Paying Blake [BTBAM] for drums on our PROG ALBUM

Between the Drummer and Me:

Hi, I'm Connor, I'm 33 years old, and I've been writing a progressive metal record for years. Last month, Blake Richardson from Between the Buried and Me recorded all 70 minutes of drum parts for it. Our band, Sun Keeper, has made payments to Blake since February. (The photo below is from March, outside a BTBAM show in London.) Blake finished the drums in May and sent the drums to Jamie King, who is mixing/mastering this record.

Explosive Growth:

But a lot of musicians are involved now. Like, 30+ people. Many are volunteering their time and talent, but others like Blake need to be paid and our project is growing so fast! We want to pay everyone who needs money for their involvement but we're struggling to from our own out-of-pocket, personal funds. There's a whole list below, but one example is Moat Lowe, the bass guitarist for Slice the Cake and his prog metal band, Novena (of which Ross Jennings from Haken is the singer.) We're honored that Moat is re-writing and recording our bass guitar parts, and we've made 50% of his payments, so far.

Help us keep up:

Now, due to this surge of interest, there are more people to pay than we can pay with the funds we had personally saved up. Blake from BTBAM deserves full pay for his work first, so we are striving to finish paying him before his Parallax II Tour with Between the Buried and Me. That starts June 16th. With all the other payments we've made, though, we need the community's help to finish paying Blake ASAP!

So we can keep working with:

I mentioned a long list of collaborators from the prog metal community. Want to see who we're in talks with so far and trying to raise funds to be able to hire (or in some cases have already)? (Disclaimer: We cannot *guarantee* that anyone's contributions will arrive on the final record, but everyone listed below is someone who we are in talks with about their contribution. Will update you immediately about any changes, below.)

Here's our list of to-be-paid interested artists thus far:

Many of us aren't quite as known, yet, but have tons of talent if indeed there will be parts calling our names to record them in the next months (it's a long story):

So, Let's pay Blake before the BTBAM Tour starts:

Let's work together to at least get Blake Richardson from Between the Buried and Me paid in full before he goes on tour on June 16th, 2023! We only have USD 2,000 (GBP 1,590.85) remaining, so let's chip in and get him paid!

And once we do (stretch goals):

You can rest assured:

All funds gathered from this fundraiser will be paid to the artists mentioned here, GoFundMe protects your donation for up to 1 year. Our project's estimated launch date is late winter / early spring of 2024. As a final note of confidence, Jalen Roark, founder of the All Things Between the Buried and Me fan group, is part of our project (as a vocalist, lyricist and advisor), and if I or anyone involved were trying to head the direction of fraud or misusing our community's hard-earned money, he would have already found out and black-listed us from the community through his admin/mod connections, and he still has the power to do that at any time, even beyond the 1-year guarantee that GoFundMe can offer you for your generous donation.

So, Let's Go!

Help us get Blake paid in full for his incredible drumming on our new project's 70-minute-long debut prog metal album — before he goes on his Parallax II Tour with Between the Buried and Me! Sharing is just as important as donating. Let's do this!

With love, and many, many riffs coming your way,

Connor Louiselle

Sun Keeper