I started working on Your Life, Your Future? in early 2020.

Before COVID hit, I’d been trying to minimise my perfectionist tendencies towards music creation. During the early days of social distancing it became clear I’d be spending a lot of time in my room. Wanting to avoid falling into the trap of endlessly retreading the same few songs, I gave myself a rule: Each day, I’d make a piece of music. At the end of the day, I couldn’t work on it anymore. After six months, I’d give myself another day to finalise it. But then I had to move on.

I found this process motivated me to more fully sketch out my ideas during their initial creation period. After all, I only had the day… so they needed to be as complete as possible. When I revisited these sketches six months later, I found I could listen with new ears, make any required changes while more accurately appreciating my previous work. My ears didn’t suffer the same fatigue that occurs when you work on one track for 18+ months, as I’d done with my previous albums.

It wasn’t until 2022 that I was able to release the album though. That mostly came down to tracking guitars. While the structure of the music was set in stone, the melodies and solos that I played over the top were not. I’ve never really thought so deeply about guitar solos, or melodies. I think when you’re using the instrument as your main melodic voice, you can more clearly define what might be melodically repetitive or trite. I also struggled with other pitfalls: Corrupt Logic Pro files, the absence of a guitar for 4 months, distractions caused by beginning a relationship.

I was able to finish this largely because I caught COVID in July 2022. That gave me more than enough time to record any final guitar parts, and iron out the mixing.

There’s no real overarching narrative to this album, however I think there’s hints of a mindset change in my personal life. I see the first track, I Want To Go Outside as a depiction of my struggle with social anxiety. The beginning section tends toward yearning for communion and friendship, while the latter is the joy I’ve found from cultivating an inner life. A Conversation with Myself at Seventeen and Your Life, Your Future? form a kind of ‘self growth’ pairing. While QF857 captures the sense of longing I felt for home during Australia’s long period of border closures.

The final track I Was Never With Me is one of my favourites. Initially titled She Was Never With Me, it had felt like the longing for a lost lover. As I have begun to more clearly see my harmful patterns of self doubt, it seems to more accurately capture the way I have never really supported myself.

I’m particularly grateful to Austin Salisbury for his rhodes solo on the title track, and to Tahlia Rose-Coleman for mastering.