Well, it's almost 2025.
It's already 2025 where I am but, shhhhh.
My grandparents always say, “Don’t leave anything you meant to do this year for the new year.”
I started writing this post months ago so I think I have to post it. Honestly I’ve already messed up a little bit because I’m writing this in Japan, where it is now 2025. But in New York, I still have a few hours left… Please forgive me!
I’m THREE months behind on writing about our EP Release (in my last post I literally say, I’ll tell you about it laterrrrr lol). In fact so behind, that I’ve lost steam! I’ve verbally told the story too many times now and am bored of it. So I apologize to my substack-only readers, but you’re gonna have to come find me in person to get the full story. Or one day when we’re huge and I get to write my celebrity memoir, our cursed EP release will have her moment.
TL;DR there were a lot of obstacles, and it was very frustrating, I cried a lot in many places (i.e. The US Open, a Marriott Residence Inn in San Antonio, etc.), until the moment we started playing I was convinced it would simply be a garbage fire, but it ended up being really fun, people packed out a gross (complimentary) little basement in Bushwick, and I can’t complain. Are there be a million things I wish would’ve gone differently? Do I wish I could’ve been happier about everything? Yes, sure, but I learned a lot, and as my boy Shakespeare says, ALL’S WELL THAT ENDS WELL.
I’ve been playing capitalism hard mode for the past month so I haven’t had a full minute to muse as much as I’d like to. I’ve also, like many people, been feeling real weird since November 5th.
^ So I wrote that in mid November.
And then I wrote a couple more versions of what comes next over the past two months.
My late November drafts were about being angry at the sentiment “We now need art more than ever” when I don’t understand the rigor with which we are assessing what art is needed right now. And what art is art. And what is needed? What’s now? Did people think we were all just making unnecessary stuff until right before now? But it became a bit too much. More SoapBox than SubStack. I also accepted that this is a topic I could muse to no end, which is more JourNal than SubStack.
The early-December drafts were a little bit more technical (?) about first president of japan. What I’ve learned in this year without Aki; the conclusion being, WE NEED HIM BACK! I love and am grateful for Dave and Jack who have generously shared their time and talents with us this past year. We couldn’t have done any shows without them - I would’ve dried up and shattered into dust. The reps they allowed us to do in 2024 was transformative! I’m biased but I think each show has been better than the last. We’re getting more comfortable with each other, we’re deepening the colors of first president of japan. So it became clearer that Aki is the element we need to go Super Saiyan. His performance is obviously iconic, but his sound is the kind of rich that only Life can flavor, the physical freedom that his jiujitsu training give him actually grounds us. He seems the wackiest but he holds the ship down so the rest of us can blast into space without leaving the audience behind. And then I started freaking out that waxing poetic about Aki might jinx his return…
Late December, I was personally melting down so I couldn’t write for shit. I barely sent texts. I barely posted on our socials. Fragments of maybe-lyrics were maybe-mustered but they are closer to gibberish now that I’m reading them back. So I deleted everything I wrote here (again). A couple times a day, I guiltily stared at the tab in my browser without actually clicking it.
This is all very silly because the stakes of this substack are very low.
I could psychoanalyze myself forever, but I pay somebody else to have to consume those thoughts.
For now, I’d like to believe that this time I spent “sponge-ing” instead of publishing has been productive. There must be something brewing. Fermenting. Steeping. I’ve been sparking up a little bit more this past week, even if it’s just been for moments too brief for me to form a full thought.
Thank you to everyone who supported first president of japan in 2024. You have been theeeeeeeeeeeee highlight of my year.
Let’s go 2025!
Big love,
Non
love love love this