Crowdfunding Soul of the World Album

THE CALL

Donate here: https://givealittle.co.nz/cause/souloftheworldalbum

I am putting forth a call out into the world to gather the funds to record my first studio album and have it be released by the start of 2025, if not before. I was going to do this back in America, but a beautiful moment of happenstance arose recently and everything is aligning to record it here, in New Zealand, just a short drive from Highden Temple, in a place called Creative Sounds Society or The Stomach (info below).

For me, this album is A BALLAD ABOUT SOUL INITIATION, soul landing—mine, yours, the Earth's, the invisible reality we know is waiting in the cracks. It is an invocation of the inner worlds, a singular remembrance of the soul, lost rites of passage, the liminal space between dying myths and ones about to be born. It is an album of hope toward where we're heading, but also one to signal the end of our current civilization.

I have been writing music for a long time. I have always known that this music, these myths and songs, are not mine. Frankly, I have been kind of lazy and scared to stand behind my music more. Sometimes I want to disappear when I play music and not have to look people in the eyes. I have also known for a long time that this music needs to get out there, particularly for the times we're living in—ones of UNCHARTED TERRITORY, CRISIS, REVELATION, and irrevocable change.

These songs do not belong to me, yet I am the individual writing them and creating them. This has always been my tension point—between my longing to disappear in the songs and be the nobody creating them, and simply owning the fact that I am an individual someone who is crafting these songs, channeling them through, bringing them into manifestation.

And now I want to bring that MANIFESTATION ALL THE WAY THROUGH into a professional, studio album and have these living myths get out there. I want this music to be available to as many people as possible. I want this album out there by the start of 2025.

So I'm calling in the funds for a top-notch album with 10 tracks. 

This means: recording studio, live musicians, demos and rehearsal time, sound engineering, mixing and mastering, artistry for the album cover and booklet.

If I raise less than the $10,000 goal (figure roughly $1000/per track), I'll move forward anyway with what I have.

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SOUL OF THE WORLD: The Album

Donate here: https://givealittle.co.nz/cause/souloftheworldalbum

This will be a full 10 track album including the title track, Soul of the World. 

The songs are ready to go, written, polished. They are an array of tunes that have come through me over the last several years in various times of my own crisis, creativity, dreaming and longing. There are a couple of new songs working through me at the moment, so perhaps those will decide to be on there.

When I tune into these songs, they feel like rites of passage in their own way, to cut through and reach into one's heart and soul to direct us to a deeper communion with the soul. Let them be played for fun, for grief, for crisis, for ecstasy. I long for Soul of the World to be shared far and wide. It's just something that already IS anyway!

For me, personally, when I connect to these songs, this is not a love and light spiritual album; it is an album about destruction. It is where music and vibration midwife us more deeply into our next corridor of the unknown, into the next passageway of the soul's journey. It is music to make more space for the music of who we truly are, and to destroy anything that's in the way of that.

You can LISTEN to some of my rough recordings online here:

https://jonathanscottehrlich.bandcamp.com/

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COST BREAKDOWN (nzd)

To give you a sense of the cost breakdown, I'm including everything below. Every drop of donations will go solely toward the album's entire production. 

I will provide updates during each phase of production as well to keep everyone posted.

Total Goal = $10,000 (approx. $1000/per track)

Recording time estimate = 1-2 weeks

Studio: $45/hour (includes producer/engineer, all equipment, recording w/accompanying musicians, pre/post production,

1 Full Studio Day (7 hours): $315/per day

(1 day/per track - ish)

Accompanying Musician: $200/per day

(i.e. drummer, bass, extra guitar, string, etc.)

5 hours of post-production/per track, including mastering: $225

Studio time for practice/rehearsal

Album art, cover, booklet

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CREATIVE SOUNDS SOCIETY / THE STOMACH 

https://www.creativesounds.org.nz/recording

https://nzmusician.co.nz/features/25-years-of-musical-gestation-in-palmy/