea, asking God for help. In desperation, in the toughest times when chaos and uncertainty come our way. We ask God to help us not to let go and give up on life. And that when all hope is lost, we cling only to him and put our complete trust and faith in him that we'll eventually get through our problems and tribulations. And in full surrender, we declare to God that his love is our only hope. And remember him as the only one true source of our strength.   

The 1st Stanza and the Chorus is a reminder of our first encounter with Jesus. How our life had changed for the better, only because we have come to accept him in our life, as our Lord and Savior. And this encounter has strengthened our resolve as a renewed Christian. With a relationship with our Lord and savior that is new, fresh, and still on a stage where we are so filled by his love and his presence in our life. But then we got too complacent. Failing to nurture that relationship...

2nd Stanza

Then we got too complacent with our relationship with God. We got too comfortable to the point that we begin to neglect and forget about him. And then we begin to encounter challenges and hardships. And due to our complacency (or lack of Faith), we begin to think that God had forsaken us. Blaming him for the misfortunes that we begin to encounter. But if we truly have a very strong Faith in him. We put all these in stride and just accept that these challenges and hardships are just God's way of waking us up from our slumber. Sometimes when we get too comfortable with our life. We need to be jolted so that we would be awaken from our false sense of comfort. God has blessed us so much, yet we turned ungrateful and neglected him. God is just nudging us. To help us remember the most important thing in this life, which is our relationship with him. And that we should not allow these "challenges" to shake our faith in him. Or to allow ourselves to lose our Faith in him. But instead, to make our Faith stronger than before. Because these "hardships" that we encounter and learning to accept them, is a testament of how much we love God in return. That in spite of these, our love for him remains unchanged, but in fact should even make it stronger than ever before.  That in times of chaos, we could discern and remain steadfast in our Faith in him. I believe when we achieve that type of maturity in our Faith, then we would be invulnerable to whatever life throws our way.

Coda:

Which then leads us to the coda of the song. Which is a passionate declaration that we will offer and surrender our life to God. And only to God alone. This line culminates the overall experience of our journey with our Christian Faith. And appreciating the journey of our Faith is the overall end goal of our relationship with God. Because there will always be peaks and valleys. 

So, by putting all these together, the song basically demonstrates the life cycle of a real Christian. A real Christian is someone who is capable of accepting his imperfections. And that through these imperfections, the will to seek out God more and the motivation to nurture and sustain a relationship with him truly is the only goal in our life. This is my hope and prayer when I wrote this song. To get the message across that what matters in this life is Christ alone. Not the fake shallow happiness brought about by the material things that this world could give us. And even when the situation comes when we begin to doubt God. May we be able to see beyond the smokescreen and learn to discern by truly possessing a faith that is solidified by our love for God. God does not test our Faith just for the sake of testing it, but rather it is up to us to reaffirm our Faith in God. Whatever circumstance may we be in.    

It is my hope and prayer that this song has blessed you and will continue to bless someone as it travels far and wide. Never forget, God loves you regardless of who you are.     

We've finally hit the One Million streams mark on Spotify!

The graphic shows how our streams grew since we released our songs in 2021

We've finally hit one million streams on our overall song catalogue on Spotify! And it took us close to two years to hit those numbers. Though not pretty impressive for popular artists, but for a small independent artist like us, it already means so much. It's another milestone to our long running saga of keeping our songs alive through all these years. So how did we do it? Here are 5 tips on what we did to reach those numbers. Read on to find out...

Some of the playlists where our songs got added to

1.) Playlisting is the KEY!

When we started our digital music journey, we were pretty much lost on how to do the promotions and how to share our songs to more people so that they would be heard. We were pretty much happy to see our friends streaming our songs. But we have to admit, they can't stream it everyday. And not all can really help you in spreading your songs to their respective circles. So as we watched our listeners dwindle down, we decided to study about the best practices in making sure our songs on Spotify would grow. And one of the best practices that we found out was to get our songs on more playlists. So with that in mind, we just kept on sending them to playlist curators who are willing to place them on their playlists. However, in our initial run, we never knew about this thing called algorithms and how it works with Spotify. So we got into a bit of trouble. Which leads us to...

Some of the Algorithm based playlists that our songs were playlisted on

2.) Keep your algorithms HEALTHY!

Spotify uses their unique listener data reading technology to identify listener habits and tastes. Once they are able to mine enough listener data, they are going to put one and two together. Meaning, they will be sending your songs to new listeners with the same listening habits as the listeners of your songs. But unfortunately for us, we didn't know about this stuff. So we got added to playlists that are so different from our genre, to the extent that it messed up our algorithms. When listeners skip your songs, that counts as a negative to your algorithms. So when your songs are being fed to the wrong listeners, tendency will be is that they will skip your songs. Thus making Spotify's AI technology to stop feeding your songs to those listeners. Preventing growth on your part and be discovered by new listeners. Once we realized that what we did was wrong, we started to correct it. By taking our songs out of those playlists and making sure to send it to the right genre. But, besides sending our songs to various playlist curators for their consideration, we decided to be more proactive and became playlist curators ourselves. Which leads us to the next tip...

Playlists that we curated

3.) Curate your own PLAYLISTS!

What's more fun than creating your playlists of songs that influenced you or the songs that are in the same genre as yours? Or simply, songs that you enjoy listening to. Being a Spotify user gives you access to millions of songs readily available to be added to your own playlists. So there's no better way to listen to your songs than to listen to it along with the same genre that it belongs to. From independent to big named artists, everything can easily be found on Spotify. With your own playlists, you'd have better control on which song to add and be listened to along with your songs. And, it's also more fun to do playlist exchange with your friends with regards to what songs you are listening to. Just like the old days when we record mixtapes on our casette tapes or CD-Rs and share them with our friends. This is more economical and a more faster way to enjoy listening to music with your friends. No need to spend on a physical product and do the recording. All you need is a playlist and you are good to go. This is also especially helpful with friends who are also independent artists themselves. Which leads us to...

4.) Network and join communities of INDEPENDENT ARTISTS!

You have to admit, you are not the best musician out there. You could always learn a thing or two from your fellow independent artists. And trading songs with them to critique or to simply just support each other by listening to each others' songs helps build those Spotify Algorithms too. And the more network you build, the bigger your algorithms grow. Because as your algorithms is growing, Spotify will only match your song's "listeners also like" section to similar sized artists such as you. Their AI tech will not put you on a bigger artists' Spotify profile, because the volume of listeners listening to their songs would most likely be listening to other popular artists too. So even if some of their listeners would listen to your songs, their listener data will be drowned out by other listeners of the same popular artists and whatever other artists that they are listening to. It's kind of confusing really. But to explain it simply, it's just like a pyramid where artists are lumped together with their respective sizes. But the most important thing is to get your profile to appear on another artists' profile. Thus, giving you more chances to be discovered by their listeners too.  

5.) Promote, promote, promote, ... but don't get SCAMMED!

Yes, there are many ways of promoting your songs on social media and on the internet besides in your live gigs. And there are some "marketeers" and "promoters" who offer their services to you to get your song playlisted on various playlists. Some of them are legitimate ones, while the other aren't. The legitimate ones usually cannot guarantee you a fix number of listeners and streams. Because simply put, who can guarantee you a fix number of listeners who would take a liking to your song? So when there are "marketeers" that can guarantee you a fix number of listeners/streams, then that is a red flag. Because those numbers can easily be manipulated by using bots. And with the fees that they are charging you, you really cannot get your money's worth because you would be playlisted in playlists that are of mixed genre. And when that happens, it messes up your algorithms (refer to number 2 again). You know how much Spotify pays per stream, and how much those "marketeers" charge per stream as promised. So it's a double loss for you. However, if you do have the budget, then spend on Spotify's Marquee instead. It's an in-app ad that pops up for the users to see and hear a sampling of your song (refer to the video for full details). Another way to promote your songs without breaking the bank is by using the Spotify Discovery Mode. It's an algorithm based promotional campaign where Spotify sends your songs to specific users based on your listeners data. You don't need to pay anything for this but Spotify just takes a certain percentage from the stream revenue that is due to you from them. I've had some success with this program as I've managed to gain more than 100,000 streams since I activated our Discovery Mode program.     

I'm proud to say that we made the one million streams mark without spending a single cent on bots. We also missed out on being playlisted on bigger "Official" Spotify playlists that guarantees a huge number of listeners. We only got playlisted twice on Spotify's Official New Music Friday playlist. And songs there only stay for a week before the playlists gets refreshed again. We just put the work in to ensure that we get our songs out to be heard by more listeners in whatever way we could with the limited resources that we have. In totality I could say that I probably had successfully playlisted our songs to close to 100 playlists. But as per our Spotify for Artists data, our songs were playlisted in more than 1,200 playlists. There's no way that we were able to reach out to 1,200 playlist curators. That right there is the work of all those algorithms. And that's the one true ally for independent artists like us. So don't just drop your songs on Spotify and leave it there undiscovered. You have to make sure that it is being engaged to regularly so that it would reach its intended listeners. 

One BONUS TIP:

This one is kind of underrated, but studying your Spotify for Artists data is a huge help. I check my stats every day to analyze and study how my songs are doing on Spotify. And I use those data to plot and implement what my next moves are. The work that we put in basically begins and ends with that app. Not to mention that there are articles that you could read which gives you some basic tips that Spotify is trying to teach us to be successful in our Digital Music journey. 

In closing, let me share why, despite how hard it is to find our listeners with millions of songs in Spotify that is readily available to listen to, we are still doing this. It's simply because my motivation to continue writing songs is not rooted on the financial rewards. If so, I wouldn't be writing songs. My motivation is something deeper. Of course, I welcome the million streams. But even if my songs would only reach and touch just one soul and draw them nearer to seek God, then that is already enough for me. I've been at this with Wilbert Raagas Tan and Thrina Dimaano Escaño since 2006, and we have our own fair share of faith stories to tell. Did we become popular? No. Did we touch some souls along the way to seek and get to know more about God? I would like to believe so. And that's the sole reason why we're still here after all these years.

I'm also blessed to not rely on this as my means to my living (I'm not really a musician to begin with, I'm just a lyricist). And navigating this Digital Music stuff had also become a personal mission of mine. To learn from this and share whatever I learned as a means of giving back to the artists that truly deserves this. And you could be a part of that too. You just don't know, that with all the Taylor Swifts, WKND, Ariana Grande, Sam Smith, KPOP and all the other big named artists you put in your playlists, simply adding songs by independent artists on your playlists could go a long long way. It helps their algorithms and gives them a huge opportunity to be discovered.

The road to one million all began with playlisting and algorithms. You may have heard our songs, or you may haven't. But somewhere out there, someone will take a liking to our songs. And we've seen how the Spotify algorithms helped us.

It's not easy to be an independent artist. But there's a way to make this Digital Music Streaming work to our favor. So don't give up just yet. There's an audience out there waiting to hear your song. You just need to find them.

And we have written our first Bisaya Song!

For someone who takes pride coming from Cagayan de Oro, a small but progressing city from down south in the Philippine island of Mindanao. It has always been a mystery that we have never written a song in our local Visayan dialect. For sure, Thoughts And Notions co-founder Wilbert Tan had written an album worth of Visayan songs. But as Thoughts And Notions, there was never a material written in our native tongue. The fact is, we've even written more "Tagalog" songs (two) than Visayan songs. So it had always remained on our things to do for quite some time. Something that we had long carried in our bucket list. Until now...

Our closest brush of a Visayan song released (besides that commercial jingle for a sardines brand that was written by one time drummer of the band Adonis Berongoy) was actually in the form of a Visayan translation of a previously released song called "Safer in My Heart". The lyrics of the song was written by me, and with music composed by Adonis Berongoy. During the period of the band's hiatus, Adonis reworked the song with his other band Brandibelly by translating my English lyrics to Visayan lyrics. But, I could never take credit for that reincarnation of the song because you can never do a straight word for word translation of the English language to Visayan language. Sometimes you have to take liberties with the translation just to keep the original idea of the song intact. So it is his more than mine. You can check out the song here:

But before I proceed with my story, please do check out the more in depth history of Visayan Music and its rise in the national consciousness on this link. Personally, I was introduced to the beauty of Visayan Music in my younger years through the likes of Visayan Folk singer-songwriter Yoyoy Villame. And as I grew older and my musical tastes started to vary, I stumbled upon some Visayan Indie Rock bands that were experiencing their own band explosion in the late 90's to early 2000's. For sure everyone knows about Urbandub, arguably the most popular Rock band that broke out from the Visayan Queen City of the south, Cebu. Or the equally talented and underrated Indie band called Sheila and the Insects with their 80's new wave music influenced sound. But there was also a burgeoning Bisrock (short for Visayan Rock) music scene emerging in the indie music circuit in Cebu. 

Way back in 2006, we were even lucky enough to share the stage with such prestigious Bisrock bands such as Budoy and Jr. Kilat, Powerspoonz, and Smooth Friction. Cebu was truly the hotbed for Bisrock Music. And along with that burgeoning Visayan creativity juiced up, decent recording studios began to mushroom in Cebu. Something that us, Cagayan de Oro musicians could only dream of having access to back in the day. In fact, for those who had the financial budget, Cagayan de Oro bands would travel to Cebu to record their stuffs. And one such band from Cagayan de Oro did make that trek to record an album worth of songs. That band was Southrace. The band who I consider as the purveyors of Bisrock Music in Cagayan de Oro. (Hey, we were even lucky enough to share the stage with them during their Second Album Launch).    

Southrace is one of the hardest working bands in Cagayan de Oro. And their stature is even legendary in the sense that they have been in the local music industry for close to 20 years already. And even if we go a long way back, we only reconnected recently (specifically with rhythm guitarist Nilo Quitoriano) and had been in close contact as we tried to figure out this Digital Music era. So that constant communication would yield an idea about doing a collaboration. Just not with the entire band, but one half of Southrace. Or to be exact, Nilo's side project band that he named Oquilla.

And this is how our first ever Bisrock song came to be. I've never really written Visayan lyrics before. But somehow for this effort, the words flowed naturally. It felt like I was crying out to God, asking for his help to give me strength in these trying times. "Kusog nga gi hinumdom" was the chosen title of this song. Taken from the lyrics that I wrote that expressed a genuine longing to ask God to strengthen me. To help me not to give up in the times when giving up is the easy way out. And to put my full trust and Faith in God's promise that his Love will help us endure. 

Of course the lyrics are just one part of it, Nilo took care of the music part. Inspired by the lyrics, he managed to come up with a very strong Bisrock music that brought life to my words. Though not exactly as Southrace, but the sound and influence are unmistakenly what Southrace would sound like if they were the ones I did the collaboration with. And as I have shared too many times already here in this blog, of which our current setup of featuring revolving vocalists to interpret our songs, it was only natural that Nilo will have to take up the vocal chores for this song. 

This production is then capped of by the able hands of Wilbert, who did the final mix and master of the Radio Edit version of the song. Kusog nga gi Hinumdom will be released in two versions. One version honors the Bisrock sound of Cebu bands that we look up to. While the other version is a Radio Edit of the same song, but mixed and mastered with how a Bisrock Thoughts And Notions song would sound like. And, in order to maintain the feel of how an Indie Bisrock song would sound like in the early 2000's, when most Cebuano sound engineers were in the process of perfecting their craft. We made the conscious decision to have the song's production to sound like being a little rough around the edges. We wanted to make you experience how Bisrock music used to sound like years ago. We'd want you to hear the authentic sound of Indie Bisrock Music. The kind of music that ignited the hopes and dreams of musicians from down South in Visayas and Mindanao. Where opportunities with Music wasn't that plenty. But still, we trudged on. 

I'm proud of this song. And I'm doubly honored to be able to share the authenticity of this song to my fellow Visayan folks. And with that, I'll end this blog entry with these words...

Maski unsay mahitabo, ayaw gyud kalimti ug sambit sa Ginoo. Ug hinumdumi nga siya lang ang dapat pagkuhaan nato ug kusog. Kay ang iyang gugma gi saad na niya sa ato sauna pa. Ang atong kinabuhi, ihatag para lang sa iya ug wala nay lain pa.

Help us Pre-Save the song on the link below...

https://bfan.link/kusog-nga-gihinumdom

Brand New Reason gets remixed with a brand new sound!

First things first, Brand New Reason at some point became our top song

Brand New Reason was the first song that we released last year, without our longtime vocalist Thrina, doing the vocal chores. The whole story of that was shared here. But to keep the long story short, we had to improvise by featuring different guest artists to interpret our songs. We've released a couple more songs since then but I feel Brand New Reason could be something more. I mean this is not to knock the older version. In fact, just as I was starting preparations for the release of the remixed version, the song all of sudden experienced a surge in listeners and streams (see photo below). Currently rising as the number two most popular song on our catalogue (of course, Runaway Angel continues to take the top spot). Plus, the algorithms seemed to put the song in front of an audience that took a liking to the song. Giving the song a huge lift in playlist additions by those who were able to listen to the song. Honestly, the number of people playlisting the song is the highest that I've ever experienced among all of our songs. And getting those numbers for the Pre-Save campaign is something that I feel is very daunting to reach. So yes, Brand New Reason has it's own charm. Of course, you could never fail with my long time songwriting partner Wilbert helming the musical composition of the song. Even if he just decided to use sparse instrumentation to highlight Kai Huyno's vocal chops.

Sudden rise of streams for Brand New Reason

But while the original version is a very good song in its own way, I feel that there's an opportunity to turn this song into something sort of an EDM (Electronic Dance Music) type of song. Somehow, being exposed to Spotify's wide range of music genres opened my musical tastes. And it is of great privilege of mine to be able to have worked on this song with Dud Lemon. A very talented and rising beatmaker and artist who is just starting to explore his own art and music. Dud Lemon has so far released an EP collaborating with another talented rising indie pop artist Jonah Agas (you should check out her dreamy lo-fi, indie/synth pop EP). And though their collaboration just feels like magic (there's more coming from them), I wanted to "borrow" Dud Lemon and take his talent to explore something outside his comfort zone with Jonah. And this is how BNR came to be. Though admittedly, I was not really a fan of EDM/Disco music back in the day, but what Dud Lemon did on this song totally blew my mind. 

BNR is a very chill and breezy song that would take you to the retro disco music years while evoking beach music vibes. Just perfect for a hot summer release. I'm actually surprised with the finished product. For I have lived the disco years and listening to the song made me feel a bit nostalgic of my younger years where disco music lorded it over the traditional radio airwaves. Of course, I actually told Dud Lemon to own the song like it was his. And sure enough, the end product made the song sound totally new. You'd actually think that this is a different song from the older one. Of course, the lyrics remained the same. Though Dud Lemon took the liberty to experiment on Kai's vocal tracks. This was totally a fun project to work with. Couldn't be proud enough to have worked with Dud Lemon for this song. As far as a Thoughts And Notions song is concerned, this is going to be another first in our song catalogue. And I could probably say that this feels like a first for Dud Lemon's own catalogue too. 

BNR Album Artwork mixed in with some Korean words

I also had fun conceptualizing the artwork. I researched on various disco colors that I could work on to keep the album cover art a complete representation of the song. And even put some Korean words up front. K-Pop music is so huge all over the world now, so I just thought of putting a Korean title in there as a homage to the successful rise of K-Pop music. Of course, Kai looks a little bit Korean if you come to think of it. And I'm hoping on one end that K-Pop music fans would take a liking to the song too. Maybe we can bring back the glory years of Disco Pop music and have it integrated to Pop music now.  

The song is simply called BNR, the acronym for Brand New Reason. I feel it fits the song nicely. But the Korean words on the album art cover is the alternate title for the song (if google was able to translate it correctly). But I'm not saying what it means. You'll have to figure it out yourself. 😉  

Help us Pre-Save the song on this link and be the first to hear this totally new song that we are very excited to share with you:

https://bfan.link/bnr

And one more thing. I just remembered that I actually didn't write anything about the song's message, in the blog entry I wrote when the original song first came out. Well it's just a very simple hopeful and inspirational song, that encourages us to always find a Brand New Reason for you to live each day. There are a lot of things worth living for. You'd just have to put on your dancing shoes and dance to the beat that life takes you to. Of course, with HIM above being the great comforter that he is to bring direction to your life.