Soon, I'm going to make my 1,000th Youtube video! Some thoughts.

[This post ended up being a little more personal than I expected when I started writing it, but hey, that's the human condition for ya. It's a little rambling and is more for me to get out than to be read. It still feels worth posting though.]

As I write this, I've posted 990 videos to my Youtube channel. That's a wild thing to consider. A milestone like this makes me think about why I make videos. Surely there must be a good reason, if I've spent the time and effort to make nearly a thousand of them!

I posted my first video almost exactly 14 years ago in 2011 as a wee small boy (It's this, if you're curious: https://youtu.be/8CL6pn5Qv7Y?si=Pg7XxOI42kpwnNXn
A piece of music from a film that I still haven't seen - Bari Improv, from August Rush - that I added instruments on top of. A precursor to dubs, though I wouldn't start making dubs for another 6 years.). Since then Youtube has been many things for me. A hobby. A part-time job. A full-time job. A marketing tool. A musical lifeline.
If I had to easily define what making content is for me, I don't think I could. Most creators' journeys don't go as long as mine has; they're more succinct, more easily categorized and boxed. They're enviably clean. Mine is a messy smorgasbord, which - while beautiful in its own way - is awkward. It's awkward to interpret as a viewer, and it's certainly awkward for me as a creator to define.

For a long time I've felt like the channel exists in this odd middle ground. As of right now, it has 180,000 subscribers (and through that, some support on Patreon, followers on other sites, etc.) and 83 million video views. I and my work have been featured in some cool places; a venue here, a convention there. The level of success I've had is not small. Nor is it truly big, though. There have only really been small windows where it's been actively successful enough to be my full-time job (I've been lucky enough to be a full-time musician, but that's also achieved through composing soundtracks, doing commissions, etc.). It's consistently and confidently been part-time job material, hence the "middle ground" terminology. I'm in the middle class of Youtube, somewhere in between big and small, somewhere in between full-time career and hobby. The channel goes through periods of boom and periods of bust, steep slopes and flatlines. In 2024, my monthly ad revenue ranged from $500 to $5,000. It's the furthest thing from consistent (huge thanks to you, patronfolk, who grant me some degree of consistency through your patronage).
This is important groundwork to lay because that inconsistency makes it unreliable, and that unreliability makes it difficult to define how making content should fit into my life. Should I bank on the channel doing well and put my full effort into it, hoping that the effort will yield enough growth that I can do it full-time? Should I call it quits? If I maintain it as a part time-job, that means I can't fully commit to another job. So can I fully commit to it as a part-time job? Not reasonably, not really. I have a hard time being in this middle place, even after having spent years and years in it.

I think it's good to question why you do the things you do in general. Living passively is no way to live. I know that the milestone of 1,000 videos is only as meaningful as I decide it to be, but for some reason it's looming over me. All the more so because I'm 10 videos away, and 5 of those are already made! I'm releasing a 4-track EP of new music soon, and I'm going to be posting a soundtrack to a game I scored in a couple weeks. And with these long-gestating projects released - and perhaps with the revival of Write Me A Song wrapping up - a lot of bows are about to get neatly tied up. It will leave me looking into the future, and in a position to make some big decisions about where I'm going.
To be honest, I've felt restless for the past couple years. I put virtually all my life's effort in my 20s into building a life where I could be the master of my own fate and spend my days making music. And I did it! I'm 31 now. With the help of friends, family, and fans, all of whom I am deeply grateful for, I clawed my way up into some semblance of stability. I've been a full-time musician my entire adult life. In today's economy? What a luxury. What a privilege. At long last, I'm reaping the fruits of a 10-year journey. I have my own place, my own studio, I spend my days doing exactly what I (think I) want to be doing, and I'm still restless. The value of the journey might have been in the journey. The destination feels a little hollow. It's not enough of a struggle to be compelling, and it's not successful enough to be exciting. Here I am in that middle ground once more. There's no small part of me that wishes that my Youtube channel massively succeeds so that I can justify giving it my full-time effort. But there's also a part that wishes it utterly fails, so that I can justify calling it quits and move on, conscience-free, to something else. Right now I feel this odd obligation to keep it going, because to give it up would feel like a waste. I'm reminded of the lyrics from my song "Empty".

I'll take loss but not a draw
Lend me passion, strip me raw
I'd take it all and thirst for more
Just to feel something

It's easy to justify not changing, since what I have is so good. Even in my information gathering over the past couple years into other possible places to live, jobs to have, etc. I've gained perspective that has made me even more grateful for how good I have it. But at the end of the day, I'm still restless. And as I come to this threshold of 1,000 videos on Youtube, as several other projects wrap up, as I reach a point where I have a pretty clean slate, few attachments, and the opportunity to do...something...I wonder what the right decision is.

Back to the start. Why do I make videos? I'm not sure right now. Maybe it's as simple as "it's what I know". Why I do everything I'm doing right now feels a little like that. It's what I know. I'm pretty good at it. Some of it is fulfilling. Some isn't. I'm reassured that, at its core, music hasn't changed for me. Writing music is still so deeply soul-satisfying, and despite all my uncertainty and restlessness I have no doubts that I adore music as much as I ever have. More, even! My heart is bursting to full with symphonies. So maybe it's just how I'm going about it that needs to change. There are ten thousand configurations for doing what you love in life. Maybe my pieces are just in the wrong places.

With 1,000 videos approaching it feels like I have a timer on figuring it out, like if I hit that milestone and then release a 1,001st, I'll have committed to staying the same forever. Maybe that timer is a good thing, even if it's just something I made up in my mind. Maybe a little pressure is what I need to make some of these decisions instead of saying "I have it good enough right now". Here's hoping.

Thanks for reading.