Following the release of "Love Me Land" last July, I am happy to announce that my new project — "Future Starts Now" — is now available! It carries some of the characteristics from the last year's release — I have again included only a song per artist, have gone for a more upbeat vibe, and it is even less commercial than my previous playlists. It includes 66 songs which is 6 more than last year's, and it is my biggest summer playlist since 2014's "#CantLetGo" which was re-released at the end of 2021.
Despite the playlist containing 66 songs, there are 84 artists. This is the most I have included in the last few years. 41 of them have not been seen in any of my previous projects. There are songs from 10 music genres, including Pop, Dance, Alternative, and Electronic. 31 of the songs were released in 2021 and 35 — in 2022.
Artwork
The artwork is, for a second time for this project, a collaboration with my favourite designer George Stefanoff (Efoff Designs). While having a completely different overall look and feel, we also wanted the cover to have some resemblance to the artwork for "Equally Lost" which was released in 2020.
"Equally Lost" was released during the Covid pandemic which coincided with an already very miserable for me year. The artwork, I believe, illustrated very well the hopelessness I was feeling back. Nowadays, things look different and I am more optimistic about where I am and what awaits me. The "Future Starts Now" cover embodies the idea of taking your life into your own hands and confidently making the decisions needed so to achieve this and start a new chapter.
As I have said many times before, this series of music projects sort of "tells the story of my life". In that respect, I try to show how I feel at a certain time both through the artworks and the songs included in each of the releases.
Couchbase Introduces New Developer Experience for Capella
Couchbase released the all-new Capella. It is the project I have been working on for the past few months. Capella is Couchbase’s database-as-a-service (DBaaS) offering and is expected to become the company's flagship product.
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University
August 29, 2022
Going back to University for an in-person graduation
On July 28, a year after I graduated from the University of Sheffield as a software engineer, I went back to celebrate my achievement in-person. I met many of the students I used to go to university with and also collected my Mappin Medal award.
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Music
August 29, 2022
Taylor Swift announces "Midnights"
At the 2022 MTV Video Music Awards, Taylor Swift announced her tenth studio album — Midnights — is to be released on October 21. At the ceremony, she was awarded three awards, including "Video of the Year" for "All Too Well" (Taylor's Version).
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Personal
August 20, 2022
The road to Couchbase
In July 2022, I moved to Manchester, UK, to join Couchbase as a Software Engineer. I was thrilled to end up in the front-end team which would allow me to gain professional experience in a field I have shown continuous interest since a child.
