Attention all contestants and other interested parties: final week until the VAC15 deadline! Hoping to see a lot more of your beautiful submissions come in, give us judges a run for our money!

Your favorite horned bog roll is back again with a new VA contest! #VAC15 is a Halloween themed, every VA for themselves affair, with cash prizes and of course Newgrounds fame to be won. Read about it here.

Show us what you gots, peeps.

For the past 12 years, this little spot served as my home studio:

I recorded drums, guitars, bass, pianos, sound effects and a whole slew of different vocals in here, both for music as well as for voice acting. And not half an hour ago, I finished work on the final project this particular set-up will ever produce. It was, as you can tell, in the middle of the living room, which caused more trouble than it was worth, and I'm glad to get rid of it. Even more so as we bought a new house, that's big enough for me to have my own room to put all this stuff in, and further improve on the audio quality!

It'll be a while before I'll have everything rebuilt though - my wife apparently doesn't think this is a high priority, go figure - so for the foreseeable future I won't be recording or producing anything. But I'll be sure to stick around and occupy my NG time with other activities. I'd say it's about time for another VA competition, for example...

Please stand by. Do not adjust your set. We'll be back.

<3 <3

After having spent over a decade trying to find musicians I could connect with over making the music I want to write, I've finally found a stable line-up and we'll be working on writing and perform a bunch of new material as soon as possible.

If you like music from bands like Helmet, Deftones, Whores, Rollins Band, and Wrong, please follow HORK to stay tuned for new tunes.

Here's a demo version of one of the songs that's gonna be in our first set:

Hope to see you at one of our shows, somehow, some day!

Cheers,

D

Haven't felt myself lately, or rather had enough of the parts of myself that have been getting in my way more and more. And as these things go, these feelings turned into a song before I knew it. Produce in its entirety over the span of about 11 days, here's what feels like it could be a turning point in life.

Enjoy

And so NYE rolls by again. Not the most productive year in terms of Newgrounds contributions, I must admit. Over the past years I've seen people at least a decade younger than me complaining how they were getting too old for this community, but on that I have to disagree - NG offers an incredibly broad spectrum of content for children of all ages. Because that's basically it; we're all kids lost in a world run by grown-ups who are in turn kids themselves, they just started taking themselves too seriously at some point.

Last year made this painfully clear for me. As part of my career plan (I can sound like a grown-up too, under pressure), I took a training in basic coaching skills. "Coaching is two people who don't have answers, and one of them gets paid not to." It teaches you how to ask the questions that allow people to find the solutions to their problems within themselves, rather than telling them what to do. It's also based on the fact that you need to be in touch with your inner workings: you can't coach people beyond where you've already been yourself. Contrary to all the education and trainings I've already taken part in, this one wasn't about sitting in class listening to someone talk all day. It was about taking a small bit of theory and putting it into practice, and just talk, talk, talk. And because we all needed guinea pigs, this meant half the time you'd be the coach, and the other half the one being coach. I like to quip my classmates were in luck, because I have problems up the wazoo. On the flip-side, though, that meant I was equally Lucky (ha!), as I got to explore parts of myself I never got to know. Stuff that's been in my way for over three decades now.

I ended up locking myself up in my friend's apartment for the better part of week with a notepad and a pen. For the first time ever, I took the time and opportunity to start digging into what moves me. How did I end up here? What's going on inside of me that causes me to make all these choices, both the good as well as the stupid ones? What makes me, well, me? I still don't have all the answers, but a lot of pieces of the puzzle have started falling into place. There's a Dutch saying that translates to "It's not about the marbles, it's about the game." That's not how I was raised. I never brought enough marbles home. This has caused me to evolve into a 42-year-old who constantly worries about all the stuff he hasn't done yet, or hasn't done well enough - all the marbles he didn't manage to win. It took me that long to turn around and look behind me, at the huge tank standing on the dresser in the corner of the room, filled to brim with marbles of all shapes, sizes and colors. I have always considered myself lucky in the sense that fortune smiles upon me in a lot of ways, hence the moniker. I never took the opportunity to actually feel lucky, to feel blessed with all the good things I have going on. All the stuff I achieved. I did that. And I'd do well to remind myself of this more often.

If you're half my age or below and have made it this far into reading: congratulations, you have an admirable attention span, which seems to grow rarer and rarer as I grow older. And if you sometimes worry about whether you're doing yourself justice, whether you're doing the right this or doing it right, well, it won't get better or easier. At least, not by itself. You're going to have to put in some effort - but you don't have to do it alone. Find yourself someone who can ask you the questions that need to be asked, and answer them truthfully. If the questions are right, you might be amazed at the answers that present themselves.

You're never too old for anything. Not for this community, and especially not to learn. The last tattoo I got was of a tree - use your imagination, I drew it myself:

The same friend whose couch I crashed on once told me there's a Chinese proverb that translates to "The best moment to plant a tree is thirty years ago - the second best moment is now."

Plant that tree.

Thread new grounds.

Happy new year <3

I got interviewed by @Aalasteir for the @OffTheWallShow <3

Turns out I say 'uh' a lot when I do unscripted talks ><

Talking about @Hyptosis, @NickSenny, @VoicesByCorey, @JoshDytonVO, voice acting, music and trying to be a good person.

I was a little apprehensive about this at first, but Aalasteir turns out to be a really nice guy to talk to, and once I got going it was just very easy. Loved doing this, thanks for the opportunity everyone!

Enjoy my sexy voice (@CryNN's words, not mine) right here:

Last weekend I was reminded of how the LuckyDeeIndustries brand got started, well over a decade ago by now. My drive was to create a platform to expose the world at large to good music - or what I felt was good music anyway. Whether it was by my own creation or by that of others, I didn't really care. Of course I had plenty of plans, but as I am wont to do, too few of these plans were actually followed up on. Or, in some cases, they actually were, but the world appeared to be conspiring against me in seeing them come to fruition.

One of the songs that truly inspired me growing up was called 'Awake', by a band called Larve. Back when, some 25 years ago now, our national MTV copycat TMF would broadcast their show Wet & Wild one or two times a week, on weekdays at a time my parents expected me to be in bed. And with me being the obedient kid I was, I would tape the show on VHS and watch it the next day. I got my first taste of some incredible bands and songs thanks to that show, with special mention to Strife's 'Blistered', which we ended up playing a cover of with my previous band. Back then I never figured I'd be able to play that song, but hey, we fucking did it! God damn playing that drum fill halfway through the song...

Anyhow, for another fifteen years or so I kept on the look-out for that Larve song. It found its place into the soundtrack of my life, and I just needed to hear it again. Then, during one of my searches, I managed to find out the name of one of the band members, who went on to pursue a career in the creative arts. I got in touch with him, explained where I came from, and he was awesome enough to share the video with me, along with some other even lesser known material, and gave me his blessing to share this track with the world. And so I did:

Looking back, there's something inspirational in this, at least to myself. Putting in a decade and a half of effort and actually seeing it come to fruition. And still it seems I haven't learned my lesson yet. It's so easy to forget how gratifying it is to hang in there and carry your ideas on through the end. To set your goals and take concerted action to achieving them. I am now pushing 42, the Answer to Life, the Universe and Everything, and even though the answer's right there the question seems to efface itself time and time again.

So here I am, trying to remember the question. Trying not to fall asleep again while the answers are all swarming right within my grasp, if only I would have the wherewithal to wrap my fingers around them. A decade has already ceased to sound imposing, yet still I feel defeated having to wait a couple of months, weeks, days or even hours for gratification.

This makes me human, I guess, especially in today's instant world, but still... I want to stay awake. I want to remember what it is that keeps me going, whether it takes me five minutes or the rest of my life to get there. I want to make that song. I want to breathe life to that character. I want to see and feel it all. I can do this.

How about you?

In other news: I <3 @CryNN

2022 - What a ride...

Okay, technically there's still 3 weeks of 2022 left, which suddenly seem to be heavier with potential than I'd have figured a month ago, but now seems as good a time as any to look back on the past year and celebrate.

Nobody ever asks how I got my handle. Hell, only marginally more people ever ask about my avatar - which is actually based on the shadow of a roll of toilet paper, I kid ye not - but that's beside the point. I dubbed myself LuckyDee as a constant reminder of how good my life actually is. That may sound like showing off, but I actually need to remind myself of this, every single fucking day. I wasn't raised to be a happy person. In fact, it's only been since the past couple of months, at the age of 41, that I'm learning to stop identifying myself with negativity, with the things that I'm not accomplishing. It feels like being born again.

So instead, I thought I'd list the things that I did accomplish, even if it's only the stuff that happens right here, online. In a make-believe world that's populated with existing people nonetheless, where magic happens if you look at it from the right angle. The only place where magic can still exist, with so much of it dependent on the beholder's interpretation of what is happening. Am I making sense here? I hope so, but in the end it's neither here nor there.

This is not for you.

The words came at me from nowhere, even though I had this book in my hands only yesterday, for the first time in years - the page in the picture remained out of sight then. But the words have always stuck, and they ring true here. This one's for me. To remind myself of all the beautiful things I helped create in a year during which my mind was mostly elsewhere:

• Hosting an entire Voice Acting Competition - with massive help from @Pingu, @VoicesByCorey, @Bro-son and @JoshDytonVO

• Judging this year's Audio Death Match competition thanks to @LD-W

• Rolling out my own "Voice Your OC" voice acting series

• Being part of my first ever game, courtesy of @SuperJeffoMan and @Graeme

• Getting included in major animation collabs thanks to @ZaazNG and @WesMakowski

• Featuring in a bunch of cool animation shorts and episodes by virtue of getting acquainted with @Blaznthekid, @worldofandrew, @Ret-art, @BlueJayNG and @jswordanimation

• Running in the Creepypasta Collab (through @sereneFalconer), Halloween Spooktacular (@TeffyD) and Robot Day Collab (@Fersto), and actually winning in the latter two!

• Getting featured in @GrantTheHierophant's Wizardo the Wonderful series

• Landing a guest vocal spot on @ThatJohnnyGuy's Piercing Lazer album

• Competing in the Art-Inspired Music contest, meaning I finally managed to finish a piece of my own music again

• Acting in and producing for this years release of the NG VA Collab

As the year was going on, I kinda took all this for granted. Looking back, I'd say this is actually a list of accomplishments to be very, very proud of. And right now I have multiple things going on again to make sure 2023 gets off to a productive start.

This one's for me. But I hope I can manage to inspire you too, while I'm at it. Being Lucky isn't found in a big house, a fast car or your name in the headlines. Being Lucky is doing the stuff you love doing, just because you love doing it. And sometimes it's just good to remind yourself of it all, because you're likely to take a lot of it for granted.

Just as I am, you are Luckier than you realize. Hold on to that, and don't let go.

I have to take these challenges to head on

No more excuses or fragile promises

I hope now I finally understand,

My absent friend

It's the last chance to face the fears I have always known

Better that than to fear the unknown

How the years condemned