Inktober '23 is a a musical project and currently demo album that was inspired by inktober.
background
inktober is an annual event that was created by New York illustrator Jake Parker. originally as a way to practise his own inking and drawing skills but turning into a worldwide phenominon, the idea is to draw something everyday in October. Jake started Inktober in 2009, but the first list of prompts for other artists to use that is available comes from 2016.
i'm not an artist, in the sense that i can't really draw or paint, however over the years i have attempted to do inktober a couple of times.
once in 2019 and another time in 2021, but both times i gave up at some point.
in september 2023, my friends were looking forward to starting the year's inktober. i had planned on joining them by just making digital art again as that is something i've wanted to do for a while, but i had the idea to instead write a song every day for each prompt.
just before and during october 2023, i had written down an idea for an album based off of the inktober prompts. the idea was for each 10 prompts to be its own individual song but with each part corresponding to the day's inktober prompt. while i had something in mind for prompts 1-10 and 21-30, i could not come up with a consistent narrative for prompts 11-20. what ended up happening was those prompts ended up being singles or very short instrumentals.
prompt list
inktober 2023's prompts were:
- Dream
- Spiders
- Path
- Dodge
- Map
- Golden
- Drip
- Toad
- Bounce
- Fortune
- Wander
- Spicey [sic]
- Rise
- Castle
- Dagger
- Angel
- Demon
- Saddle
- Plump
- Frost
- Chains
- Scratchy
- Celestial
- Shallow
- Dangerous
- Remove
- Beast
- Sparkle
- Massive
- Rush
- Fire
composition
since i was making a song every day, they were all made in only a few hours at most. thanfully, most of the compositions are just sections of a much larger song.
this album also features the first time since Something Familiar that i performed and added vocals.
since this album was made in just a month and i was rushing most of the process, i am considering it in its current state to just be a demo album and i plan on remaking the songs and releasing it in full at some point in the future
the album is named 'Inktober '23' just for simplicity's sake, though other album titles were thought of.
album art
the album art was drawn by me in Krita, it depicts a stick-figure lying down in a white void with the inktober prompts behind him.
an alternative piece of album art was conceived, which looked like a lock and chains blacked out, but this was ultimately not used as every person who i asked said they preferred the original album art.
release
each song, or section of a song, was released on the corresponding day of the inktober prompt. however the album was officially released to bandcamp on november 1st, 2023. the track 'The Weight of Expectations' was also released to Newgrounds on this date.
tracklist
| No. | Title | Length | Prompt(s) |
| 1 | The Spider's Journey | 16:47 | Dream, Spiders, Path, Dodge, Map, Golden, Drip, Toad, Bounce, Fortune |
| 2 | Aimless Wandering | 3:21 | Wander |
| 3 | Hot Sauce Station | 1:04 | Spicey |
| 4 | Rise in Peace | 2:52 | Rise |
| 5 | Your Castle | 4:10 | Castle |
| 6 | Cutthroat | 0:40 | Dagger |
| 7 | Two Visitors | 5:43 | Angel, Demon |
| 8 | I'm Stuck on this Saddle | 0:48 | Saddle |
| 9 | Star-Shaped Pillows | 1:03 | Plump |
| 10 | Ice Caves | 2:29 | Frost |
| 11 | The Weight of Expectations | 16:25 | Chains, Scratchy, Celestial, Shallow, Dangerous, Remove, Beast, Sparkle, Massive, Rush |
| 12 | Goodnight, Inktober | 1:53 | Fire |