So.

[Artemus]

I sincerely apologize to be the bearer of bad news, but I will no longer be participating in the arts of music.

My eyes have been opened to the fact that there isn't much of a point to continue in an environment that I simply cannot survive inside of. Toastbeard VII has brought this fact to light.

Some may have already noticed, but my facebook, soundcloud, and skype accounts are either deleted, or no longer active. All of the other art sites will be deleted through today. Which also means my MLR account will simply no longer post. I bid you all luck, and give thanks to those who have been kind.

I also vowed never to touch a piano again, but that's gonna be difficult.

[Interrobang Pie]

You'll be back.

[Artemus]

No no. Feel free to party, I-Pie. Really. I won't crash it again.

[Icky]

I hope you'll return at some point, whatever your reasons are to leave I hope you do well. Till we meet again Artemus.

[Bagpipe Brony]

Dude, can you give us more info as to why EXACTLY you want to quit something I feel you still love doing?

[JackleApp]

You bloody idiot.
You can't quit music.
You can't.
once you play music, your heart won't let you stop.
Don't deny yourself music or arts
It's denying yourself expression
I'm not lying when I say that I think your music is beautiful
I'll fucking hate you if you stop making it
We love you here, You're a part of our community
and we'd be losing a friend and a producer if you leave
I'm fucking tearing up as I'm typing this you twat
DON'T FUCKING LEAVE
STOP.
PLEASE.
It's selfish and terrible and It's really upsetting me.
Please don't leave, Artemus.
Seriously.

[ArtAttack]

I suck at talking to people seriously, so I'm just going to agree with Jackle.
Don't stop.
Ever.
You're talented as fuck, dude.

[Interrobang Pie]

TOASTBEARD.
EPIC PIANO SECTION.
CHORDCHORDCHORDCHORD TASTIC.
COME ON MAN, IT WAS LIKE THE ONLY GOOD ENTRY IN THAT ROUND.

[Overkillius]

I KNOW INTERROBANG PIE IS AWESOME, BUT THAT IS NO REASON TO QUIT MUSIC.

[Artemus]

Dude, can you give us more info as to why EXACTLY you want to quit something I feel you still love doing?

I'll be the first to tell anypony here that I'm the super-jealous type. Extremely so. I'm so tired of putting in a lot of effort into making something good, and having it overshadowed by something else. Not that I'm pretentious enough to say that my piece is the best, I'll admit that you others are better. But therein lies the issue. Why bother putting effort into something when something exponentially better is surrounding it?

This is the fourth time I've musically tried myself to my limit only disappoint myself and everyone around me. I'm so sick and tired of being overshadowed, so I'll do something different.

Yeah, I know what all of you are saying, 'But everything you do will have someone better than you!' and my response to that is I'll keep looking then. There's something I'm good at, somewhere. I just haven't found it yet.

Jackle: Yeah, it is pretty terrible, I thought so as well. But there's just no reason to continue. You guys will be just fine, making good music.

ArtAttack: There's better in our skype chat. It's like auditioning for a part in an opera and not getting it.

I-Pie: Bull-fucking-shit. I was there to see the complaints, and the other songs.

Killius: You are the worst motivational person ever.

Plus, there's still SenatorMyth and Overkillius to make good, quality classical for all of you. And think about it this way, now you don't have to deal with my stupid opinions on how much Earth Ponies suck.

[Overkillius]

Artemus. I don't have a car. Drive me over there so I can beat you up.

[Artemus]

It's really upsetting me.

Also, I'm really not sure how many people pay attention in Skype Chat, but I made it pretty clear that this last competition was the most upsetting one ever. I even posted on facebook saying I quit, and you commented on it, Jackle. I guess you must've thought I was kidding, because I totally wasn't.

I was so upset yesterday, I'm still pretty upset.

[Bagpipe Brony]

You, what makes you think we just woke up talented and experienced? We had to work our asses off to get here and besides, no one is more jealous than I. And I'm still here and never leaving so I suggest you follow my example and just keep practicing. If all you desire is to be better than everyone you will never be happy, just strive to be equals to those you personally admire.

[Interrobang Pie]

I'll be the first to tell anypony here that I'm the super-jealous type. Extremely so. I'm so tired of putting in a lot of effort into making something good, and having it overshadowed by something else. Not that I'm pretentious enough to say that my piece is the best, I'll admit that you others are better. But therein lies the issue. Why bother putting effort into something when something exponentially better is surrounding it?

I

KNOW

EXACTLY

WHAT

YOU

FUCKING

MEAN

I-Pie: Bull-fucking-shit. I was there to see the complaints, and the other songs.

In a sea of fucking boring chill stuff, your thing stood out to me. AND THEN IT GOT REALLY EPIC. GOD FUCKING DAMMIT. I need it. I need it now.

[Artemus]

You, what makes you think we just woke up talented and experienced? We had to work our asses off to get here and besides, no one is more jealous than I. And I'm still here and never leaving so I suggest you follow my example and just keep practicing. If all you desire is to be better than everyone you will never be happy, just strive to be equals to those you personally admire.

Then I guess I'm just doomed then, aye?

You're still here, and jealous as ever? Great, good for you. I'm not you. If I was, I wouldn't be having this problem. But I am, and therefore, it needs to be addressed.

Practice? I practiced every day, for three to six hours...every day, on that piano. I promise no one practices more than I do. And look where it got me....no where.

[Makkon]

So I don't get it. I guess I need a little more information here to understand where you're coming from. Is everything going okay, bro? [edit: okay, gotcha]

If anything else, why can't it least be a hobby? Why quit altogether? No offense, bro, but quitting music is a terrible idea, one that you'll regret years down the road if not sooner.

Just like I regretted it.

So my advice is to stop this reaction-istic approach you're taking now and get a new perspective. Reconsider your options. If this is something you really want to follow through with, so be it, so long as you've found something else to fill that hole that will help you to be happy. If you haven't found anything, whatever you're going through will only get worse.

[EDIT]
sleep on it, man. Give it some time. I've gone through what you've gone through years ago, a lot of us are probably older than you. Just get a new perspective.

[JackleApp]

afkljahkfjsdfouha

FUCK.

[Artemus]

I-Pie: Bull-fucking-shit. I was there to see the complaints, and the other songs.

In a sea of fucking boring chill stuff, your thing stood out to me. AND THEN IT GOT REALLY EPIC. GOD FUCKING DAMMIT. I need it. I need it now.

Boring? I had a 13 minute piece with a good 2 minutes of 'worth hearing'. Plus, didn't you change your name to I-mpressed at one point? I can't imagine how well I 'stood out' outside of 'fucking long' for you.

Makkon: I tried. Every single competition, I just brushed my problems on MuseScore for having "String-Spam" and bad MIDI's. But there's no excuse for a professionally recorded piece of music that I spent so long trying to piece together. Sure it only took 30 minutes to record from a few takes, but I spent months trying to get that together. And it was 'okay', 'on-par', 'mildly enjoyable'. Everyone else did fucking great. Fantastic.

Jackle: My words exactly, last night. I'm pretty sure I said something in IRC, but I won't hold that to anyone (because that shit scrolls fast)

IF YOU GUYS REALLY WANTED TO TALK ABOUT IT, I'm on Skype.


But seriously, one at a fucking time.

[Artemus]

sleep on it, man. Give it some time. I've gone through what you've gone through years ago, a lot of us are probably older than you. Just get a new perspective.

True story, a lot of you are older and more experienced than I.

[Whitetail]

If you're not writing music for yourself, why bother writing music at all?

Personally I'm quite dissapointed that you're just going to give up on music period because you're not instantly popular, welcome to life - you have to put A LOT time and work into anything if you want to get noticed, get yourself out there and send your stuff in to every pony blog under the sun instead of feeling sorry for yourself.

[Artemus]

If you're not writing music for yourself, why bother writing music at all?

Personally I'm quite dissapointed that you're just going to give up on music period because you're not instantly popular, welcome to life - you have to put A LOT time and work into anything if you want to get noticed, get yourself out there and send your stuff in to every pony blog under the sun instead of feeling sorry for yourself.

See, this makes sense. But I already came to the conclusion you stated above. I don't even like the music I compose, I've said that quite a few times. I have no ability to compose what I've always wanted to, nor do I have the patience to grant the ability. Therefore, there's no point.

[Makkon]

Artemus: Don't quit now, this is the event horizon. It only gets better from here.

[Whitetail]

You're never going to get any better feeling sorry for yourself.
Practice makes perfect so get your flank in gear and just write tons of stuff.

Basically if you want to write music like you want to write, you have to write tons of music.

Toastboard is for fun, that's it
No one's entering to win
It's a popularity/who can make who laugh the most contest more then anything
If you're taking the final voting seriously you missed the entire freaking point

[Artemus]

Then I missed the point.

[Makkon]

Dude, this isn't like finding your cutiemark. You're not searching for the one thing in your life that's your calling, that you'll be doing for the rest of your life. Life is so much richer than that. If anything else, it'd be wise to have a better attitude about all this. Give it a day or two and you'll feel better.