Sometimes I miss my old website. This one is much more efficient, but I miss all the pictures of the pretty flowers! Perhaps I should post them somewhere as a tribute to the old site [now located on the sidebar]. Flowers make me happy! Speaking of which, it’s spring in San Diego. Well, at least how I know spring to be. We’ve gotten some rain and we’re seeing signs of all new life. Pretty flowers are popping up everywhere and new buds are beginning to surface on trees that once were bare.

This is usually the time of year when you start getting organized. You have new goals and it seems easy to dispose of useless clutter, literally and figuratively speaking. They don’t call it spring cleaning for nuttin’! I’m definitely excited to see what things are accomplished in 2010. Jess and I recently started going back to school, so I feel kind of young again now that I get to flash my student ID around town for discounts. Strange because I didn’t even realize this was the semester we would start until Jess signed up for a couple classes and encouraged me to as well. This was very last minute, but I managed to squeeze in one necessary credit.

I don’t expect this to interfere with my other projects any time soon. I won’t have any work outside of class and so I’m taking advantage of this time while I’m free and motivated. This means spending more time on the Angelic Voices website, as well as working on my own music. This doesn’t even include all the non-music projects I’m involved in. Believe me, my time is rarely wasted idly. I couldn’t sit still if you asked me to! I just enjoy being in the thick of it and dabbling in each of my interests. Sometimes this means that I don’t get to focus as much on one thing, but variety is the spice of life and I’m feeling spicy!

When I’m feeling mentally exhausted, or discouraged, I try to remind myself of all the good things that made working on a project so rewarding. It’s usually enough to keep me going when I really feel like I want to give up. The same is true when it comes to music, of course. When I have those days the best remedy seems to be going through old emails where people took the time to send me an encouraging message and let me know how much they enjoyed my efforts. I can’t tell you enough how much those emails inspire me in troubled times.

Since I began releasing music there are a few key moments like this that stand out to me most. These are the ones that blew me away and made me realize what a small world we live in. Sometimes you’re reaching people even when you feel like no one is listening. For now I will share 5 of these moments that I hold particularly close to my heart.

#1 Being contacted out of the blue by Liesje Sadonius, the original lead vocalist of Hooverphonic, to tell me that she likes my music. This coming from the person who sang lead on one of the very first albums that got me into dreampop/downtempo music. She seemed to have fallen off the face of the earth after that release and now she was listening to my work! Truly an honor.

#2 The time my brother was talking to someone at work about his sister who spelled her name J-A-K-K-I and she asked if I happened to be a musician. Apparently she had been introduced to my music by a friend and was already familiar with my work!

#3 Finding out from an online acquaintance that he heard one of my songs playing at a club in the UK. Talk about shocking! What a coincidence that he was there at the right time to report back to me, or I never would have known!

#4 Since I moved to San Diego I met a girl through totally unrelated means who previously was introduced to my music through a friend who was playing it at a party. She recognized me from the picture on my MySpace page!

#5 Some years ago I used to play regularly at a little pub. I was always extremely touched by the warm reception I received each night I played. I felt like I was at the center of the universe some nights. People would even ask for my autograph and come every week to hear me play. It’s one of the sweetest memories I have from a completely different time in my life.

I thought about doing a blogcast for a while, but then I decided to simply write out my New Years greetings and update you the old fashioned way (is it easier to read or listen?). First off, I hope you all had a wonderful holiday season. I really enjoy holidays in a big way, so it stands to reason that it’s my favorite time of year. Of course, it’s much easier to take now that I live in San Diego where it’s warm and sunny just about every single day. Certainly makes a difference, but somehow it doesn’t seem to affect my Christmas cheer. In fact, a part of me has always enjoyed celebrating Christmas in a warmer climate, as it allows you to get out and do more things, enjoy the festivities and such! This was definitely the case when I lived in Florida and Virginia Beach, but even Michigan cold didn’t stop me from getting out and enjoying a sleigh ride and some caroling.

About the only thing I miss about being in Michigan during the holidays is spending time with family. I can’t honestly say I’m missing much though, as it seems the family is scattering about as the years go on. Also, my brother came out to stay a couple weeks and wore me out plenty! So much so that I couldn’t stand the thought of going out on New Years Eve. We decided to take it easy with a low-key evening, though we did go to a nearby neighborhood and enjoy some massive light displays for the last time. I would have rested up all the more if I had known my husband would surprise me the next day with an overnight trip to Arizona! We had a great time but now I’m ready to just enjoy everyday life again. Decorations are put away and I am forging onward.

Which brings me to music. If you didn’t already know, I digitally released my 6 song mini-concept album, “Seasons” on December 21st. (the first day of Winter). Simultaneously I appropriately decided to release the first single from the collection, also entitled “Winter”. Although first available through Soundclick, “Seasons” is now able to be purchased on Amazon and will soon be available on itunes and other digital media distributors. I am also planning a physical release of the CD in due time. For now, check the STORE if you’d like to grab a copy, or download the single in the MUSIC section for your collection! Also, if you’d like to know more about the concept behind “Seasons”, check the front page for more info.

So now what, you ask? Well, I have been contemplating for some time how to release music in the future. Music distribution is changing so much and mp3s seem to be the media of choice. Especially when it comes to lesser-known artists, such as myself. Printing up CDs hardly seems worth it when I consider how long they take to finish on my own. There is such a large amount of silence in between releases that it’s difficult to gain momentum. So, for now I am going to be releasing a series of singles. These tracks were once planned to be a part of my album “Luminous”, but I figured putting them out individually will keep me consistently releasing something. Perhaps when enough tracks are out I will consider compiling them as originally planned.

One thing to note is that these tracks will differ greatly from the content on “Seasons”. They are much more electronically based, and just to give you an idea of what’s in store, here is a clip from the track “A New Chapter”. Hope you are all extremely blessed in 2010 (and buy a copy of Seasons for good measure)!!

Hello everyone, I know it’s been silent on my end, at least where my music is concerned. The truth is, I have completed music that I chose not to release. There are a myriad of reasons for this, but one of the top is that I feel there have been more important things going on in this country. I have chosen to spend my time fighting the powers that be in hopes of halting disaster that could inflict our great country. This greatly limits the time I can give to promoting albums right now, so I’ve kept these on hold.

For the most part, I have always been able to separate my work as a recording artist from politics. This is becoming increasingly difficult, as I believe we are facing crucial times. Though my passion for music is great, it will never override my core principals, which I feel are at stake. So, please forgive my absence. I realize the risk I’ve taken, but it was necessary. Thank you for your support. Music will soon live again!

Tune is as I talk about the recent heatwave in SoCal, my husband’s car accident, a news flash on the status of Seasons and a current contest taking place on the Angelic Voices website!

Tune in as I give updates on the status of the Seasons EP and talk my recent adventures to the drive-in, Disneyland and the beach.  There’s even a surprise for those who listen to the end!

It’s been a couple weeks since my last update, but it isn’t from lack of being busy.  So much has been going on in the musical realm, but also just in everyday life.  Jess and I celebrated our 12th wedding anniversary this month and Jess also had a birthday.  Soon after that we both caught a bug of sorts, which has kept me from finishing up the vocal tracks I planned to wrap up this past week.  As I am on the recovery end of things, I am hoping to get to that by next week.  So much to share, but I will go into that through a blogcast in the next week or so.  For the moment, off to do laundry.   x Much love!

P.S. If you want to know what I’m up to on a daily basis in brief sentences, follow me on Twitter: twitter.com/jakkijelene

I haven’t had the Last.fm Scrobbler installed for a long time, so I decided to get it going again.  It’s always fun to track what you’ve been listening to and share your listening habits with other people.  It’s a great site that continues to grow and expand.  So go ahead and check it out!

http://www.last.fm/user/jakkijelene

Just popping in to touch base with everyone.  It’s been sort of a slow week, but I’ve been working on things here and there.  Finished up production on a song for “Luminous” yesterday, which I’m very pleased with.  There’s only one other song that still needs some work, which I’ll most likely finish up after “Seasons” is complete.  Well, you never know for sure, because sometimes there are just those days where I need to step away and work on something different.  I’ll see what I am able to accomplish today, but then I’m taking the weekend off to enjoy time with Jess.  Saturday is our 12 year anniversary, so we are planning some special things.  More on that next week!  Have a great one!

If you listened to my last Blogcast, you might recall me mentioning that I was playing Zelda, Phantom Hourglass on DS.  Well, I just beat it tonight.  Oh, don’t bother to congratulate me, Link really did all the work.   Anyway, it was a great game and if you like that sort of thing, you should definitely pick it up…unless of course your don’t want to fry your brain over the course of a week.  Next up: Kirby, Super Star Ultra.  Well, maybe I’ll hold off a little before getting sucked into another game so soon!