Soldier's Dream by Wilfred Owen

Soldier's Dream
by Wilfred Owen

I dreamed kind Jesus fouled the big-gun gears;
And caused a permanent stoppage in all bolts;
And buckled with a smile Mausers and Colts;
And rusted every bayonet with His tears.

And there were no more bombs, of ours or Theirs,
Not even an old flint-lock, not even a pikel.
But God was vexed, and gave all power to Michael;
And when I woke he'd seen to our repairs.

Self-improvement and the Culture of Elitism

I found this article thought-provoking. Long, but worth it.

The mark of superior people, in Ortega’s sense, is that they consider themselves inferior to what they may become. Self-improvement, for all that it smacks of the self-help shelf at Barnes and Noble, is also, in this way, the rallying cry of the only kind of elite worth having.

Every day, I try to make myself better than I was the day before. Fretless bass, working out, reading, thinking, being a decent human being.

Doing anything well requires some hard work. Daily practice, usually, and a focus on the process rather than the outcome. Science has shown people don't value things that come easily to them, and that even modest effort increases perceived value.

Yet our society has evolved to venerate those who are simply gifted, rather than those who put in the work. Somewhere in the 80s, the hard work became a short montage set to a pop song.

Malcolm Gladwell's recent book "Outliers" pushes the idea that 10,000 hours of practice are required for expertise in something. That may be simple to understand, but it also underscores that it is not easy. That kind of time investment requires passion and discipline.

If my previous post was about not taking others for granted, perhaps one can see this one as saying "don't take yourself - your core self - for granted, either."

No Coasting

In the weightlifting world, there is an axiom that one is either getting stronger or getting weaker - the idea being that either you are regularly training and improving, or you are not, and you are sliding downhill. Over the years, I have refined this idea into "No Coasting".

The second law of thermodynamics tells us the universe tends towards maximum entropy over time. The only defense against this is literally putting energy (or work) into a system. I think about this a lot.

From a Facebook conversation with a struggling musician:

"Ultimately, if you are in the business of selling music, you (or someone in your "organization") have to be somewhat excited and willing to invest/work on the business part, not just the music part.

This is why many bands hire managers, agents, PR people, and the like. It's also why a lot of mediocre musicians succeed - they know they're not the best songwriters/performers/whatever, so they expend effort being the best marketers/salesmen/promoters.

You can't just sign up for TuneCore or drop CDs off somewhere and go "OK I'm done with that part!" any more than you can write your first 10 or 20 songs and say "OK, done with the songwriting part!"

You have to invest time and energy in constantly improving the business side and looking for promotional opportunities. You wouldn't coast as a creative person/artist, and you can't coast as a businessperson, either.

The artists who are most interesting keep challenging themselves by changing and improving their craft. The financially successful ones also continue to look for new business opportunities. Somehow much rock music got the idea into its head that doing that is a bad thing.

I also think about the problems of nuclear waste. In the wake of the Fukushima reactor problems, waste disposal remains a big issue. We need to think about the problem differently: Don't assume today's storage solution is tomorrow's storage solution.

Storing any kind of hazardous materials is seldom a "bury and forget" proposition. You do the best thing you can think of today, and you keep looking for a better solution and move it up as needed. It is ludicrous to assume that WIPP and Yucca Mountain are the best humanity can possibly develop over the next 10,000 years. It's just the best we have right now, and is far better than current temporary storage practices.

We must keep investing effort in the things that are important to us.

Today I have been married to my wonderful wife for 7 years. Every day I see her I feel like the luckiest man in the world. I am so fortunate to have her in my life.

It is easy to "coast" in a relationship, to stop trying to have new experiences, to stop making a bit of effort every day to make your partner's day special, to surprise them. But this is often the beginning of terminal relationship entropy.

Don't coast. If you bring your best effort and attitude to work or the projects you value most in life, why wouldn't you bring it every day to the things that really matter most? It is not a guarantee of success, but not doing this is almost certainly a guarantee of failure.

Mick Karn, fretless bass, and finding your own voice

As far as I'm concerned, there's only one bass player that really mattered in rock music: Mick Karn.

Nearly anyone who plays fretless bass cites Karn or Jaco Pastorious as the inspiration. These two people created a language and style that made every musician in every genre think about bass in a different way.

Karn was originally a bassoon player. He credits learning classical bassoon and other wind parts (he played all the wind instruments on Japan's records, too) with shaping his perspective on bass playing.

It's fairly obvious - Karn's bass lines have far more in common with symphonic wind parts than the typical "play 8th notes on the root" that passes for bass playing in most popular music. If nothing else, Mick Karn proves that being educated about different styles of music is critical to making your own music more interesting.

Mick Karn achieved something rare in music, and especially instrumental music: he created a unique, instantly identifiable voice. A recognizable sonic entity. You hear him playing on a record and it is unmistakable.

Finding, or more accurately, developing that voice is difficult but rewarding. It is part of how you stop being a mere copyist or pastiche factory and start being a true artist.

Painters spend entire careers looking for that kind of presence and signature. You know them when you see them - the painters you can identify from across the room. Franz Kline, Magritte, Rothko. I'd put Mick Karn up there with any of them.

That voice can be limiting, I suppose. If you speak with a distinctive accent, people make fun of it. And you end up being reduced somehow: "The guy who plays fretless bass THAT way". "The person who paints everything with dots". "The idiot with the sponges". But I'd rather be made fun of for being unique than blend in with everyone else any day.

I still remember first hearing the sound of fretless bass in Rock School videos and on the Japan compilation "Exorcising Ghosts" that my friend Jen DT gave me (and for which I am eternally grateful, Jen!). I thought it was beautiful and mysterious. I also understood it was very difficult to play and compared to the synthesizer, somewhat sonically limited.

I used to practice instruments a lot, striving for proficiency. But I eventually realized I was more interested in songwriting and composing than being a virtuoso (not that they are exclusive!). For many years, I said fretless bass was the only instrument I'd consider practicing on to get good.

Mick Karn's untimely passing had me listening to his work and I was inspired. I'm not getting any younger, and there's no time like the present. I recently bought a Squier Vintage Modified Jazz Bass Fretless and am teaching myself to play many of his bass parts as well as some things by The Police, Gary Numan (Mick Karn played on "Dance", and Pino Palladino played some great fretless parts on "I, Assassin"), and many of my other favorites.

Fretless bass is a wonderfully expressive instrument, like the human voice in many ways. I don't expect to approach Mick Karn's level of eloquence on it, but I hope to perhaps belch out a few phrases on an upcoming recording project.

Thank you for the music, Mick Karn.

Japan. "Visions of China"


Dali's Car. "The Judgment Is The Mirror"


Japan. "Swing"


Japan. "Gentlemen Take Polaroids"

Keep It Simple, Sell!

Helen DeWitt is a wonderful and brilliant writer. Her book "The Last Samurai" introduced me to the Japanese word "jinsai" which quickly became my nom du jeu (and is part of this blog's URL!)

This post she wrote discusses notable classical composers writing simple pieces.

"It was Beethoven who felt that the desires of the amateur -- or even of the average professional -- were not worth attending to except when he wrote an easy piece to make a little extra money."

My friend Sid Luscious would say "Beethoven is a dope. Making 'a little extra money' is the whole point! Keep It Simple, Sell!"

I'd agree with keeping it simple, but for different reasons.

For most of my artistic career, I have made a conscious effort to write simple songs: no fancy chords, no tricky rhythms, no odd time signatures, and no compositions that rely on technical virtuosity.

Some of this is motivated by a Sid Luscious-esque desire to "sell out". Because that is part of how you make pop songs that endure - keeping it simple. "Simple" songs are more frequently covered, and can be picked up by people just starting to play instruments.

Some of my pop song simplicity is motivated by my own limitations. My instrumental technical skills are modest. I have relatively short fingers for a guitar player or keyboardist, and this affects my ability to conjure some of the more elaborate chords and parts from my instruments. I compensate by using computers, either to play the difficult parts or to allow me to combine 2 simple parts or chords to create a more complex one.

But most of it is the challenge and discipline of staying simple. Simple songs are difficult to write. It is easy to keep a listener from being bored if you are constantly surprising them with new parts and tricky rhythms. It is more difficult to write a short melody that is both instantly memorable and holds up to repeated listening. 

For my instrumental/electronic/ambient work, simplicity goes by the wayside, or is at least less overt. Instrumental music by definition has no vocals, and this allows people to listen to the music differently and deeper. This in turn requires instrumental composition to be more rigorous, layered, and tricky.

The Analog vs. Digital Distraction

Many musicians and listeners assume analog recording (tape) and reproduction (vinyl or tape) is better.

They claim it is "warmer", "more accurate", or that digital is inferior because it "slices sound into tiny pieces".

Mostly this is the music fan's version of wishing for the mythical good old days.

Analog is not better. It's worse, or at best, it's different than digital.

Those who actually lived and worked in the analog days, have a less-romanticized, more realistic perspective on this issue.

Analog wasn't that great. It was limited, it was noisy, it distorted, and it was expensive to use and maintain.

Noise sucks. Noise isn't a "sense of reality", as one blogger claimed. Noise is unwanted signal. As for "the ear-pleasing nature of analog distortion":

• Not all analog distortion is the same
• Not all analog distortion is"ear-pleasing"
• You may not want distortion

The "new type of silence" noted above has been available in music since all-digital recording and gating of channels on mixers were available. Certainly from the late 80s, and arguably earlier.

The original poster argued that people are more tolerant of "noise" in music now. I disagree. People used to tolerate a ridiculous amount of surface noise on recordings. They had to, because listening through it was the only way to get to the music underneath. (Though I suspect the poster was referring to what he considers "noisy music", which is basically music with slightly more abrasive timbre)

In the last few decades, recording technology has removed surface noise and improved quality of reproduction. This means artists can now work with noise and more subtle sound treatments and have it heard.

Just as the first recordings favored loud voices and instruments, the newer, quieter, clearer technologies allow for softer voices and using sounds that would have been previously hidden behind tape hiss or vinyl surface noise. In fact, entire electronic pop styles have evolved out of using timbres that sound just like tape hiss or vinyl surface noise!

The relentless march of instrument technology has also put "noise tools" in the hands of composers in ways that allow them to precisely shape and sculpt any sound. The artists working in so-called "noise" genres are still addressing a niche audience, comprised largely of people looking for something different. The people listening to this music have always been more tolerant of non-traditional timbres.

Reasons people think "analog sounds so good":

• They don't have it. You always want what you don't have. 20 years ago everyone wanted to ditch their 1/2" 8-track Otaris for ADATs and DA-88s, because the 8-track analog machines distorted and were too noisy!
• People like what's familiar. Most of the "great records" people are familiar with were made on analog gear using old-fashioned methods. Digital recording and instruments allows for a whole different kind of music to be made, and neither the artists nor the listeners have a grip on it yet.
• Mythology and a grain of truth. Early CDs and digital recordings did sound relatively less awesome when compared to top-quality analog recordings. But in the 21st century, the quality of analog/digital/analog converters is quite high even at low prices. The myth persists, however.

I can't think of an "analog" recording that wouldn't be just as good digital, or vice versa - when the tools are properly used. These days, digital sounds great - if you know what you're doing. Same with analog. You can make "clean" or "dirty" recordings with both technologies.

My issues with analog are that it's very expensive, power-hungry, and challenging to maintain. In other words, it's elitist - and that may explain why it is so popular amongst some musicians.

At least in my case, the problem with my music isn't that it's being recorded (or created) digitally instead of analog. I can best improve my music by improving the quality of what I'm creating, not how I'm creating it.

In the end, people listen to music, not recordings.

Interview in the Berklee Music Business Journal

The Berklee College Music Business Journal did a short interview with me about the digital music business and MOG.

[This interview was transcribed by Berklee from a phone conversation and as a result contains some typos.]

I have been rather busy lately working on several new projects, including learning to play fretless bass. I will try to post more frequently.

Thanks for reading!

Interview with Jon Appleton [updated]

Jon Appleton taught me nearly everything important I know about music and composing. Here's a wonderful interview he just posted on YouTube. Enjoy his creativity and warmth!



I feel incredibly fortunate to have learned from him and remain grateful for the opportunities he provided, the wisdom he imparted, and the challenges he set before me.

His pedagogical style, what he taught, and why he taught were main drivers for my own educational efforts at the Duke University Talent Identification Program and related projects.

[Updated to include the latest version of the video. Thanks, Ray!]

The Ghost Town: Status and Preview

The album is being mastered by the incredibly talented Michael Hateley of Lotus Mastering, who has mastered such illustrious bands as Green Day, Built To Spill, Mastodon, Slayer, Neil Young, The White Stripes, Tegan And Sara, Josh Groban, Circle Jerks, Rise Against!, Linkin Park, and Sid Luscious and The Pants.

The artwork is being created by the amazing James Carrière, who has done the artwork for 2009's "Overcast" and the yet-to-be-released 2010 "Reflection". ["Reflection" is taking a long time because the book design is both complex and spectacular.]

The book is being designed by the lovely and award-winning Iran Narges, who has been a favorite collaborator for a decade.

I expect to have a listening/release party in a month or two.

For the time being, you can listen to these low bit rate, unmastered MP3s.

Jinsai's player:

RPM 2011: The Finish Line

Day 28 - 7 Songs, 37 minutes


It's done. RPM 2011: "The Ghost Town".

1. The Empty Sky
2. For the Love of Mary Lee
3. Tumbleweed
4. Interstate Wasteland
5. The Ghost Town
6. What The Wire Said
7. The Crossing

Total running time: 35:56

That's not the cover image, that's a picture of my cowboy boots, used for my "method recording" technique.

CD mailed off to RPM Challenge today at lunch. As per usual, there will likely be some minor tweaks to mixes and mastering, but the record is, for all intents and purposes, done.

I will have an "official" release once I have cover art.

My 2010 album "Reflection" will also be officially released soon, as the cover art for that is taking a bit longer than planned - but it is so totally worth the wait!

RPM 2011: Week 4

Day 21 - 6 songs, 32 minutes
Great to have a holiday. Slow start with houseguests, but I did get to work at last. Worked on finishing up tracks that were close, and started the heavy work on "The Empty Sky".

After the gym I made final tweaks. "The Crossing", "The Ghost Town", "Tumbleweed", and "For the Love of Mary Lee" are all in the can. That leaves "The Empty Sky" and "What The Wire Said".

"Empty Sky" needs some major work. I really like it (even if no one else did!) but I have to polish it up, and that means throwing out nearly all the recorded tracks. I got pretty far on it today.

"What The Wire Said" needs vocals and a bit of structural tightening. I can probably get that done tomorrow.

Then I just have to write one more track before Sunday ends...

Day 23 - 6 songs, 32 minutes
I fly to New York for work. I listen to the existing mixes and make a few notes. Can't do anything else, between working and flying I have barely any time to think

Day 24 - 6 songs, 32 minutes
I fly back from New York, the return trip taking almost double the time the outbound leg did. I get home after midnight, my body tired and on the verge of being sick.

Day 25 - 6 songs, 32 minutes
I spend the day working at home, and the evening doing some touch-ups on the existing mixes.

Day 26 - 6 songs, 32 minutes
I spent the morning working on "What The Wire Said", redoing the vocals, adding effects and a few percussion parts, and editing and tightening.

I spend the afternoon struggling with a new track, which will be called "Interstate Wasteland". I sketch out a bit, laying down a beat, some chords, and writing far too many lyrics.

Day 27 - 7 Songs, 37 minutes
After my usual slow Sunday, I went down to the studio and started working on "Interstate Wasteland". I quickly edited the lyrics down to just 3 verses and changed the chord progression to allow for a nicer melody. I had to do a bunch of vocal experiments before I got a take I liked.

I had a few brief flashes of panic - was this totally awful? - but I powered through, adding some nice guitar parts and a few simple production touches.

I reached a point where I couldn't think of anything else to do - I was noodling on guitar, noodling on keyboards. Clearly the song was finished. Well, maybe after some backing vocals.

Touched up the mixes for "Empty Sky" and "Tumbleweed" and went to the gym for a quick workout and to listen.

Sounds pretty good. Some final touches, and "Interstate Wasteland" is probably finished. I render out WAVs, install WaveLab 7 demo, and build a potential master CD.

Tomorrow, final touches and mailing off!

RPM 2011: Week 3

Day 14 - 4 songs, 23 minutes
Today was Valentine's Day. My lovely wife is far more important than my RPM Project. I spent my free time with her.

Day 15 - 5 songs, 27 minutes
Tonight I quickly assembled the foundation of a new song - "Tumbleweed". Clip-clop trip-hop at its finest. Needs vocals and a bunch of other fixes. But the basics are there. Have a rough melody in place. As always, wondering if the melody is any good.

Day 16 - 5 songs, 27 minutes
Extended "Tumbleweed" out to nearly final length, though it's still missing a few important sections. I laid down some vocals with rough lyrics and put a few harmonies down. Sounding pretty good. Sort of like Cowboy Shriekback rolling through Las Vegas in Massive Attack's muscle car.

I need to re-do the guitars, finish the lyrics, and maybe write a bridge and riff.

Looking like this record might have fewer songs than previous ones, but they'll likely be longer songs. That's not so bad. "Meddle" by Pink Floyd is that way.

Day 17 - 5 songs, 27 minutes
Stayed up late working on "Tumbleweed". Got Tumbleweed to correct length, including adding a longer 2nd verse and some other adjustments. I finished writing the words but it was too late to lay them down.

Day 18 - 5 songs, 28 minutes
Today I laid in more vocals for "Tumbleweed", adjusted the mix, and added a Spanish-sounding guitar solo to the bridge, and some more twang to the outro. Fixed some problems with the bass, too. It's not bad. Sounds very clip-clop trip-hop!

Day 19 - 6 songs, 31 minutes
First day of a three-day weekend, and a lot to do, as this is the penultimate weekend and I have to travel next week.

I had a bunch of clean-up to do on some of the other songs, but I wanted to get some new things down first - clean-up is good to save for short bursts and/or when you aren't feeling too inspired.

Sometimes creativity and songs just do what they want to do. I had intended to work on a faster new song, but "For the Love of Mary Lee" just wouldn't leave me alone. I spent the morning working up some flamenco-style rhythms, studying Spanish guitar YouTube videos, and by mid-day had started to pull together a nice 6/8 feel for the track, complete with handclaps.

When the Muse pulls you in a particular direction, it's best just to follow - the guitar parts came effortlessly (well, the writing - I am still a terrible acoustic player) and sounded very nice.

Melody was going to be a bit of a problem, as my original draft of "Mary Lee" was in a different key and major. I worked on it, wrote the lyrics, had something that would probably work overall.

My voice was pretty tired, and I'm not sure I like singing in the higher register for this one. So much of the rest of the record is in the low-voice/Johnny Cash vein, and the higher voice seems a little too "Broadway". I intended for this song to be one of those fado-ish extremely "emotional" types of songs, and I wanted it to be like "El Paso" and "The Streets of Laredo" in terms of its melody, content, etc. and those are on the pretty side as well. I just think it sounds weird right now.

Tomorrow I'll probably take a whack at vocals in the low octave. Might be too low. I dunno. Maybe I'm over-thinking it. Like the last few records, at this point I worry the latest song isn't as "good" as the other songs already completed for the project.

Day 20 - 6 songs, 32 minutes
Sometimes, when you think you've gone the wrong way creatively, the right answer is not to go back, but to go farther in the "wrong" direction.

I tried redoing the vocals in a low octave. No dice. And the chorus already sounded good. So I redid all the vocals in the original octave, and worked until I had a nice solid performance. I added some handclaps, more guitars, and added some subliminal Wall of Voodoo drum machine. I think it sounds great.

Went to the gym. Did some errands. I adjusted a couple of other mixes and then some unexpected guests showed up, which more or less ended my day a bit prematurely. Good news is I am within sight of the finish line.

Bad news is that even though I have 1 week left, none of the songs are finalized yet. There are some that are very close to done, but they all need tweaks ranging from minor (shaker down 1 dB!) to major (re-track all guitars and vocals, re-do drums).

I will finish. It will be a good record. But it's going to be a busy week and tight weekend...

Why Products Really Suck, Part 2

Your Team Is The Enemy
If you're like most product managers, you don't get to choose your team. You get whatever resources the company has available - engineers, QA, design, project management, and so on.

Sometimes you get a team of great people. Sometimes you get so much deadwood and burn-out cases you're afraid a spark may ignite the whole bunch.

You will almost certainly have fewer people than you'd like, and you may have fewer people than you need.

But regardless, they are your team. They are the ones who will be doing most of the actual work of creating the product.

Your job is to make sure they make the right product. And it's tricky, because without proper guidance and structure, your team is the enemy, and they will wreck your product.

Lights, Camera, Action
In many ways, Product Managers are like directors, and products are like films. The products have themes. The participants need to understand their motivation - why are they doing what they're doing? And the Product Manager needs to make it all happen.

If you don't direct them, your team will wander, literally and metaphorically. Good products come from teams that know exactly what they're building and why. Teams need to know what's important about their product - what makes it worth building? They need to know the most important use cases (things users will do with the app) and invest development effort there.

They need to know where the value in your product is coming from. Is designing a new kind of scroll bar a good time investment? (probably not, because it's not what's driving your product's value) How about a whizzy new database? (only if it's something your product relies on). Many teams wander because the individuals have their own agendas...because the product manager wasn't clear about what the team's agenda should be.

Imagine a bunch of actors on a set. They all have particular goals and takes on their characters. They may even have different acting styles. In good movies, the director works to blend everything together and pull it in service of a common goal. Gratuitous, unnecessary, or inappropriate elements are cut. The same should be true with products.

Focus
Once I worked on a software product intended for audio playback. The engineers had a very cool interface technology that allowed for some very ahead-of-its-time customization of the UI. We all thought it was neat, so we included it in the player. The code was solid, and it had minimal CPU impact...but it was a mistake.

The feature did not drive the core value proposition of the app, and actively distracted users and the company from the app's true value proposition. The sales guys were showing off that part of the product because it was visual and different. People got excited and wanted enhancements. But improving that part of the product didn't help the business. It was a huge distraction.

If you let your team drive the product, you may get a bunch of cool features and designs, but they won't cohere, and they may not drive your core value proposition.

Democracy Is Bad
On a movie set, the director makes all the decisions. Right or wrong. In most of the successful rock bands, one person makes the final decisions. Same is true of the best product teams. And that person is the product manager. YOU are responsible for whether or not it's any good.

Product management is not a democracy. Many people have opinions and perspectives, but only one person has responsibility. Some refer to the Product Manager as the "one neck to wring". The trade-off for that liability is "final cut" or final approval. Use it.

If you don't, you are not likely to end up with a great product - one that has a vision, a theme, and some bold direction. You'll get oatmeal. A bunch of things that are OK. Or you might get a bunch of stuff in a box which sort of works.

I believe the best design visions, the best products, the best art all come from single perspectives. They can be made richer via other input and may require other people to execute, but there should only be one "designer".

Don't Be A Dictator
That is not to say you should be dictatorial. You should strive to build a harmonious team. And you must listen to everyone with great care, and take their comments and concerns seriously. Build consensus where possible.

The key words are "where possible." Despite best efforts, you are going to reach a point where your team disagrees. There are many ways to drive consensus ("Fist of Five" being a good one). Don't be afraid to make a call. Just make sure you have reasons for doing it, and make sure the team understands.

Alienating your team is a fast-track to failure. You cannot succeed without them.

Fires
Most of the time, you work with grown-ups. Even if they aren't in love with the project or your decisions, they will bring their "A-game" (or at least their B-game) every day and get stuff done. But sometimes you get stuck with a bad apple.

This can be the person who simply doesn't pull their weight. It can be someone who undermines the team explicitly, by being a jerk to the team, being overly negative about the project, or who constantly argues with you about direction. This can also be someone who is talking to people in the company above you without your knowledge.

These are small fires. If you don't put them out, they can grow quickly and result in product wreckage. It might be cancellation, reduced buy-in, or just demoralization.

The first and best approach is to find out what's bothering the team member and see if you can mollify them.

But do not be afraid to request their removal from the team. Often it's best just to get them out of the picture.

Feedback
Provide lots of low-latency feedback to your team. In other words, talk to them a lot, and talk to them as the project is in motion.

Important things to do:

• Talk to all team members every work day. Not just to pester them about "are you done yet?", but ask what obstacles they're encountering. What can you do to help them succeed?
• Know your team. If you want to understand your team, get to know them. Maybe your developer is slow this week because he's having personal problems.
• Eat lunch together. Buy your team lunch every now and then. Even if the company won't expense it, you can get everyone a sandwich somewhere for not that much money. It's hard to be a jerk to someone you had a sandwich with yesterday, and everyone likes the surprise of a literal free lunch. Plus it fosters communication. And I don't mean "bring in a pizza and keep working." I mean get OUT of the office, go sit down somewhere, and relax.
• Regular reviews. Periodically review the accomplishments. Praise hard work. Look for things causing problems. This is most important early in the project and at the conclusion of the project.

This stuff may seem overly basic, but I am always surprised at how often people don't do one or more.

Up next: YOU are the reason.