(2013 - 2019)
manapotion was an important project to me! here, I have created a personal little shrine detailing all the records for anyone interested
Mana Potion (EP) [May 2013]
This first one!!!!!!111
Confusingly stylized with a space, rather than like manapotion.
Arguably not a "self titled" album because of this.
I started working on this when I was like 14,
and its basically me fucking around in FL Studio, no clue what I'm doing.
It's super naive but also holds a really sweet place in my heart.
Like fr, the concept of mixing is absolutely not present,
and the fake guitar VSTs are honestly a fucking vibe,
like idk if FL Slayer
is supposed to be used this much but I certainly did lol.
Favorite Track: Underground
Psychostructure [March 2014]
Yeah I have no idea what I was doing here either,
but you can hear I was starting to grasp the software a bit more, as well as composition too.
Somehow its even messier and more naive in its own ways?- probably an extension of pushing myself to do new stuff.
Notably, it also features sample use.
I really wanted to branch out from making "video game" music and only half succeeded,
but the end result is still neat. Its hard to not reflect on artifacts like this with some level of pride,
even if they don't really stand up on their own. I find myself really liking a lot of the tracks on this record.
Yes that is my 15 year old face on the cover art lol. The album art itself is really neat, you can see some early digital collage work of mine.
Favorite Track: Sky Voyage
(im starting to see a pattern where all the second tracks are my favorites wtf)
GeoArena Online Soundtrack [August 2016]
Haha this one is a mostly unremarkable soundtrack for a browser game created by Victor Zhou.
No clue where I found this game exactly, I just remember finding it on the internet somewhere, and recognized that it was early in its development as a student project.
So I just cold emailed him and offered to make some music for free, produced these few tracks, and sent them over.
About 3 of the 6 tracks got used, and were up on the internet w/ this game for awhile, but the game's domain has since died 😔
Stylistically, you can hear how it still lives in the realm of Psychostructure, but I was picking some new tricks up.
Favorite Track: Dodecahedron Duel
memory [Sep 2016]
This is the first album that I think I can actually say I'm really proud of, and listening back to it evokes a lot of strong feelings for me.
I had a great time trying to weave a narrative with just the music and the track titles, and for me at least I succeeded.
I produced this album while wrestling with the reality of breaking up with my high school significant other because of the classic "going to different colleges" thing.
Often times, in real life, I find that music I'm listening to colors my memories.
Ear worms wriggle and squirm in my mind and attach themselves to the time.
I remember hearing this album run through my mind in some of our final moments together, and I found myself literally crafting a theme for the end of our relationship.
Specifically the melody from isthisgoodbye...? being reincorporated into the final track butweforeverhaveourmemories like both those tracks just still give me chills idk
Ughh or the dissonant recontextualization of some of the melodies in the end of nowimanxious, I love that.
Overall, its interesting because you can hear a lot of amateurish production decisions still, but I was definitely starting to stretch some storytelling muscles.
Favorite Track: isthisgoodbye...?
familiar [Jan 2017]
This one is marks a bit of a shift in my production abilities,
and functions kind of as the prologue to dreams releasing right after this one, and I see them as connected works.
Ultimately, I do kind of just forget about this one a lot. It reminds me of a lot of my manic excitement of starting college and then the subsequent fall into depression.
Like as soon as I got to college, I mostly skipped all my classes and just played video games and made music, and this was the first output of that.
Oh my god the fucking konata samples in make me smile, like what a fucking closeted trans girl weeb I was lmao
Favorite Track: make me smile
dreams [June 2017]
This one definitely hit some 2017 vibes channeling lofi hip-hop and future bass-esque kind of influences.
Pretty much the direct follow up to familiar.
As a no-name artist, this record also has technically gotten a few thousand hits over its lifetime, which is neat!
Also, not really going for a strong narrative with this one, but more just capturing a lot of the feelings I had starting college, wrestling with a new anti-depressant, going through breakups, getting entangled with new people, etc.
Hard to choose a favorite track, I'd say its between Norepinephrine and Missing Someone
Missing Someone samples an old unreleased track by one of the people I was missing at the time, whom I still dearly cherish, and so it means a lot to me.
Spotify seems to agree because its also the most popular track according to their metrics.
Favorite Track: Missing Someone
Alone [unreleased 2017/2018 sessions]
I bet you were not expecting this!
well I bet you were not expecting anything and have no idea what any of this is! 🙃
I never finished this album, nor have I even released it.
Basically, it was intended to be a full length LP iterating on the style I was going at w/ familiar and dreams
I wanted to sing on it and everything, like make it feel like a debut,
but I quickly got frustrated with it and I hated all the tracks I was working on honestly.
I almost retired manapotion right here, in frustration.
Despite not finishing it, I still look back on some of the wav files I have with fondness.
Perhaps, the astute observer would even be able to find what remains of this session 🩵
Favorite Track: sillycatbois.wav
bitbeats [April 2018]
honestly i released this one on 4/20 in 2018,
and it was really just a collection of beats that I made while high from the start of 2018
Thats really it, its like an outlier, as there is not a huge personal connection to this album for me.
The album art is a glitched rendition of a photo taken by my friend, Rowan.
but like girlbro i kinda fuck with it though. i literally did not mix/master anything its almost as blown out as og manapotion, and i love that
Favorite Track: argh- 'twas a Succubus
double you [July 2019]
The last one- and I honestly adore this one.
It has a little bit of new production flair from all the skills I've been slowly practicing,
but I honestly went in trying not to think too hard about everything and keep a sense of childlike wonder.
I'd say I was able to succeed in this aspect,
and I really enjoy a lot of the tracks on this one- for me, it feels like quintessential manapotion style.
You can also see some imagery and tellings of my first conscious acknowledgements of gender dysphoria,
which is fun and neat.
The title double you was just too fun to pass up as a bit of word-play,
dancing around the overall theme of the multiplicity of the self, but also just like titling each track with "W"s.
You can see this captured as well in the album art,
as the Man figure fades into the background, and the abstract Woman (starts with a W!) takes the foreground.
Favorite Track: Women I Used to Know