[TBBT] Ch: 19 [Going Viral] (Patreon)

[One Week Later]

[First Person POV]

By the end of the following week, Apartment 5B looked less like somebody's home and more like a recording studio.

The microphone I'd bought was perfectly acceptable for recording "I'm Yours," and my guitar had done its job without giving me any serious problems. Once I decided to record three more songs together, acceptable stopped being good enough surprisingly quickly.

So I upgraded everything. A better acoustic guitar came first, followed by an electronic bass guitar, several better microphones, additional stands, cables, and enough acoustic treatment that one corner of my apartment slowly began resembling an actual recording booth.

Then I bought a piano.

Technically, I didn't need one. Between FL Studio, which everyone still seemed determined to call Fruity Loops half the time, and Logic Pro, I had access to enough virtual instruments to fake almost anything I needed. The software came loaded with synthesizers, sampled instruments, pads, bass sounds, electronic bells, drums, and an increasingly ridiculous number of ways to manipulate sound.

Still, "Just the Way You Are" deserved a real piano foundation before I started layering anything around it.

I spent far too long testing different models before finally choosing one that gave me the warmth I wanted without forcing me to explain to myself why buying a concert grand for an apartment was somehow financially responsible.

The rest of the arrangements came through a mixture of real instruments and software.

"Fireflies" was probably the strangest one to rebuild because so much of its identity depended on the electronic atmosphere. I spent hours recreating tiny melodic layers, soft synth textures, electronic bells, rhythmic elements, and background sounds that seemed almost insignificant when you heard the finished song.

Once I started separating everything, I realized how much work had gone into making something sound effortless.

"Somebody That I Used to Know" created the opposite problem.

The arrangement needed space. Every instinct I'd developed through scientific work told me that complicated problems required more information, more variables, and more control. Music occasionally demanded that I shut up and stop adding things.

That took actual practice. There were sections where another instrument would've made the recording technically fuller while simultaneously making the song worse. Learning when to leave empty space became almost as important as learning what to put inside it.

Then there was "Just the Way You Are."

That song nearly drove me insane. I recorded the piano several times, changed the vocal arrangement, rebuilt sections of the percussion, scrapped two mixes entirely, and once spent almost an hour adjusting a background element nobody listening through ordinary headphones would consciously notice.

At around four in the morning, I leaned back from the computer and stared at the waveform across the screen.

"This is what perfectionism looks like when somebody gives it recording software."

Nobody answered because normal human beings were asleep.

For nearly a week, I gave the project everything I had.

I woke up, logged into the System, ate something, recorded, edited, mixed, researched, had a few dinners with Penny, and then repeated the process until the days began blending together. There were moments when I realized I'd been sitting at the desk for six hours without moving except to adjust a microphone or reach for water.

By the time I finally finished all three masters, I had four complete songs ready for proper release.

"I'm Yours" was already circulating through MySpace and YouTube, while "Just the Way You Are," "Somebody That I Used to Know," and "Fireflies" were completely new.

Before recording any of them, I'd checked this reality as thoroughly as I reasonably could.

Copyright databases, publisher records, label catalogs, independent releases, MySpace pages, artist websites, online music communities, interviews, existing songwriting credits, and whatever archival material I could access all received my attention.

The songs didn't exist here.

More importantly, I couldn't find unpublished versions, registered compositions, or obvious precursors connected to the people I'd remembered from my first life.

The timeline had already shifted enough that blindly trusting memory would've been stupid.

Future knowledge told me what might work.

Research told me what I could safely use.

Once the masters were finished, the next stage became considerably less glamorous: Distribution Hell. CDs were dying, thanks to the uprising of the digital market. So, I had to take some careful steps. 

I created a TuneCore account and immediately discovered that releasing music involved far more administrative work than most listeners would ever imagine.

I uploaded the mastered audio files for all four songs, including "I'm Yours," then entered the titles, artist information, songwriter credits, publishing details, and every other piece of metadata required to keep the releases properly organized.

Then came the cover art.

For some reason, that became another project capable of destroying an entire night's sleep.

I possessed two doctoral degrees and still spent several hours staring at different fonts while wondering whether moving a title slightly toward the left somehow changed the emotional identity of a song.

Eventually, I finished everything and submitted the releases.

TuneCore's model was almost suspiciously perfect for what I wanted.

Instead of signing with a record label and surrendering a massive portion of ownership and revenue in exchange for distribution, I paid a relatively small flat annual fee for each release. TuneCore handled the technical formatting and delivery to digital stores while the royalties they received on my behalf remained mine after the retailer took its normal share.

That difference mattered enormously.

Control had been the reason I rejected NASA, and it was also the reason I wasn't about to hand most of my music income to a label simply because somebody in an expensive office knew how to place tracks onto iTunes.

And in 2007, iTunes was the target that mattered most.

Apple dominated the legitimate digital music market, so I wanted every purchase link active before I pushed the songs aggressively.

Unfortunately, distribution required patience.

It took roughly two weeks before everything finished processing and appeared properly on the iTunes Store.

Those two weeks felt considerably longer than they actually were.

I resisted the temptation to upload the new songs everywhere immediately because doing so would've wasted the first wave of attention. If somebody heard one of the tracks, loved it, searched for it, and couldn't buy it, that interest might disappear before the purchase link ever existed.

So I waited.

The moment every iTunes page went live, I moved.

MySpace became the center of the first promotional push.

I uploaded the new tracks, redesigned portions of my music page, added direct iTunes links, posted announcements, responded to messages, connected with music communities, and made sure anyone arriving because of "I'm Yours" immediately saw the other three songs.

Then I pushed them through YouTube, forums, personal pages, early music blogs, and every online community that looked remotely useful.

I didn't spam blindly.

I targeted people who were already discussing acoustic pop, electronic music, alternative tracks, singer-songwriters, and new independent artists.

The first day looked promising.

The second became strange.

By the third day, something had clearly changed.

MySpace plays started climbing faster than I could comfortably track them. YouTube comments appeared constantly, people reposted songs across their own pages, and the iTunes links began circulating without any involvement from me.

"Fireflies" spread particularly fast through younger online audiences. Its electronic sound stood out enough that people kept sending it around simply because it didn't resemble everything else they were hearing.

"Just the Way You Are" quickly reached a new audience. Couples shared it, guys sent it to their girlfriends, and girls posted parts of the song on their profiles.

Then "Somebody That I Used to Know" began attracting listeners who kept describing it as strange, emotional, addictive, uncomfortable, or some combination of all four.

The funniest part was what happened to "I'm Yours."

The attention around the three new songs sent thousands of listeners backward toward my first upload. Suddenly the song that had been growing gradually started climbing alongside everything else.

I sat at the computer staring at the numbers until my brain finally accepted what was happening.

"Oh, holy fucking shit."

I jumped out of the chair.

Then I made one complete lap around the living room.

Then another followed immediately.

At some point, I threw both arms into the air, shouted something that didn't qualify as any recognized language, dropped onto the carpet, and rolled onto my back while laughing at the ceiling.

If somebody had walked inside during those thirty seconds, my reputation as a calm scientific prodigy would've suffered permanent damage.

Eventually, I sat up, fixed my shirt, returned to the desk, and attempted to behave like a mature professional adult again.

That lasted until I opened my inbox.

Messages were flooding in.

A&R representatives wanted meetings. Producers wanted phone calls. Publishers wanted conversations about songwriting. Managers wanted to represent me. Labels wanted to discuss contracts, development deals, album plans, and whatever other language people used when they smelled money.

Dropping three songs that were rapidly becoming hits during the same week had done exactly what I'd hoped.

It made ignoring me difficult.

I didn't answer the labels.

There were more important things to handle first.

I immediately registered myself with a Performing Rights Organization and made sure the songwriting side of everything was properly documented.

Then I created a publishing LLC under my control.

I created this music all on my own. I wrote the songs, arranged them, recorded them, and produced them without any help. This means no one else has any claims to the music or shares in the ownership. I own all the rights.

Once that structure was being handled properly, I finally turned my attention toward the people filling my inbox.

That created a new problem.

Lawyers.

I understood research agreements, patents, technical licensing, and academic contracts reasonably well. Entertainment contracts operated inside an entirely different ecosystem, and being intelligent enough to recognize my ignorance seemed considerably wiser than pretending expertise I didn't possess. Yeah, I had past life experience but not at this level. 

So I called Mom.

She sounded far too pleased that I needed help.

"I thought you were proving you could survive without us."

"I'm proving I can survive without Dad's money," I replied while pacing around the apartment with the phone against my ear. "Nobody said I had to intentionally become stupid."

Her laugh came through immediately. "I'll make some calls."

Her connections got me access to a top-tier entertainment lawyer based in Los Angeles.

I paid him with my own money.

That detail mattered to me more than it probably should've.

Using Mom's connections was one thing. Making her finance the entire operation would've crossed the line I'd established for myself when I left home.

The lawyer reviewed the emails, explained several things I'd overlooked, and quickly became the barrier between me and every label trying to reach me directly.

People at his level often worked on percentage-based arrangements instead of ordinary hourly billing, which meant his financial incentive was aligned with mine. If I made more, he made more.

Five percent is costly. However, it is much better than losing ownership because I signed something foolish.

I forwarded the incoming A&R messages to him.

His response to the labels was beautifully simple.

'Karl Peterson was currently evaluating his options and would begin taking meetings the following week.'

That one sentence changed the tone immediately because nobody knew how many companies were contacting me, what offers I had, or if another company had already promised me better terms.

Most importantly, everybody now knew I had professional representation and couldn't be pressured into signing some standard newcomer contract simply because I didn't understand what half the clauses meant.

The emails and calls became more frequent.

And the numbers started rising.

For once, I wasn't standing outside powerful institutions hoping they'd give me an opportunity.

They were competing for access to me.

[Fourth Week]

By the end of the fourth week, the adrenaline finally stopped carrying me.

I walked into my bedroom sometime after midnight, dropped my phone onto the nightstand, and practically fell across the bed.

Even with the System's physical upgrade, exhaustion had caught up with me.

I'd spent weeks recording, editing, mixing, researching, promoting, registering songs, creating a publishing company, dealing with paperwork, talking to lawyers, monitoring sales, answering messages, and sleeping far less than any sane person should.

Excitement had kept everything moving longer than it should've.

Now, my body wanted rest. The music was getting popular. Money was starting to come in. Record labels were competing for my attention. My lawyer was managing the negotiations. For the first time in almost a month, I didn’t have anything urgent to deal with before sunrise. I won't be checking the numbers tonight. Maybe tomorrow... 

I pulled the blanket over myself and buried my face into the pillow. 

"Thank you... all the artists from my past world for creating such wonderful music... I should invite Penny out to a nice dinner tomorrow."