#slightly shorter post today orz

[jamiepaige]

Constant Companions Closeup #2: NOT QUITE THERE

(also on spotify!)

b-b-back once again

Round two of the Constant Companions Closeups - a series of in-depth dives into the songs off of my latest album, Constant Companions! Yesterday was track one, Dyad - today is track two, Not Quite There, featuring the incomparable telebasher!

This one's a bit of a dark horse relative to the rest of the album, but it may very well be my personal favorite song on the entire thing so dammit let's Yap

---

For the uninitiated, this song pulls heavily from a song off my previous album called Gummyworm, both in vibe and by very directly quoting its synth motif.

Both of these songs deal with two sides of the same emotional coin. I actually don't want to go into too much detail about it - I feel like the lyrics spell things out clearly enough - but I will say this:

When it's all you know, it's easy to believe that a love that isolates you, a love that doesn't respect you, a love that hurts is better than no love at all.

You deserve better. There are always people who genuinely want what's best for you, who want you to feel truly loved. It certainly isn't always easy - it's genuinely good if your interpersonal relationships have a little friction sometimes - but love should make your life brighter.

You deserve a love that's fair.

---

The original version of this song was actually intended to be on Bittersweet alongside Gummyworm. The original concept for that album had a whole heady concept involving duality, songs reflecting each other, the two halves basically being reprisals of each other... Ultimately, I'm glad I scrapped that idea, because it was waaaaaay too much for me to manage after a couple years of barely making music. Maybe I'll revisit it someday though?

The drums on this song are sampled from an Instagram post by Louis Cole, where he's doing this crazy one-handed hi-hat blast by holding a drumstick sideways. I'm a drummer and that shit genuinely scares me a little like i dont know how he does half the things he does its fucked BUT. I bring this up because he's one of my biggest inspirations as a musician! I'm really big on jazz in general, in case my love for spicy chords wasn't enough of an indication, but his specific brand of freaky hyperactive bullshit just does it for me.

Seriously, go watch his band KNOWER play their song Overtime. Absolutely insane performances across the board. also Clown Core

This whole song is really just my attempt at matching some of that hectic jazzy energy with my own style of music, so I figured it only made sense to make it another collab with another musician making delightfully frantic jazz bullshit - the legend herself, telebasher! I really am such a massive fan of her work, and I struggle to think of anyone who plays guitar quite like she does. We previously worked together on another Bittersweet track, Asemic Speech, and her guitar work is a major reason why that song is still one of my favorite I've ever released!! She's just built different like listen to this oh my god!!!!

Lastly, since this song was one of the first written for this entire project... it is admittedly a case of me shoehorning the album's leitmotif in after the fact. It's a little forced when it shows up in the backing vocals! But, the choir of vocal synths during the guitar solo served an additional purpose - my own voice doesn't show up on the album again for another four entire songs, and this would've otherwise been the only song on the entire album that didn't feature any vocal synths. Thus did I attempt to bridge the gap, as it were. Hopefully it makes the final product feel more natural!!

Either way, that's all for today's post.... i think.... which means that tomorrow.... we're gonna rot.... for clout

[lioden-sim]

Eye of the Cubs, Aqua Eyes & Global Rotting!

CODING UPDATE

Global rotting

Any food in clans will now rot every day, no matter if owner rolls over. It works like reclaiming lions - follows server rollovers, not player ones. We believe this will prevent abusing clans as storage. We have given you a heads up last week about it and believe you had enough time to use up your food in clan hoards. There will be no refunds for all rotted items today. We store timestamps for clan hoards, so if one is due to expire today, it will be picked up by a 30 minute cron throughout the day. EDIT: Only food in CLANS will rot globally, not your own personal hoards Another thing we are introducing to fight food freezing is setting private trades to expire in 2 days of creation. We don't believe there's any reason for a private trade to last more time than that, it's enough for a person to react and accept the private trade.

NEW EMOTES!!!

:bork: :o7: :orz: :sigh: :squint: :sweat:

Based on this suggestion we have introduced 3 new items to Oasis, 1 GB each, 10 uses per.

Eye of the Kitten will let you change your lion's image into a Cub Newborn (as long as you have Cub Stages enabled).

Eye of the Youth will let you change your lion's image into a Cub Young (as long as you have Cub Stages enabled).

Eye of the Fierce Roar will let you change your lion's image into a normal Cub.

- Items work like any Decor and lose uses when you unequip. - If you do not have Cub Stages enabled, the item won't work, however it can be applied. - This item won't change your battle/den portrait if you equip it to main male (sorry!) - This item might not affect some muties such as lethal cubs. - You can apply any number of such items on a lion including Tigers Eye - they will just override each other so what's the point?

Small Tweaks and Fixes

- Fixed GMO chicken being always found in water-based tiles - Suggestion - added "Accept All" to clan memberships. - Fixed patrolling being stuck when a patrolling adolescent leaves pride from overcrowding - Fixed Shrubland AWD encounter filing impression bar excessively - Fixed Game Notifications not showing up after Rollovers - Suggestion - Tweaked issues with Ultrasounded females appearing on the dropdown still - Suggestion - We have followed one of the suggestions - Primals won't override any mutations anymore, this should make breeding easier and maybe the rates slightly lower. - Raffle Ladies will now start displaying/having Poses from time to time! - Suggestion - Levelling up Dreamboat will now always give you +1 to each of your stats except for skill (totalling 5, guaranteed every time)

Remember any breeding changes have effect in game only towards breedings after news post.

We are working on wardrobe saved links bugs but that might be updated a longer bit after news today or tomorrow! Can't be more precise, sorry!

Updated Polycaudal files for all stages. The only pending art to do is Male's Mane versions.

Egg Yolk Solution

Based on the poll result and community response, we have decided to not follow poll results. Any of them. Instead, we have upped the hunger filling of Egg Yolk from 1% to 3%. We believe that + clan/private trade rotting should deal with most problems. However there's also this... tackweeding + breeding endlessly a lioness to make her super hungry and keep feeding Egg Yolks. We have also removed the -1% hunger debuff from breeding females. If you had any reason for which that was useful for you other than mass feeding stat food items please let us know in a suggestion in forums as well.

Aqua is a new custom eye colour available in Oasis or Eye Changers. Tan is a new custom mane base colour available in Oasis or Mane Colour Changers. 

Remember that the event ends on April 30th at 11:59 pm, and all your currency will be stored in your account until next year. Remember to NOT wear your Wenet Mask if you want a Lamb carcass :O

We have added a new subforum for Tree Carvings called "Art Freebies" - Suggestion

There are new avatar Tags made by Shad, for April and Misc, check them out as always!

MOD APPLICATIONS

Until April 11th we'll be accepting Mod Applications (shorter due to Easter coming). Fill out a form here - please be aware there's a decision period after which we'll contact chosen people + training period. People who we deem a very good Helper material will be also chosen from these results.

Explore Encounters - Egg Breaking explanations

We would like to address this community question but to not make the news too long, here's a link to a screenshot where Abbey is stating why this was added few days in as well as reasons for it - http://scr.hu/0hb8/bi1cc

Raffle Lioness

Congrats Mr. Spellbound (#36023)! You have won the last raffle lady! New lady with the Sunset over Entabeni BG is up for impressing in Special Lioness area in Explore or in NEWS section under News Post List! ;D Ooo hey would you look at her!

Polls and Dev Notes

So, new poll LINK  - We have this idea for an item "steroid X animal" sort. Drops Lionesses fertility to 1% permanently. What could it be and for what shop or event? :D I would love if it would be within next 4 events.