In March 2023, I acquired a Global Talent visa and relocated to the UK. Interestingly, this visa type isn’t widely known, so I’d like to shed light on it and share my personal experience. If you’ve been contemplating immigration, this article might offer valuable insights.

Overview

The Global Talent visa is designed for individuals within the realms of science, art, culture, and digital technology.

gov.uk/global-talent

The visa grants permission for legal residency and work in the UK for up to five years, with the option to extend, apply for permanent residency, and later, citizenship. It also permits bringing along your partner and children.

Self-processing the visa can cost approximately £3000 per individual. I went through this process independently and will elaborate on the breakdown below.

Upon completion, you receive a Biometric Residence Permit (BRP) card. This internal document enables activities like opening a bank account or obtaining a tax identification number.

The process took me five months, from discovering this visa type to gathering documents and acquiring the BRP. I’ll outline a detailed timeline below.

Differences from a standard Work Visa

When considering a work permit in another country, the typical option that comes to mind is a work visa. In the UK, this is termed the Skilled Worker visa.

gov.uk/skilled-worker-visa

In theory, obtaining a Skilled Worker visa is easier because most of the bureaucracy rests on the employer. You can apply for a job from abroad, undergo an interview, and secure an invitation to work, along with your relocation to the UK.

However, there are nuances:

• Not every company or profession qualifies for this visa. The government website maintains a register of approved companies and a list of professions; if yours isn’t listed, you’re out of luck.
• Even if a company is on the approved register, they might not be interested in hiring a foreign worker like you. Various reasons exist for this, ranging from increased costs in hiring non-local specialists to internal restrictions. I encountered this scenario personally. Despite 12 years of experience and a stellar reputation with the company, I couldn’t secure a position in their UK office due to internal regulations. This situation led me to explore other options, and fortunately, I discovered the Global Talent visa.
• The Skilled Worker visa ties you to an employer. Switching jobs means leaving the UK and starting anew. If your company struggles and you’re laid off, you’re also required to leave. Overall, this visa provides limited or no social security, a major drawback for me as a family person.
• You must undergo an English test, provide income proof, and maintain a minimum amount of money in your account for the Skilled Worker visa.

In contrast, the Global Talent visa requires proof of your talent but offers extensive flexibility. You can opt to work or not, switch jobs without constraints, freelance, or establish your own business – all without the requirement to demonstrate proficiency in English or meet specific income criteria.

As far as I know, the Global Talent visa has only two restrictions: you cannot work as a doctor or a professional sportsman, and you cannot claim public funds, such as benefits or pensions. Apart from these limitations, you have the freedom to live and work as you prefer on this visa.

Preparation and categories

When you peruse the general descriptions and prerequisites for this visa, you’ll come across terms like “exceptional talent” and “acknowledged leader.” Somewhere in the mix, there’s a mention of “If you have Oscars or Grammy awards, click here.” Initially, it might seem a bit daunting. You might think, “Well, that’s a bit extreme! I don’t have any of that. Looks like this visa isn’t for me.”

The key to getting ready mentally is not to feel intimidated or misled. You don’t need to be a global star. Any level of success in your field might just be enough. From my experience, this visa isn’t primarily about inherent talent; it’s more about your willingness, determination, and your ability to meet the criteria.

From my experience, this visa isn’t primarily about inherent talent; it’s more about your willingness, determination, and your ability to meet the criteria

The Global Talent visa comes in two categories: Exceptional Promise (for those who show promise) and Exceptional Talent (for recognised leaders).

The key difference between these categories is that achieving indefinite leave to remain takes at least 5 years under Exceptional Promise, while Exceptional Talent requires only 3 years. Clearly, Exceptional Talent is the preferred choice.

The decision of which category to apply for is yours to make. However, it’s crucial to note that if you apply for Exceptional Talent and fall short of the recognised leader criteria, you may still qualify for Exceptional Promise. On the other hand, applying for Exceptional Promise might restrict your eligibility only to that category. So, my advice is to always opt for Exceptional Talent, even if you’re uncertain about meeting all the stringent requirements.

Stages and costs

The visa process globally comprises two primary stages referred to as Stage 1 and Stage 2 in official documentation.

Stage 1 involves obtaining approval from a cultural institution. Normally, immigration officials, who typically deal with formalities like border crossings, income, employment, and criminal records, might not possess the expertise to determine your talent in the cultural or scientific field. Therefore, they redirect you to the relevant organisations that are better equipped to assess your credentials.

The cultural institution you approach for approval depends on your area of work. This step, known as endorsement, is the most critical and often the most challenging.

The visa fee totals £623, divided into two components: £456 for the endorsement application and £167 for the visa application. For Stage 1, you’ll need to pay the initial £456 online from anywhere globally. Unfortunately, if your endorsement isn’t approved, the payment is non-refundable. You can reapply by paying the same amount again.

Stage 2 involves applying at the visa application centre once you secure the endorsement. This necessitates physically submitting the required documents to the specified address. If it’s your first time obtaining the visa rather than renewing an existing one, you must apply outside the UK. This phase is primarily a formality, and it’s almost certain that your visa will be granted.

According to regulations, you’re eligible to apply from any country where you have permission to stay for a minimum of 6 months. However, there are cases of successful applications from countries where legal residence is less than this duration. If this detail is crucial for you, I suggest delving deeper into this aspect. I haven’t encountered this situation personally as I applied from Israel.

During this phase, you’ll need to settle the remaining £167 for the visa and, notably, £624 for health insurance (Immigration Health Surcharge) per year per individual, which can be quite a hefty sum. For children under 18, the amount is slightly reduced to £470 annually. Additionally, there’s an additional £55 fee for the visa centre.

Total cost:

You’re not obliged to apply for the full visa period in a single application. You have the flexibility to select a duration between 1 to 5 years. For instance, if the immediate payment for insurance is challenging, opting for a shorter term is feasible. Yet, it’s worth noting that extending the visa later will incur an additional £623 fee. Hence, making a one-time payment for the entire term is the most cost-effective option.

Here’s an overview of the process and its associated costs. Now, let’s delve into the specifics.

Choosing the field of work

Before diving into document collection, it’s crucial to decide on the specific field you’ll be applying under. As mentioned earlier, various endorsing organisations correspond to distinct fields, each with its unique application requisites and nuances.

Here are the available options:

I applied under the following category: Arts and Culture → Combined Arts, Dance, Literature, Music, Theatre, or Visual Arts → Music → Performing DJ, Music Producer, Curator, Events Promoter.

The endorsing body for my field is Arts Council England. It’s important to note that all my experiences pertain specifically to this organisation, considering my application falls under this category. If you’re applying in another field, ensure you thoroughly research their individual requirements.

A full list of requirements as well as the specific disciplines in which to apply in arts and culture is available in the official guide from Arts Council England. Be sure to download and study this document carefully.

A list of eligible disciplines in the field of music. Screenshot from Arts Council England guidelines

Stage 1: Endorsement

To apply for endorsement, you need to provide 13 documents :

3 letters of support from organisations with international professional recognition with whom you have previously worked.

The letters should describe how you met, the things you have done together, your achievements and how they think you can enrich the cultural life of the UK. The latter is particularly important: not what the UK is good for you, but what you can do for it. It is very important here to outline what specific plans you have for the country in the short term.

The first letter must be from a UK organisation. The second letter can be from any international organisation. The third letter can be from either an organisation or an individual who is also a well-respected expert in your field.

Each letter should contain the company’s logo, full legal address, date, signature, and a brief company profile or author’s biography to ensure clear identification. Only senior executives may sign these letters.

Pro Tip: Provide a draft when requesting recommendations, making it easier for them to adjust details and sign off, significantly enhancing your chances of securing it.

10 supporting evidence of your professional activities. These should fall into at least two of the following categories:

• Media recognition: independent reviews, critiques, or evaluations of your work via articles on websites or magazines. While interviews are acceptable, they are less desirable.
• International awards: any awards or nominations that highlight your work’s quality.
• Proof of appearance: any professional activities relevant to your application.

There should be at least two media coverage. Other than that, it is up to you to decide on the proportion of these documents, as long as they do not exceed ten in total. For example, you could have three media recognitions, five awards and two appearances. Or whatever else you like.

Each document should focus on one event or article and not exceed two A4 pages. Roughly speaking, you cannot name a document “All my performances abroad” and fit all your tours into it.

Two important points to note:

• All evidence must be no more than five years old. Showing an award you received six years ago, unfortunately, is not possible.
• You can’t use blogs or social media. If the poster of your most important performance is only posted on Facebook, it won’t count as evidence, sadly. Only websites or magazines.

Be prepared for those handling endorsements to Google your name. Ensure that your online presence displays relevant and reputable content. This holds true for the companies providing recommendation letters.

There are no special rules about the layout of the documents – do as you like. There is only one requirement, though: if you show a screenshot of the website as evidence, save the page through the print version so that the date and the link to the source are automatically inserted in the footers.

I can show you one of my evidence as an example, as there’s no confidentiality concern:

An example of my document from the proof of appearances category. The page on the right is a screenshot from the website. Note the headers and footers: they are a must

Please note, the document showcases my stage name, Daniel Lesden, rather than my real name. This is fine: during the application, you can present various versions of your first name (including transliteration, maiden name, etc.) alongside your stage name.

You might wonder, ‘What if I lack an award, media mention, or any other necessary document?’ This, indeed, constitutes the primary challenge of the visa! Remember the emphasis on determination I highlighted earlier? Write, search, network, inquire. There’s no one-size-fits-all solution, but I firmly believe that any hurdle can be overcome.

Once all the documents are gathered, you can proceed to apply for endorsement through the Global Talent Endorsement page. You’ll be required to complete a comprehensive application form and pay the initial portion of the visa fee. Once you’ve gone through these steps, you’ll receive a crucial precious address to which you must submit all the documents. Attachments should not exceed a total size of 25 MB.

Here’s the composition of the final list of 13 documents I submitted to Arts Council England:

• Evidence 1. Media recognition
• Evidence 2. Media recognition
• Evidence 3. Media recognition
• Evidence 4. International award
• Evidence 5. Proof of appearances
• Evidence 6. Proof of appearances
• Evidence 7. Proof of appearances
• Evidence 8. Proof of appearances
• Evidence 9. Proof of appearances
• Evidence 10. Proof of appearances
• Letter 1 (UK)
• Letter 2 (USA)
• Letter 3 (UK)

The entire process of understanding the requirements and gathering documents took me a little over a month. I imagine this timeline can differ significantly for each individual: the more tangible accomplishments you have, the smoother the document preparation, and conversely.

After dispatching the documents, all that remains is to wait. Speaking from experience, it’s quite an emotionally charged period.

I got a decision after three weeks:

“Letter of happiness” indicating the endorsement. The spelling has been preserved. The main body of the message is highlighted in yellow

From this point, the clock starts ticking: the endorsement remains valid for 3 months. If you don’t proceed with the second stage within this timeframe, the endorsement will expire, requiring you to begin the process again.

Step 2: visa application centre

If you were in the UK as a tourist during your stage 1 application, as I was while in London, you’ll need to depart the country. The second stage must be applied from outside the UK.

During this stage, you aim to secure an appointment at the visa application centre. At the appointed time, you’ll submit your documents there. Similar to the prior step, you’ll need to complete an extensive application form and make the insurance payment at the end.

Following the payment, you’ll have the chance to schedule an appointment on the visa application centre’s website. At this point, there are two entry methods: self-service and assisted service. The distinction lies in self-service, where you independently upload your documents online, while assisted service involves bringing copies of your documents to the visa centre for scanning and online uploading. I opted for the first option as it appeared more convenient for me.

Here are the documents I uploaded online:

• Scans of all the passports I listed on the application form
• Endorsement email

It’s important to note that, in addition to these documents, a tuberculosis certificate is required, and this can be a bit tricky. The test is mandatory for those who have in these countries resided in specific countries within the last six months, including Russia but excluding Israel. The test must be conducted at UK-approved certified clinics. When I scheduled my appointment at the visa centre, there were no such clinics in Israel, as residents there aren’t typically required to undergo this test. This presented a challenge as I couldn’t physically take the test there.

I must highlight that this was a point of contention; they were not pleased with this situation, and I was instructed to send them the certificate anyway. Interestingly, around the same time, the UK website suddenly listed Israel as one of the certified clinics! Regardless, I eventually managed to obtain the required test, and fortunately, everything was alright. Nevertheless, it was a stressful experience, so I strongly advise taking care of the certificate beforehand, ensuring it’s completed wherever it’s feasible.

After your appointment, you’ll receive a checklist outlining the required documents for your appointment. However, there might be a section that might initially give you a scare:

“Visit information, savings, real estate”.... er, what? Aparentely, this is a part of a general checklist applicable to various visa types, including regular tourist visas, and doesn’t pertain to the specifics of the Global Talent visa. Phew!

In the end, I only needed the first sheet of the printed application form and my passport at the reception at the visa centre.

Bear in mind that your passport will be taken from you while you wait for your visa, which can take up to 8 weeks. If you want to keep your passport with you, you can use the Keep My Passport service for a fee. This service costs an additional £55 and is only available online, before your visit. This service is not available at some visa centres.

Then the procedure is the following: your passport is sent to the Decision Making Centre, a vignette is stamped in it, then they return your passport, and then you can fly to the UK with it.

Exactly 15 days after the visit, I received this email from the Decision Centre:

This email might appear alarming, particularly with phrases like “unfortunately” and “120 working days.” However, it’s a standard automated email expressing regret for not meeting the ideal 15-day processing time. So, if you receive this email, don’t panic – it’s a routine message.

My passport was returned after 8 weeks and 5 days, delivered by a DHL courier.

Tel Aviv visa centre building

By now, your Biometric Residence Permit (BRP) should be awaiting collection at the designated post office in the UK, as indicated on your application form.

This marks the start of your life as a resident in the UK, with new challenges like finding a place to stay and setting up a bank account ahead of you. It’s a whole new adventure!

Timeline

Here’s the final timeline in my case:

Family

As previously mentioned, the Global Talent visa also allows you to bring your partner and children:

• Spouse or civil partner
• Unmarried partner
• Children under 18

They hold a special status as ‘dependants,’ meaning they rely on and are linked to your visa. If you choose not to renew your visa or leave the UK, they must also depart. However, they are permitted to legally live and work throughout the visa’s duration, similar to the main talent visa holder.

Dependants do not require endorsement, yet they are responsible for the full visa and insurance costs—matching the main talent visa expenses: £623 for the visa and £624 per year for insurance. For children under 18, insurance costs slightly less at £470 annually.

Interestingly, dependants can apply without waiting for the main talent visa’s approval. Although it may seem illogical, there’s no explicit rule preventing dependant applications before the main visa decision is made.

Indefinite leave to remain

The visa marks the start of the journey, not the destination. I’ve delved into what comes next, but it’s all theoretical, so it’s best taken with a pinch of salt.

After spending a few years on your visa, you might qualify to apply for permanent residence, known as Indefinite Leave to Remain (ILR). ILR allows you to live in the UK without time restrictions and access social security benefits.

gov.uk/indefinite-leave-to-remain

For Exceptional Promise category holders, the minimum qualifying time for ILR is five years, while for Exceptional Talent, it’s three years. However, this differs for dependants. They can only apply for ILR after five years, even if the main talent qualifies for Exceptional Talent and could apply after three years.

ILR requirements for Global Talent visa holders. The main point is highlighted in the yellow box

This rule seemed puzzling to me and doesn’t quite add up. In essence, it means that regardless of the Global Talent visa category, your dependents will end up paying for the full five years of insurance.

To secure ILR, it’s necessary to demonstrate income derived from the professional field related to your visa. I’m still in the process of figuring out the exact income requirements, but it seems employment documents, receipts, and three months’ worth of bank statements are considered suitable evidence.

Additionally, meeting the ILR criteria involves spending no more than 180 days outside the country per year and passing language and UK life tests.

Unlike the visa, a permanent residence permit doesn’t have an expiration, but staying outside the UK for over two years can lead to its revocation.

The application cost for ILR stands at £2404.

Citizenship

The final milestone of this journey is citizenship. Eligibility for citizenship comes after residing in the UK for five years, including at least one year with ILR. It’s important to note that the actual time spent in the country matters, excluding time spent abroad.

gov.uk/apply-citizenship-indefinite-leave-to-remain

Upon completion, you’ll receive a blue passport adorned with the royal crest. This passport functions as both an internal BRP replacement document and an external travel document for international trips.

The UK allows dual citizenship, but the rules concerning three citizenships and any potential implications remain unclear to me.

Applying for citizenship costs £1330 for adults and £1012 for children. Additionally, if a child is born in the UK while both parents already hold indefinite leave to remain, they automatically gain citizenship.

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I hope this post helps anyone going through the Global Talent application process. Thanks for giving it a read!

If you’ve got any questions while dealing with your Global Talent application, just drop them in the comments. I’ll try my best to help out.

I also want to express my heartfelt gratitude to everyone who supported me during this challenging period – it was undeniably the toughest time in my life, and your support meant everything.

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Please note: I’ve been receiving numerous emails with questions, but I want to clarify that I’m neither a lawyer nor an expert on this visa. This article shares my personal experience in obtaining it, so I can’t predict the success of your case. Unfortunately, I can’t share any other documents beyond what’s discussed in this article. If you have questions, please post them in the comments below, where others might also contribute helpful answers.

Best of luck!

One of the things I do now as a music curator at Beatport is to feature releases on the store. Every week I listen to thousands of tracks (literally) and decide whether to feature each or not. And since featuring placements are very limited, I have to decide thoroughly.

If you think about it, that’s thousands of micro-decisions to make every week. I started to analyse some common patterns in my decision-making process, and I thought I would share my observations with you.

Here are some of the things that I pay attention to:

Production. I use production as a broad term to describe the overall quality of sound design, arrangement, mixdown and all other nuances that form how a track sounds. Sometimes a track has some decent musical ideas, but how does it sound? Would it be played well in a DJ mix? Would it hold up on a big sound system in a club? Since the electronic dance music genres I deal with are predominantly made for the dancefloors and play a big role in the DJ culture, these questions are essential. In 2016 I published a post where I gave my insights into what I think is the criteria of professional productions, and it’s still relevant.

Novelty. To me, novelty is something that makes a track stand out. Let’s say there are a hundred amazing-sounding tracks in terms of production, how would you choose just one among them? It doesn’t have to be something entirely new per se, but there must be something to it, some idea, a musical or any other cleverly-made part.

Trends. Genres always blend, evolve and emerge. I love noticing such changes, and I believe it’s a part of my job to reflect those changes as an answer to the community’s needs. But oftentimes, finding future trends means actually going against the current trend. As a curator, I’m trying to be proactive, and sometimes I highlight tracks that are odd. Tracks that are different from what is called music standards of a particular genre. I’m trying to be open-minded and willing to embrace experiments, and who knows, maybe a track that sounds weird today will become the next big thing.

Diversity. I think diversity in a broad sense makes the global phenomenon of electronic music so interesting, so I’m trying to reflect the communities we serve, including people and music from all different genders and backgrounds. This is how the music culture evolves, and I’m doing my best to nurture it.

Release type. As an artist, I know what it takes to make an album. Sometimes artists work on their albums for years. So while a sheer quantity of tracks is never a factor for a feature, I might prioritise an album over a single, if everything I’ve talked about above is also true. It’s just more proportionate to the efforts and it feels right.

This list is not definitive by any means, but I hope it helps to provide at least some insights!

What exactly does a DJ do? What’s the main objective, and what tools are employed to achieve that goal?

There’s a common belief that a DJ’s primary task is merely to play music. But in reality, a computer can execute that task by streaming tracks in succession, compiling a lengthy playlist.

Conversely, some assert that a DJ’s essential role is to blend tracks seamlessly in a continuous mix. Yet, this, too, can be accomplished through pre-made mixes, leading to the misconception that a DJ’s skill hinges solely on their ability to mix tracks manually. This often leads to unwarranted debates, like comparing a DJ who uses vinyl records to one using a controller, which, frankly, holds no merit.

In essence, playing music and mixing tracks serve as tools, not the ultimate purpose. Surprisingly, mixing tracks is considered one of the simpler skills in DJing.

So, what is a DJ’s primary task?

The core purpose of a DJ is to create a proper vibe on the dance floor, making sure the crowd is having a good time. The definition of “good” varies based on the event’s nature, of course. It might involve providing a fresh musical experience or eliciting nostalgia through familiar tracks. Sometimes, it’s about setting a soft backdrop. But at its core, it’s about ensuring the audience feels good.

An adept DJ tunes into their audience, intuitively selecting the right tracks to suit the moment. It’s about gauging the energy levels—whether to play a chart-topper that ignites the crowd or introduce something novel to elevate the mood.

When viewed from this perspective, endless debates about equipment and sound effects become trivial. However, does this mean a DJ should cater solely to the crowd’s whims? What about personal enjoyment?

Ideally, a DJ’s music aligns with the event and the crowd’s preferences, offering both freedom and a chance to build a fan base. But it’s important to recognize that these perfect circumstances may not occur every time, especially for new DJs.

In essence, if making people feel good on the dance floor is the main goal, then the primary tool is simple: playing the right track at the right time. Achieving this requires understanding the event’s expectations, cultivating musical taste, maintaining a diverse music collection, mastering set construction, and the nuanced skill of reading the crowd. It’s a lot more than merely ‘playing music’.

In the recent episode of The Rework Podcast titled “Your Estimates Suck”, David Heinemeier Hansson and Jason Fried, the co-founders of 37signals, discussed an exciting technique that allows their company to be productive. 37signals is a software development company, so the discussion was related to that topic, but I think you can use this approach in many other areas in general.

So the premise is that people are terrible at estimating how long it takes to complete a particular task if it includes any novelty. If you make something cookie-cutter for the tenth time, you might be somewhat decent in your estimations but still not perfect. And if the process includes any form of creativity, making something new that you haven’t done before, then your estimates surely suck, as the podcast episode title suggests. And that’s okay; it’s just how our brains naturally work.

In practice, in many companies, it works like that. Let’s say someone wants to make a website. Some person, a project manager or a developer, usually gives their estimate: “It will take us six weeks to build it”, for example. By the 4th week, the team realised they hadn’t done even a half because certain features took them longer than expected. So after negotiating with the client, which took another week, they decided to postpone the launch for a month to give the team more time. Then the same happens again and again, and eventually, the demoralised team built a product that no longer reflects the client’s needs. On top of that, the company or the client had to pay for this much more than initially estimated because time is money.

I had experience working as a project manager in software development, so I know for a fact that my made-up example above is a pretty accurate illustration of what often happens in the industry.

So how is David’s and Jason’s approach different? First, it starts with acknowledging that estimates are no better than guessing, and guesses are not a reliable source for planning weeks, months, and especially years ahead. Second, they fix the timeframe and the deadline and never change them. And third, they ship the product on time no matter what, even when the resulting product isn’t quite what was planned. Instead of delivering a set-in-stone product that would take an unknown amount of time to make, they set the deadline in stone and ship what they believe is the best version of that product possible to make during that timeframe. With this approach, they basically say, “let’s spend an X amount of time to solve this problem, and once X is passed, we are done”.

Sounds controversial, right?

The key here is that you cannot sacrifice quality. Things you deliver must be good. What you can discuss and possibly cut, though, is the scope. Going back to that website example, using this approach, they would ship it after six weeks, but probably with fewer features. And having fewer features is not necessarily a bad thing. What’s important is that the company or the client would have an actual, good working product exactly when they wanted, even though the product might be slightly different. And that alone sometimes is enough to start generating profit or making decisions on further iterations based on real-life user interaction with your product rather than theorycrafting for months while your product is stuck in a never-ending “work in progress”.

I believe that this mindset of fixed deadline rather than the scope might be helpful outside of software development in things like marketing, personal projects, or even music production.

I’ve been hosting my monthly music podcast for more than a decade, and you know how often I would like to have just a little bit more time to find some new tracks to include in the show? Every time, pretty much! Luckily, I have a fixed deadline, so I keep delivering new episodes every month, even though each episode usually isn’t as ideal as I would like it to be. I’m sure I wouldn’t make nearly as many episodes if I’d kept polishing each one until perfection.

I think this paradigm of “fixed deadlines but flexed scopes” might be especially useful and act as a self-protective mechanism for creative work where it’s so tempting to keep working until a so-called “perfection” (which sometimes means infinite). And as they say, done is better than perfect.

I like productivity apps: to-dos, calendars, notes, timers, and things like that of all kinds. I like being organised and that feeling of satisfaction by completing a task (which is probably just a dopamine release, but whatever).

But what is productivity, exactly? What does it mean to be productive? If I tick ten to-do’s a day, am I productive? And what about other things that I want to do but don’t do? The usual excuse is, “I don’t have time for that”, so does it mean I need to improve my time management?

I started asking myself these questions about a year ago, and eventually, they led me to the whole system that I’m going to share today.

Backstory

One day, I remember completing yet another dozen tasks, but strangely enough, I felt it didn’t really move me anywhere. All of those tasks that I ticked every day were repetitive little tasks that helped to maintain where I am but didn’t contribute to moving the needle for me.

At the same time, ironically, I always felt behind and thought I could have done more. For example, I could release more music, but I had an excuse that I didn’t have time and felt bad about it.

So, on the one hand, I didn’t feel any progress despite completing many tasks. On the other hand, I felt guilt and anxiety for not doing things I could’ve done. That’s where I was in the middle of 2020 or so.

After that, I started to think about it: “Okay, I’m stuck like a hamster in the wheel and don’t move anywhere. Hm, but where exactly do I want to go in the first place?”.

That made me think even deeper, or rather higher if you think about it as zooming out from the ground level, and I asked myself what my goals are. Literally, my goals in life. “What do I want?” – that simple question became game-changing.

Now let me explain to you the key concepts of this approach, and then I’ll give some tips on how to turn it into a doable system that you can copy and use for yourself.

Goals

The first important thing is to write down your goals. You can use a pen and paper, or any note-taking app like Apple Notes, Google Docs, Bear, Notion, or whatever. I use Craft, but again, it doesn’t matter.

To find out what your goals are, you need to ask yourself “what do I want”. Asking this question seems obvious on paper, and yet we constantly get so busy and induced with information and distractions that we rarely ask ourselves any questions of that kind. For this reason, you may struggle to answer this question initially, and that’s okay, give yourself some time.

A goal can be anything. Spending a vacation in Barcelona can be a goal. Writing a sci-fi novel can be a goal. Releasing an album. Launching a course. Buying a house. Anything you want.

When writing down goals, you need to be very specific. And there is also a very tricky difference between focusing on the input versus the output.

For example, “have at least one gig a month” sounds like a nice goal for a starting DJ, right? The problem is a gig is an output, the result, and generally speaking, we have no or very little control over the outputs. You see, to get a gig, someone needs to book you to make it happen. And how do you know for certain whether someone will or will not book you? Well, you don’t!

Another and probably more common example of goals focused on the outputs could be “get 5 kg of lean mass” or “lose 5 kg of weight”. And although such numbers are very specific which is supposed to be a good thing, you don’t have direct control over them. Furthermore, not meeting those numbers can lead to disappointment and frustration. Instead, I’d suggest writing this as “Make a habit of exercising three times a week”, which is much more tangible and within your control.

Here’s something interesting. If you think about the example above, “Make a habit of exercising three times a week” doesn’t look like a goal unless exercising itself is your goal. I would say, for most people, exercising is probably a way to get healthier and feel more attractive. So in this case, “Get healthier and feel more attractive” might be the real goal, and exercising three times a week is just one of the many ways of achieving this goal. Be honest with yourself.

Values

If you are lucky enough and know what you want, then the answer to the question “why do I want this” is your value. For example, someone may say “I want to work remotely”, and that’s the goal. But why? The answer might be, “Because I value the freedom to work from anywhere I want”, and so in that case “the freedom” is the value for that person.

But sometimes it’s less obvious. Since we live in a monetary world, many things are tight to money or the possibilities it can provide, whether we like it or not. For example, oftentimes a person might see their job as a way of paying the bills, but not the actual thing they enjoy doing. So to eliminate money from the equation, I find the following thought experiment useful.

Imagine that you’ve got one million dollars. Or that you have an almost infinite amount of money, so you never need to worry about them again. Or that society is free from money and everyone does whatever they want. You can play around with the exact scenario of this thought experiment that feels best for you, but the main question is, what would you do then? How would you spend your resources, time and energy? What would change for you?

I’ll give you my example. At some point, I supposed that I run my advice series as one of the ways to contribute to increasing my income. Although the advice series is completely free, the idea was that when I share some helpful information, people start to see my expertise and the value I provide, so it helps to spread the word about my name, and eventually that influence leads to more business opportunities and hence more income. If you shorten the path, it can be expressed like “I run the advice series → I get more income”. And as a matter of fact, this blog does indeed give me an extra indirect income, as some people I worked with explicitly said that they wanted to do some business with me because of my writings, which only supported my initial belief.

However, after having that thought experiment I described above, I realised nothing would change for me. I would still run this blog and the advice series even if I had all money in the world. As it turns out, my motivation for doing that wasn’t financial at all. And that shift of perspective changed everything for me.

After that discovery, I went through all activities and things I do (or don’t do) and asked myself why. Sometimes it took me several layers of “why’s” to get to the real answers. For example, “I do A. Why? To get B. Why?”. That articulation of why is crucial, and I’ve learned so many things about myself. For example, I realised that I didn’t produce music due to a so-called lack of time but simply because I couldn’t answer the question “why”. It was a revelation.

So write down your values next to your goals or somewhere. These are the things that are important to you, your motivation. And they are usually very basic, like health, influence, fame, curiosity, et cetera. Again, be honest with yourself and make sure to understand why you want (or don’t want) certain things, as this understanding is crucial.

Projects and tasks

Once you know what and why do you want to achieve, it’s time to ask yourself “how am I going to achieve this”. This is where projects come into place.

A project is an action that requires more than a single step to complete. It’s a group of step-by-step to-do’s that ultimately will help you to achieve a particular goal. Some complex (usually long-term) goals may have several projects; others may have just one.

For example, “Plan a trip to Barcelona” is a project because it involves more than one step. These steps might include: decide on the exact dates, purchase flight tickets, book a hotel, plan the itinerary, research local sights to visit, pack a suitcase, etc. All of those little individual steps I call tasks, or to-dos.

To keep track of your projects, I highly suggest using some form of task manager. Again, it can be a pen and paper, an app, or whatever. I have another article on how I use a to-do list to manage my tasks and projects, so I won’t go over the details here.

Quarterly planning

This system of setting your goals, understanding your values, and executing them with actionable projects works great, at least for me. But life isn’t static; our priorities, conditions, and desires change. I use quarterly planning to reflect those changes, and the name suggests how often I do it.

Quarterly planning is a 1-on-1 meeting where I check in with myself. To make this process fun and enjoyable, I usually go to a new place such as a café where I can sit with my laptop and a cup of tea for about an hour or two without distractions.

During this process, I do the following:

• Reflect on the last quarter’s results: write shortly about what I’ve been working on, what I’ve succeeded and failed at, and how I feel.
• Mark previous goals completed if I have any.
• Set new goals for the next quarter, making sure those goals align with my values and articulate why I want to achieve them. Sometimes I might have dozens of goals, but trying to achieve them all simultaneously would be not realistic. During this planning, I pick up just some of them, typically from one to three, and set them as a priority for the next quarter.
• Identify actionable projects for these goals for the next quarter and add them to the task manager as a list of specific things to do.

I find this process essential for the piece of mind and clear vision. After that, I know exactly what to do and how things I do every day actually move me towards my goals. Just knowing this brings so much calm and clarity.

Do you remember at the beginning of the article I said that I felt guilty for not doing things I could’ve done? This priority system treats exactly this symptom. By saying “the next quarter I’m going to work on A, B, and C”, I also say to myself “I’m not going to work on D, E, F, and everything else”, which is a huge deal. Compare “I don’t do X because I don’t have time for it” and “I don’t do it because I have consciously chosen to do other things that are more meaningful to me now”, that difference is a big quality shift in the attitude.

To me, doing this planning every three months turned out to be the sweet spot. One and two months seem too short for many of my projects, whereas four, five, and more months seem way too far in the future.

Weekly reviews

While quarterly planning gives a strategic birds-eye view, weekly reviews help me to stay on track on a more tactical level.

During this review, I do the following:

• Check calendar events for the upcoming week to evaluate how much time I can spend on my tasks on each day.
• Figure out what I should focus on next week. One of the reasons I love my task manager, Things 3, is because I can set not only deadlines for the tasks but also the day I’m planning to start working on a given task. So I usually pick some important tasks from my projects and decide when I’m going to work on them.
• Set deadlines and reminders for important tasks to ensure I didn’t miss anything.
• Move to “Someday” tasks I won’t be doing in the coming weeks. This is again something about my particular task manager app, Things 3, but basically this “Someday” feature hides all tasks that I don’t need right now, so I always have only relevant to-dos in front of me.
• Remove tasks that are no longer relevant or outdated, which should be self-explanatory.

Basically, this whole process is a quick clean up where I make sure that all action steps for my goals are reflected in my task manager appropriately. Unlike quarter planning which usually takes 1-2 hours as I think about my life goals, weekly reviews take about 20 minutes. I usually do them on Sundays to feel ready for the week ahead, so on Monday morning I wake up with a list of to-dos waiting for me, and I know that these tasks have meaning and contribute to my goals.

Doing quarterly planning at The Moon And Maybe. London, October 2022

Recap

There was probably a lot of information to digest, so let me quickly summarise:

1. Being productive means doing things that matter to you, your goals. It’s not about quantity but rather direction and consistency.
2. Write down your goals. Things you want in your life, no matter how big or small. Take your time.
3. Think about why you want to achieve those goals, that will be your values. Write them down too. The answers might surprise you.
4. Identify actionable projects for your goals, or the steps that would move you towards them.
5. Transfer those projects and to-dos to a task manager.
6. Check in with yourself and set priority goals every quarter to stay calm and focused.
7. Clean up the task manager weekly to stay on track.

Credit

Last but not least, I would like to give credit to Peter Akkies. Although I’ve read many of these ideas in various articles and books, his work inspired and “clicked” with me the most.

I hope my humble article will help someone, just like Peter’s helped me.

Starting today, I’m officially joining the Beatport team and taking on the role of music curator.

Beatport is a transatlantic corporation known by DJs worldwide as a credible source of fresh electronic dance music and the best store, Beatport.com. Besides the DJ store and its streaming service, the company’s assets include the plugins store Plugin Boutique, samples service Loopcloud, the distribution platform Ampsuite, and other music tools and services.

As a curator, I’ll be overseeing two big genres in the DJ store: Trance and Psytrance; assigning tracks to the right styles; featuring playlists; making editorial picks; tracking analytics; collaborating with labels and doing lots more.

Being a professional DJ, I’ve been an active Beatport user for over a decade, so I’m very happy to join the team and contribute my knowledge and expertise to the growth of the global electronic dance music community.

Notes from Andrew Huberman’s lecture on dopamine

Discussions about health issues, and motivation, in particular, are often neglected in the music industry. And yet I know in person quite a few people who struggle with motivation after a big release or are burnt out despite having what seems like a success.

I came across a fascinating lecture by Andrew Huberman, a neuroscientist at Stanford University, about a molecule called dopamine and how it affects our motivation, drive, and even overall happiness. He discusses important questions, like why we perceive certain experiences differently; what dictates our so-called quality of life; how to keep focused and keep enjoying things that we do repetitively; what are underlying mechanisms of motivation and what behavioural patterns can reduce it; why sometimes being too ecstatic about big achievements can cause negative long-term effects; what’s an addiction; how our internal reward system works; and many, many more things around those topics. And it’s very useful for anyone, even outside the music career, of course.

I found this lecture so eye-opening, so I took some notes and shared them here my blog, even though it’s beyond the scope of typical posts in my blog.

Here is the full video that I encourage you to watch, and below are the notes that I took from it:

What it is

Dopamine is a very important molecule, a so-called neuromodulator. It’s not only responsible for pleasure, it’s responsible for motivation, drive, and craving. It also controls time perception and is related to body movements.

There is always a baseline level of dopamine in our bodies. When you feel excited and motivated, it’s called tonic and phasic release: tonic is always there circulating in the brain, and phasic are the peaks above the baseline. These two things interact, and it’s important. Dopamine can change the way our neural circuits work at a local scale (synaptic) and at a very broad scale (volumetric, affecting many neurones).

Peaks

If you were to take a drug or supplement that increases your level of dopamine, you are influencing both the local and volumetric releases of dopamine. This is related back to the baseline and the big peak above the baseline. And that turns out to be important. Many drugs and supplements will actually make it harder for you to sustain dopamine over long periods of time and to achieve those peaks that most of us are craving when we are in pursuit of things.

Why? Because if you get both volumetric releases, the duping out of dopamine everywhere, and you’re getting a local release, it means that the difference between the peak and baseline is likely to be smaller. And how satisfying or exciting or pleasureful a given experience depends on the height of that peak relative to the baseline. So if you increase the baseline and you increase the peak, you’re not going to achieve more and more pleasure from things. Just increasing dopamine will make you excited for all things, it will make you feel very motivated, but it will also make that motivation very short-lived.

Perception

Dopamine is unique in our brain, it communicates with other neurones slower through G protein-coupled receptors. It slows, but can have multiple cascade effects. So its effects tend to take a while in order to occur.

Dopamine is a universal currency in all mammals, especially humans, for moving us towards goals. How much dopamine is in our system at any one time compared to how much dopamine was in our system a few minutes ago and how much we remember enjoying a particular experience of the past dictates your so-called quality of life and your desire to pursue things. It’s the way we track pleasure, it’s the way we track success. Even subtle fluctuations in dopamine really shape our perception of life and what we’re capable of, and how we feel.

This is why when you repeatedly engage in something that you enjoy, your threshold for enjoyment goes up and up.

All of us have different baseline levels of dopamine. Some of this is sure to be genetic.

Epinephrine, also called adrenaline is the main chemical driver of energy. We can’t do anything, anything at all, unless we have some level of epinephrin in our brain and body. Epinephrin and adrenalin are manufactured from dopamine.

Appreciation

The cortical part is important. The cortical part actually has a very specific part, which is your prefrontal cortex. The area of your forebrain that’s involved in thinking and planning, and involved in assigning a rational explanation to something, and involved in assigning a subjective experience to something. So, for instance, a pen that I’m holding right now, it’s one of the Pilot V5s, I just happen to love them, I like the way they write, and how they feel. If I spent enough time thinking about it or talking about it, I could probably get a dopamine release increase just talking about this pen. As we start to engage with something more and more, and we say about it, and what we encourage ourselves to think about it, has a profound impact on its rewarding or non-rewarding properties. Now, it’s not simply the case that you can lie to yourself. What’s been found over and over again is that if people journal about something, or they practice some form of appreciation for something, or they think of some aspect of something that they enjoy, the amount of dopamine that that behaviour will evoke tends to go up.

Layers

There used to be a cigarette and a cup of coffee, or when people drink alcohol, oftentimes they’ll smoke. And it’s well-known that different compounds like alcohol and nicotine, or caffeine and nicotine, or certain behaviours and certain drugs can synergise to give bigger dopamine increases. And turns out it’s not the best approach: layering together multiple things, substances and activities that lead to a big increase in dopamine, can actually create pretty severe issues with motivation and energy right after those experiences and even a couple of days later.

I’m not saying that people shouldn’t take the occasional pre-workout if that’s your thing, or drink a cup of coffee before working out; some people enjoy that. But if you do it too often, what you’ll find is that your capacity to release dopamine and your level of motivation, drive and energy overall will take a serious hit.

Celebration

Once we achieve certain things we wanted, our baseline of dopamine reduces for a while. And it doesn’t just go back down to the level it was before, it goes to a level below what it was before you went out seeking that thing.

“I’m going to run this marathon, I’m going to train for that marathon”, and when you run the marathon and cross the finish line, you feel great. And you think, “Okay, now I’m set off for the entire year, I’m going to feel so much better, I’m going to feel this accomplishment in my body, it’s going to be so great”. That’s not what happens. You might feel some of those things, but your level of dopamine has actually dropped below the baseline. Now, eventually, it will ratchet back up, but two things are really important.

First of all, the extent to which it drops below the baseline is proportional to how high the peak was. So if you cross the finish line pretty happy, it won’t drop that much below baseline afterwards; if you cross the finish line ecstatic, well, a day or two later, you’re going to feel quite a bit lower than you would otherwise. It’s so-called postpartum depression that people experience after giving birth or after some big win, graduation, or any kind of celebration. This is very important to underground because this happens on very rapid timescales and it can last quite a long time.

It also explains the behaviour that most of us are familiar with of engaging in something that we really enjoy. But if we continue to engage in that behaviour over and over again, it kind of loses its edge. It starts to feel less exciting to us.

Addiction

Dopamine is released in the system only when it’s ready; when it’s synthesised. If you take something or do something that leads to huge increases in dopamine, afterwards your baseline should drop because there isn’t a lot of dopamine around to keep your baseline level going.

Fortunately, most people do not experience or pursue enormous increases in dopamine leading to severe drops in the baseline. Many people do, however, and that’s what we call addiction. When somebody pursues a drug or an activity that leads to huge increases in dopamine, and now you understand that afterwards the baseline of dopamine drops because of depletion of dopamine, that readily releasable pool. The dopamine is literally not around to be released, and so people feel pretty louse. And many people make the mistake of then going and pursuing the dopamine-evoking, dopamine-releasing activity or substance again, thinking mistakenly that it’s going to bring up their baseline, it’s going to give them that peak again. Not only does it not give them a peak, but their baseline also gets lower and lower because they’re depleting dopamine more and more.

Burning out

What about the more typical scenario? What about the scenario of somebody who is really good at working during the week, they exercise during the week, they drink on the weekends. Well, that person is only consuming alcohol maybe one or two nights a week, but oftentimes that same person will be spiking their dopamine with food during the middle of the week. Now, we all have to eat, and it’s nice to eat foods that we enjoy. But let’s say they’re eating foods that really evoke a lot of dopamine release in the middle of the week, they’re drinking one or two days on the weekend, they are one of these work hard, play hard type. So they’re swimming a couple of miles in the middle of the week, they’re going out dancing once on the weekend. Sounds like a pretty balanced life as I describe it, right?

Well, here’s the problem. The problem is that dopamine is not just evoked by one of these activities, dopamine is evoked by all of these activities. And dopamine is one universal currency of craving, motivation, desire, and pleasure. There’s only one currency. It makes sense why that person after several years of work hard, play hard, would say, “you know, I’m feeling kind of burnt out.” What is happening is they’re spiking dopamine through so many different activities throughout the week that their baseline is progressively dropping. And in this case, it can be very subtle, so it’s difficult to notice in the short term, but it kicks in the long term.

Now, of course, we all should engage in activities that we enjoy, everybody should. A huge part of life is pursuing activities and things that we enjoy. The key thing is to understand the relationship between the peaks and the baseline and to understand how they influence one another. Because once you do that, you can start to make really good choices in the short run and in the long run to maintain your level of dopamine baseline, maybe even raise that level of dopamine baseline and still get those peaks and still achieve those feelings of elevated motivation.

Healthy approach

There are optimal ways to engage in activities or to consume things that evoke dopamine. The key lies in the intermittent release of dopamine, and the key is to not expect or chase high levels of dopamine release every time we engage in these activities.

Intermittent reward schedules are the central schedule by which casinos keep you gambling. There’s something called dopamine reward prediction error. When we expect something to happen, we are highly motivated to pursue it. If it happens, great, we get the reward. The reward comes in various chemical forms including dopamine, and we are more likely to engage in that behaviour again. This is the basis of casino gambling. This is how they keep you going back again and again, even though on average the house does win.

That intermittent reinforcement schedule is actually the best schedule to export to other activities. How do you do that? Well, first of all, if you are engaged in activities, school, sport, relationship etc, where you experience a win, you should be very careful about allowing yourself to experience huge peaks in dopamine unless you’re willing to suffer the crash that follows and waiting a period of time for it to come back up.

What would this look like in the practical sense? Well, let’s say you’re somebody who kind of likes exercise but forces yourself to do it, but you make it pleasureful by giving yourself your favourite cup of coffee first, or maybe taking a pre-workout drink, or taking an energy drink, or listening to your favourite music. And then you’re in the gym and you’re listening to music, that all sounds great, right? Well, it is great except that by laying together all these things to try and achieve that dopamine release, and by getting a big peak in dopamine, you’re actually increasing the number of conditions required to achieve pleasure from that activity again.

And so there is a form of this where sometimes you do all the things that you love to get the optimal workout. You listen to your favourite music, you got your favourite time of day, you have a pre-workout drink if that’s your thing; you do all the things that give you that best experience of the workout for you. But there is also a version of this where sometimes you don’t do the dopamine-enhancing activities. You don’t ingest anything to increase your dopamine. You just do the exercise. You might think, “well, that sounds lame. I want to continue to enjoy exercising”. Ah, well, that’s exactly the point! If you want to maintain motivation for school, exercise, relationships or pursuits of any duration in kind, the key thing is to make sure that the peak in dopamine, if it’s very high, doesn’t occur too often. And if something that does occur very often that you vary how much dopamine you experience with each engagement in that activity.

The reason why I can’t give a very specific protocol, like delete dopamine or lower dopamine every third time, is that that wouldn’t be intermittent. The whole basis of intermittent reinforcement is that you don’t really have a specific schedule of when dopamine is going to be high, and when dopamine is going to be low. That’s a predictable schedule, not a random intermittent schedule. So do like the casinos do, it certainly works for them, and for activities that you would like to continue to engage in overtime, whatever those happen to be, start paying attention to the amount of dopamine and excitement and pleasure that you achieve with those, and start modulating that somewhat at random. There are a lot of different ways to do this.

For those of you that are begging for more specificity, we can give you a tool. One would be, you can flip a coin before engaging in any of these types of activities and decide whether or not you are going to allow other dopamine-supportive elements to go, for instance, into the gym with you. Are you going to listen to music or not? If you enjoy listening to music, well then flip a coin, and if it comes up heads, bring the music in, and if it comes up tails, don’t. It sounds like you’re undercutting your own progress, but actually, you are serving your own progress, both short-term and long-term, by doing that.

Smartphones

It’s extremely common nowadays to see people texting and taking selfies and communicating in various ways, listening to podcasts, listening to music, and doing all sorts of things while they engage in other activities. That’s all wonderful, it gives depth and richness and colour to life, but it isn’t just about our distracted nature when we’re engaging with the phone, it’s also a way of layering in dopamine. And it’s no surprise that levels of depression and lack of motivation are really on the increase.

I know this is a hard one for many people, but I do invite you to try removing multiple sources of dopamine release, or what used to be multiple sources of dopamine release, from activities that you want to continue to enjoy or that you want to enjoy more.

Rewards

Hard work is hard. Generally, most people don’t like working hard. Some people do, but most people work hard in order to achieve some end goals. End goals are terrific, and rewards are terrific, whether or not they are monetary, social or any kind. However, because of the way that dopamine relates to our perception of time, working hard at something for the sake of a reward that comes afterwards can make the hard work much more challenging and make us much less likely to lean into hard work in the future.

Let me give a couple of examples by way of data and experiments. There’s a classic experiment done at Stanford many years ago in which children in nursery school and kindergarten drew pictures, and they drew pictures cause they like to draw. The researchers took kids that liked to draw, and started giving them a reward for drawing. The reward generally was a gold star or something that a young child would find rewarding. Then they stopped giving them the gold star. And what they found is the children had a much lower tendency to draw on their own. No reward. Now, remember this was an activity that prior to receiving a reward, the children intrinsically enjoyed to do, no one was telling them to draw. What this relates to is so-called intrinsic versus extrinsic reinforcement. When we receive rewards, even if we give ourselves rewards for something, we tend to associate less pleasure with the actual activity itself that evoked the reward.

This doesn’t mean all rewards of all kinds are bad, but it’s also important to understand that dopamine controls our perception of time. When and how much dopamine we experience is the way that we carve up what we call our experience of time. When we engage in an activity, let’s say school or hard work of any kind, or exercise because of the reward we are going to give ourselves a receive at the end, the trophy, the meal, whatever it happens to be. We actually are extending the time bin over which we are analysing or perceiving that experience. And because the reward comes at the end, we start to dissociate the neural circuits for dopamine reward that would have normally been active during the activity. And because it all arrives at the end over time, we have the experience of less and less pleasure from that particular activity while we’re doing it.

The striving to be better, this mindset of “I’m not there yet”, but striving itself is the end goal. And that delivers a tremendous performance. And all of us can cultivate a growth mindset. The neural mechanism of cultivating growth mindset involves learning to access the rewards from effort and doing.

If you say “Oh, I’m going to do this very hard thing, and I’m going to push and push and push for that end goal that comes later”, not only you enjoy the process of what you’re doing less, you actually make it more painful while you’re engaging in it, you make yourself less efficient at it, and also undermining your ability to lean back into that activity the next time. The next time you need twice as much coffee and four times as much energy drink just to get out the door in order to do the run or to study.

So what’s more beneficial, in fact, it can serve as a tremendous amplifier on all endeavours that you engage in, is to not start layering in other sources of dopamine in order to get to the starting line, but rather to subjectively start to attach the feeling of friction and effort to an internally generated reward system. The ability to access this pleasure from the effort aspect of our dopaminergic circuitry is without question the most powerful aspect of dopamine and our biology of dopamine.

Don’t spike dopamine prior to engaging in effort, and don’t spike dopamine after engaging in effort, learn to spike your dopamine from the effort itself.

Knowledge of knowledge can help our forebrain with getting a reward from the process itself. And that’s the beauty of these dopamine circuits. It’s not just attached to the more primitive behaviours of food, sex, heat etc., it’s also attached to the things that we decide are good for us and are important for us. So telling yourself that exercise or fasting or studying or listening better or any kind of behaviour is good for you will actually reinforce the extent to which it is good for you at a chemical level.

Social connections

Social connections, close social connections, in particular, evoke oxytocin release. Those are the romantic type, parent-child type, and friendship related. And oxytocin release is central to stimulating the dopamine pathways. So the take-home message here is quite simple: engage is pursuing quality, healthy social interactions.

A few months ago I talked to Tara Hawes, a music journalist and staff writer at one of the most long-established UK underground music communities HarderFaster.net, and she wrote a fabulous article covering my decade of dance music. As always, for the sake of archiving purposes, I’d like to post it on my blog as well.

With November 2022 marking my 20 years of music journalism and event promotion on this website under a variety of aliases and, in some cases, long-dead record label and party names (may they Rave In Peace), it’s very easy to become jaded reading the usual ubiquitous DJ bios. But as a geriatric hobbyist DJ myself, I still can’t help but read the bloody things. It’s become increasingly rare, but just occasionally, someone catches your ears and eyes that really stands out from the crowd, and in the case of music producer, DJ and JOOF Recordings’ A&R Manager Daniel Lesden, has fitted more into his decade-long career than many artists will achieve in a lifetime.

In these narrowed-down days of strict sub-genres, Daniel stands out as a true artist, surfing between the boundaries of progressive, techno and trance. He originally embarked on his music production journey making psychedelic trance, but in his quest to constantly keep his sound fresh and exciting as it continues to evolve and progress, he now releases what he describes as “progressive and something rather techno-ish”. In the meantime, since 2012 he’s released over 50 tracks on Digital Om Productions, Forescape Digital, Iono Music, Borderline Music, Ovnimoon Records, Synergetic Records, Pharmacy Music, Research & Development, Tandana Records, and of course JOOF Recordings, the long-established champion of the underground where he appears to have found his spiritual home.

Despite this incredible release history, Daniel still considers himself foremost a DJ and has performed all over the world at some of the top clubs, raves and festivals. His love of sharing new music also comes through in his rave podcasts, while he passes on his passion through his prolific advice blog, which I kept getting lost reading while researching this feature.

As Daniel has recently touched down in London, where he’s planning to relocate, I was fortunate to get the opportunity to speak to this talented creator, producer, performer and promoter of all things underground dance music. With it being his very first HarderFaster interview, I was curious to discover what had put this already accomplished young artist onto the path he’s following today, and what sort of inspiration and support he’d had along the way. Was he classically trained like so many trance producers, or was it something he had gravitated to over time?

As he explains: “My journey for making music began when I was fortunate to get my hands on my first computer at the age of 10 in 1997. At this time I had already been introduced to the world of electronic dance music, so my interest in making music came naturally to me. As you can imagine, those first attempts sounded horrible, but it was a lot of fun nevertheless! Once I got serious about making music a career, in 2011 I went to and graduated from music production and DJing school, where I studied for about six months. Other than that, I’m completely self-taught and still a learner.”

But was there a defining track or artist that made him want to hole himself up in the studio and make his own tunes? Like a true artist, he says: “Since I was so young and new to underground music at the time, I just embraced all of it and was inspired by the whole genres and styles of music, rather than particular artists.”

Having released over 50 tracks over the last decade, I wondered how he feels his artistic practice has progressed and evolved? His response points to an uncertain future in the genre department, with the one constant, of course, being change itself. He describes this from a DJs’ perspective: “I consider myself a DJ first rather than a producer, and that affects my productions as well. As a DJ, I’m always hunting for new music, digging for hidden gems, and discovering things that I didn’t know I would like. And the music I make myself is a continuity of that ongoing process. From fast-paced and melodic, to slower and hypnotic, to driving and pounding sound, my music of tomorrow certainly won’t sound like my tracks of yesterday.”

Unfortunately I’m not going to let him get away with that one so easily. If he can’t describe his own sound, how am I supposed to?! He considers this for a minute: “Usually, I’m trying to avoid naming particular genres because everyone has their own interpretation of techno, trance, or any other genre. And it gets even harder to describe a sound when you break the boundaries and not sit within one particular genre. I like it when a track puts you into a heads-down journey; when it has some depth, some ‘storyline’ that unfolds throughout the playback. I’m sorry for such an abstract definition, but it’s probably the way to describe my music, really.”

Spoken like a true artist! I decide it’s best to let that one go and move on to getting under the bonnet of Daniel’s practice in the studio. I’m interested in how he approaches putting a new track together. Does he usually start with a final track in mind, or does it come together as the various pieces and layers unfold? “For me, tracks usually start in my head a long time before I get to the computer. First, I think about a general concept, a ‘storyline’. Then oftentimes I’m trying to find some graphic concept art as it helps me to visualise my ideas. Then I think of some more practical things like what tempo I want, what music key I want, what mood I want to convey. And only once I’ve answered all of those questions, I get to the computer to actually make it.”

Whatever formula this musical magician has composed, it’s certainly taken him to some interesting places. When asked about the key highlights of his career, he has a shed load to choose from. The young protégé’s modesty shines through: “I think every gig and international gigs, in particular, are certainly the highlights for me. It’s one thing to sit in the studio working on your music and DJ collection, but playing out in front of real crowds is a whole different level from the artist’s perspective. Having played in Russia, Hungary, Switzerland, the United Kingdom, Greece, and Israel, I’m so touched that there are people who know and like my humble music creations. Playing Open To Close sets is also quite an achievement for me, showing myself what I’m worth as a DJ.”

“It was also nice to see when my second studio album 2000 Years Ahead skyrocketed to the #1 chart on Beatport and was the top-selling CD on Psyshop. I’m also very grateful to the Spotify team who included my single Breaking From The Shadows in their editorial playlist, resulting in over 550,000 overall streams on my Spotify artist page.”

Having already achieved so much, I wonder what goals he could possibly still have left to tick off his bucket list? “I would certainly love to play out in more countries and some iconic venues where I haven’t played yet, such as the Ministry Of Sound in London or Ageha in Tokyo.”

As an A&R manager who travels the world DJing, Daniel is at the cutting edge of new music. I wonder what up and coming DJs and producers have caught his eyes and ears recently? “Artists like Pig&Dan, Eric Sneo, Axel Karakasis, Drunken Kong, Don Ruijgrok, Pjotr G & Dubiosity, DJ Dextro, Dosem, Gabriel D’Or & Bordoy aren’t leaving my Rekordbox lately, although these are established acts of course. As for the probably less-known names, I keep my ears and eyes on Fractions, DJ Physical, Dawn Razor, OTHK, Antithet, Enlusion, Bagagee Viphex13, Omformer, Aethernal, just to name a few.”

Daniel’s awesome advice series is an incredible resource for both new and experienced DJs. Having read some of the best advice around on his blog posts, I have to ask, what are his top tips for new DJs who are still trying to escape their bedrooms? “I think the best tip for new DJs to escape their bedrooms is to literally leave their bedrooms and go to the clubs. You must experience music on big sound systems as it helps to better understand what tracks work and why. Watch how good DJs build their sets and how the crowd reacts. Clubbing is also a great way for introducing yourself to the people behind the scenes, building relationships and gaining trust among other DJs and promoters.”

I especially like the direct honest advice he gives out, providing different and unique perspectives, such as considering the promoter’s point of view in a difficult situation and telling DJs not to give up their day jobs – no doubt from his plethora of experience over the last decade. I know what goes on the road is supposed to stay on the road, but I can’t help but ask him, what’s the craziest story he can tell us from his time playing at international events and festivals? “I remember when I played in Hungary, it was an outdoor open air in the middle of nowhere, as it seemed. Literally just green fields all around, wherever you look. But all of a sudden in the morning came a man who claimed he couldn’t sleep because of the event, despite the fact his house was miles away, and he tried to call the police to stop the party! I felt sorry for the man, but it was a pretty stressful moment for the organisers as well.”

Daniel is also a prolific podcaster, with the second Friday of the month dedicated to Rave Podcast day where he connects with like-minded musical fans from all over the world. What’s the concept behind the podcast and why does he think it’s resonated with DJs and producers all over the globe? “I started this podcast over 10 years ago, and since then its concept hasn’t changed: to showcase the finest underground electronic music, bringing unexpected musical twists in every episode. After all those years, I’m still very excited to mix every new episode to share my latest music discoveries, you know, like a happy child with the joy of sharing. And I’m sure the listeners can feel that passion too.”

It’s been a challenging couple of years for everyone, but DJs and producers have been hit harder than most. I have to ask, how did he survive the closure of the events industry and still manage to get creative in the studio despite the chaos around him? Ever the optimist, he replies: “The pandemic was certainly a terrible event that no one expected. I feel sorry for so many people who suffered from it. I was fortunate enough to be able to follow one of my own pieces of advice that I’ve written about distributed income, which basically says, ‘Don’t put all your eggs in one basket’.

While there were no gigs due to lockdowns, I still had income coming from royalties and other sources, so I made it through. It was hard mentally at first, just as it was for everyone, but then so many people showed empathy and support for each other, so it actually inspired me.”

Having come out the other side of the pandemic and landed in London, I am most curious about what new tracks he has in the pipeline. The abstract artist is back in the room, saying that he’s “planning a series of EPs connected through a common theme” and “it’s going to be quite interesting and diverse musically.” In other words, watch this space!

Finally, Daniel continues to explore avenues to pass on his passion to other aspiring artists, and has somehow found time to start working on educational resources to pass on his knowledge. As he describes his new venture: “Over the years of working with music and people in the music industry, I have accumulated experience, which over time has formed into a structured framework of knowledge. And I want to carry that knowledge forward. I’m working on a full-fledged training course for DJs and producers. It’s still in progress and I’m not sure yet when I’ll be able to release it, but if it sounds interesting to you please find more details on my website at Courses”. I’ll certainly be at the start of the queue!

Link to the original post
Text — Tara Hawes

Since 2017, I have been keeping a family budget: I record and track all income and expenses. Let me tell you how I came to do it, what it does for me and how you can start doing it regularly too.

Screenshot from the budgeting application website. The data is not mine

Backstory

This may sound strange, but the first time I thought about the need to keep a budget was not to check expenses but to answer the simple question: “How much money do we have now?

At the time, I was living in Israel, but I was still doing business with Moscow. In the Russian bank, I had a personal account, a savings account, a sole-trader account, and a credit card. In the Israeli bank, I had a personal account and a family account. I also had accounts at PayPal and Yandex-money, which were popular then. My wife had almost all of the same. And we also had some cash in rubles, shekels, and foreign currency left over from trips abroad.

At the same time, there was some small movement of money in all the accounts because of various automatic payments paid from those accounts. For example, I paid my utility bills with an Israeli card, I paid for my website hosting with Yandex-money, and I paid for Soundcloud via PayPal.

It was real chaos, and I’m not exaggerating when I say that I didn’t know how much money I had at a given time. So at first, I just wrote down all the accounts I had, and then I decided to track all the income and expenses to keep those accounts’ balances up to date.

Benefits

When you have all your income and expenses written down, you have an objective picture of your financial situation and can make better decisions.

For example, it may seem that you spend a lot on Uber, so you need a car. But if you write down your expenses, you may find that you spend just £70 per month on taxis, which is a few times less than the cost of owning your own car, let alone the initial cost of buying one.

Or it might seem like you only have Netflix and Spotify subscriptions, for example, for £15 per month. But if you write down all expenses, you may find that you have more subscriptions, including annual ones, so realistically all the subscription services cost you an average of £100 per month.

What to do with this information is up to you. The main thing is that you will be able to rely on real figures rather than guesswork.

Having such an objective picture has helped me plan my future better and make bolder decisions. I feel more in control of my own life, and that’s worth a lot.

It is also fascinating to record not only expenses but also different categories of income: for example, I now know precisely how much I earn from my music without any illusions.

Tips

Not everyone needs or wants to keep a budget. If the very thought of having to write down every expense terrifies you, there is nothing wrong with you. Many people prefer to go with the flow and not think about such things, which is perfectly normal.

However, if you want to take more financial control of your life and start budgeting, here is my advice:

1. Keep a budget in a separate app. Many banks’ apps have learned to categorise expenses and make nice graphs, but I recommend a separate app. It is important that you can add different accounts to it (for example, an account from another bank or a PayPal account, if you have one) and set up your own categories of expenses and income to make it more personal.
2. Find an app that works for you. I know how important this is: I’ve started and quit five times just because an app was uncomfortable or unappealing. This is very subjective, so I’m not specifically naming the app I use – just google it and try different options.
3. Keep records without tension. This is a very important point because as soon as there is tension, some minimal friction, you immediately want to quit. If you get resistance, it may be worth trying a different app – see the previous point.
4. Write everything down. This is crucial. If the data in your app no longer reflect reality, it will all become meaningless. That is why I recommend writing down all incomes and expenditures, even the smallest ones. It takes me about half an hour a week, and so as not to forget, I have created a recurring to-do in my to-do list.

I would be glad if anyone finds my experience useful.

Last weekend, I went to the Anjunadeep label party at Printworks London. I find this place quite interesting, so I decided to tell you more about it and share my impressions.

Printworks is once the largest printing factory in Western Europe. Since 2017, it has operated as a club and event space with a capacity of 6,000 people. The club is scheduled to close in 2023 due to neighbourhood renovations, so the place will forever be legendary, and I couldn’t pass up the chance to visit it.

To my great surprise, my introduction to the place began even before I got there: at the exit of the Canada Water tube station, there was a man with a Printworks sign pointing to the right exit. About a hundred meters later, on the street, there was another person with a sign. And so on, all the way to the club!

Navigation on the way to the club

Next year it will be exactly twenty years since I started raving consciously and regularly, but in all that time, I’ve never seen anything like it!

Just so you understand, the club is 600 meters from this underground station, which means it’s a five- or ten-minute walk. Printworks could easily do without this navigation, as all the other clubs do. But no, apparently, someone from the management thought it was important enough to allocate at least twenty people for this task alone, according to my observations. I think that’s cool.

Entrance and cloakroom

At the entrance, security checked tickets and inspected personal belongings, as a usual practice for all clubs. But what’s interesting here is that Printworks has organized this process in ten parallel lanes. It makes sense to do so when you think about it, but not all venues of similar capacity are doing that. I got there about a half hour after the opening, at 8:30 pm, and there was no queue at all. An hour later, I specifically went back to see what had changed: there were many more people at the entrance, but because of the multiple lanes, the queue was moving quickly.

Efficiently organised entrance group

There is no cloakroom in the club. Instead, they use personal lockers. Given the number of people, it seemed like the right and safe approach. And it’s also convenient because you can pick up and put things back in your locker anytime, whenever you want.

The lockers are pretty expensive even by local standards: £7 for a small locker and £10 for a large one. And another £10 on top in the form of a deposit, which is then refunded when you hand the key back. By comparison, from my experience, the usual price in London clubs is from £2 to £5. However, even a small locker can fit several pieces of outerwear, so for a group of people, it is even cheaper than usual, although still more expensive for one person.

You can only pay for lockers (and everywhere else in Printworks) by cards and contactless methods of payment – cash is not accepted at all. This is a common trend in many London clubs, cafes and even some stores, such as IKEA.

Lockers instead of a cloakroom: quite expensive but convenient

Space

The club has two dance floors, Inkwells and Press Halls. In addition to those, I count at least four bars, a merch store, an info centre, a medical point, and just all sorts of things that are fun to wander and explore. The brought aesthetics and the enormous size of the venue are a particular treat.

Signs with navigation with lights, well readable font and in the same style. What a beauty.

Navigation

Note the height of the ceilings:

Bars and hangout areas

Press Halls

Now let’s move on to the dance floors. Without further ado, here is the main one – Press Halls:

Press Halls, the main dance floor

I’ll be honest: the space is impressive in scale, even for a seasoned raver. The lighting design is quite simple, but in combination with the geometry and environment works perfectly. But the sound was a little disappointing: it was uneven, and I had to look for sweet spots where it sounded good.

the space is impressive in scale, even for a seasoned raver

Videos:

I was surprised and happy when one of my favourite tracks came on – I didn’t expect to hear it at Anjuna’s party:

More awesomeness:

As always, all of that was professionally filmed by the crew. Hopefully the video will appear on Anjunadeep’s YouTube channel soon:

Inkwells

Let’s move to the second dance floor, Inkwells. And I’ll tell you the unexpected: I liked it even more than the main one. Press Halls create a wow effect, and I highly recommend everyone experience its scale at least once. Whereas Inkwells is darker, more intimate, and underground, and I generally love that sort of thing.

Judge for yourself:

Videos. The lighting design on this dance floor is a special treat to my eyes:

Stage lighting engineer on Inkwells. Kudos to this man!

The food court

Let’s go to the main hall, where we went after entering the club. From there, to the left, is the entrance to the courtyard with the food stores. Yes, the food court at the club! The menu included grilled burgers, freshly made pizza in the oven, and some Asian and vegetarian options. Prices for the main dishes were about £8 to £12.

All in all, Printworks was great, except for one thing: it was too cold. I’m a little biased on this matter because I usually get cold everywhere, but it was really freezing there — some people stayed in their jackets, even on the dance floor, which seems bizarre to me.

As you may have already guessed, the music was top-notch, as good as I expected. I would also like to mention many friendly, beautiful, polite people. It’s probably more of a credit to the Anjunadeep audience than to the venue, but who knows?

I hope I can still get there before it closes (and preferably during the warm season).

Read also: how I went to the Ministry Of Sound.