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#1649: Fangs & Arbi Close Out Raindance with a Breathtaking Music and VJ Show at the Moon Pool

August 17, 2025by kentbye

I spoke with TrainingFangs & TehArbitter about Raindance Immersive Closing Night music and VR performance (now available as a replayable event in the Moon Pool VRChat World) as a part of my Raindance Immersive 2025 coverage. (Photo by Kaerun). See more context in the rough transcript below.

Here’s a recap of my Raindance Immersive 2025 & VRChat coverage:

This is a listener-supported podcast through the Voices of VR Patreon.

Music: Fatality

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Rough Transcript

[00:00:05.458] Kent Bye: The Voices of VR podcast. Hello, my name is Kent Bye, and welcome to the Voices of VR podcast. It's a podcast that looks at the structures and forms of immersive storytelling in the future of spatial computing. You can support the podcast at patreon.com slash voicesofvr. So this is my final episode of my Raindance Immersive 2025 coverage, and I'm featuring the closing night party of Raindance Immersive, which feels like very appropriate to close out my coverage with this closing night party. And so Training Fangs is one of the curators of the live music performances of Rain Dance Immersive, but also within her own right as a musician and has done different performances within the context of VRChat. But she wanted to collaborate with the Arbiter, also known as Arby, on the Night Under Lights Moon Pool, which I covered last year. The Four Seasons experience, just a really amazing experience. experience starting to use this shader program by apple blossom that allows you to input a video and then the video is split in half and so from each side of the video then there's like a translation that happens from the video input that then gets translated into this whole spatial experience and so you're able to basically manipulate all these different voxel pixels to create this kind of particle effect vj but being able to have that as a live performance with like thousands of these different boxes and voxels and pixels. And then on top of each of these pixels, there's actually light that's illuminating. And so it's actually illuminating the pool around you and then also all the avatars. And it's just a really beautiful, beautiful space. And some of my favorite performances have happened in this space. The Four Seasons is amazing and brilliant. You can also go into this world, I have a link in the show notes, and you can also watch the the performance of things and RB, we can do an replayable. So highly, highly recommend that you actually go check this out and then you can listen to the conversation, you know, maybe come and listen to this either before or afterwards, either way, you should go check it out. Cause it's really quite stunning to see what they're doing there at the night and the lights moon pool. Um, So, we're covering all that and more on today's episode of the Voices of VR podcast. So, this interview with Fangs and Arby happened on Wednesday, July 9th, 2025, as part of my Raindance Immersive coverage. So, with that, let's go ahead and dive right in.

[00:02:22.632] TehArbitter: Hi, my name is Arby, also VRbiter. I've been in VRChat since about 2018, and I've gone through a variety of different things, but nowadays I largely like to host events of... Usually pretty ambient and down tempo sort of vibes. But I also DJ, I VJ, I love to dance. And yeah, I helped make the Moon Pool, the world that Night Under Light performs in.

[00:02:50.140] TrainingFangs: Awesome. I'll pick up from there. Yeah. Hello, Kent. Thanks for having me back. It's always a pleasure to be here. For those who don't know, I'm Fangs. My name is Mary Lee Desmond, but people in the virtual realm know me as Fangs or Training Fangs. And I'm someone who wears many, many hats, literally and figuratively. I love hats. Professionally, I work as a freelance video lead for a few different audiovisual companies here across New England, but I'm also a filmmaker, or at least aspiring filmmaker. I'm a musician and a music producer and a collaborator with many people here in the immersive art space. At Rain Dance Immersive, I co-curate specifically in the music and the live performance categories, but I also help produce the virtual festival overall. And yeah, it's a real honor to help shape those different experiences alongside such a dedicated team. I love the Rain Dance team. They all work their butt off and I'm happy to be a part of that team. But outside of that, yeah, I play in a few bands, one of them being Cynthia, who plays within and outside of VR. That's a band that I have with my sister, a synth pop duo. And now I am exploring my own solo work under the name of Fangs. So yeah.

[00:04:05.253] TehArbitter: You have to wear many hats. The pile that I've seen you balance on top of your head. Like, holy cow.

[00:04:12.795] TrainingFangs: Yeah, it's a lot, but I wouldn't do it if I didn't love it.

[00:04:16.276] Kent Bye: Great. And so whenever I talk to folks in the VR community, I always like to hear a little bit more around what kind of design disciplines or training or background they're bringing into the space. And so I'd love to hear a little bit more context for each of your backgrounds and your journey into VR.

[00:04:30.014] TehArbitter: Sure. So, I mean, outside of VR, I'm basically a professional driver. I worked for Uber, Lyft, Instacart. I currently work for Carvana. So I tend to drive most of my days. I work full time. But I got into VR just because I have always been a PC gamer for a very, very long time. and it kind of feels like a natural progression for people that like to socialize and like to play games. So I kind of just found myself in there through, I found it through Twitch originally, you know, seeing some of the OG VR chatters and avatar creators. And once I kind of found a friend group there, I started to get into DJing. I had been DJing since I'm 32 now, and I've been DJing since I was 18. I used to work for Eve Online Radio. As soon as I turned 18, I bought myself a DJ mixer and signed up and they were like, you're a little young for this. but we'll have you. And I had like the 1 to 3 a.m. slot. So I just spin whenever I wanted and had like two or 300 people listening. And I had a blast with that. And that kind of died off after a while. And VRChat very much gave me a chance to pick that back up again. I had a good group of friends that It's basically a drinking club. You know, it's like people that like to get together on weekends or Fridays or whatever and just drink and have fun and socialize. So they'd ask certain people in our crew to just spin for them. And I found that to be fun for a while. But the tough part is when you do events like that, everyone's socializing. So like you kind of just feel like a jukebox standing in the corner. And it wasn't disrespectful, but more so just fun. know people don't really interact they're not particularly listening they're kind of doing something else and i found zia zia's club reflections through i think it was twitter at the time and i was kind of fascinated at this like proper like a club event and especially reflections it's all centered around center pit where the dj and the vj and the dancer are so it was very it was a very different feeling than what i was used to and i reached out to her initially and i was like at the time i was getting into vjing i was making visuals to go along with my dj set and i'm like can i can i do visuals for one of your shows sometime and she just had me you know without hesitation she's like i'd love to you know give you a chance and she kind of gave me a couple dry runs with some djs she'd not worked with before and uh it just kind of went from there and And that's where it's been going. I kind of have tried to dive deeper into the scene. And in the last year or so, I've honestly kind of stepped away as well. It's quite overwhelming. Last year's Raindance was lovely, but oh my God, it was some of the most stressful times I've had in a while. And I was glad to take a step back, but I'm also happy to be back. You know, I'm hosting Night Under Light events again and doing stuff with thanks. Our arrangement was a little bit last minute to some extent, but it was very welcome and very fun.

[00:07:21.846] TrainingFangs: Yeah, it came together beautifully. We've been receiving a lot of positive feedback on the set, so that was really wonderful.

[00:07:30.651] TehArbitter: Yeah, I had a number of people DM me, and they were like, yeah, that was great.

[00:07:33.513] TrainingFangs: Yeah, that makes me so happy. Just teaming up with you in general was really, really great. Ellie. Yeah. For me, I started playing VRChat back in 2020. I mentioned this in a past interview, but essentially I used to have... My heels really dug into the Boston music scene. I was very active. My whole family was very active in the Boston music scene. I would perform weekly in a multitude of bands. It was something I really loved to do. And then when the pandemic hit, You know, my passion, my life, my social life, my industry basically collapsed overnight and I was kind of lost. I was really lost for a long time. I ended up losing my soundstage and my practice space. And it was a soundstage, a practice space and a studio. So not only did I practice there with my bands and play shows there with my bands, I also hosted bands there. And I shot videos there, like the Cynthia Go music video, amongst other music videos that I used to shoot. And I also did a lot of photography as well. And I couldn't do that anymore. And I kind of shrunk into myself and didn't really know what I was doing. I was never a PC user. I hadn't used a PC since like 2007 when I was in high school. And my Mac died and I got a little cruddy laptop, PC laptop. And I was invited to come play VRChat with my brother. And I very, very quickly fell in love with the virtual space, even though I wasn't actually in VR quite yet. I didn't get VR until April of 2021, but I was active as a desktop user, making friends and wandering around and just seeing all the incredible things that people were making. And that's when I met Meta Rick from the Metaverse crew in Uncanny Alley. And he introduced me to all these incredible artists who are just making wonderful stuff in this space, amongst other musicians who are performing within the virtual realm. And it just blew my mind. I was like, this is it. This is what I'm going to be doing. Because at the time, you know, the new normal was we were never going to be able to go outside ever again, you know. especially in New England where sheltering in place was definitely a thing. And yeah, and MetaRig introduced me to Maria and Cynthia, my band with my sister, performed our first show at Raindance 2022. And I just fell in love with everything that they were doing. I was so enthusiastic. I pestered Maria to volunteer in any way I could. And before you know it, I was a curator for the music and live performance categories. And yeah, I guess the rest is history.

[00:10:17.483] Kent Bye: Very cool. Well, I wanted to have you both on just because the Arbiter last year with the Night Under the Lights Moon Pool, that was probably my favorite music experience that I had last year as a part of Raindance. And your set things that you did this year really blew me away. And it was at the closing night party. And so at the first half of it, I was a ghost. I turned my avatar completely off and was just watching the show. And then there was a moment where you asked us to like step in the pool or I stepped in the pool and I turned back into an avatar body and then started up with a number of different conversations. And then, you know, kind of, you know, was not able to get my full attention and then have to go off. And I had some family visiting, but I went back and watched the show and there's something like, I'm glad I had the direct experience of being there because I know there's such a difference of being in the moon pool versus watching it on a video. Yeah. So much of the spatial experience of it and just how the light is surrounding you. And so the Arbiter, I wanted to ask you first to give a bit more context as to like maybe your journey into VJing and then coming across Apple Blossom and some of these different shaders that were the core of the Moon Pool. But yeah, just love to hear a little bit more around your journey into the visual effects side of going from a DJ into creating more 3D spatial VJing and then how that developed into the creation of the Moon Pool.

[00:11:36.704] TehArbitter: Sure, happily. So I initially, as I mentioned, I was kind of DJing for a drinking club with friends. And I kind of got sick of it. This was back before BRCDN even existed. So we had to use Twitch to some extent, even before YouTube allowed streaming. So we were on Twitch and what I would do is I just had a webcam so that you'd kind of see me at the top of the screen. And then I had my old DJ deck set up, you know, screen captured below that. And I'm like, this is working, but I kind of want something more like this. It's not very engaging, you know, just kind of there. So I started just messing around with magic. I found through another Twitch streamer, it's Magic Music Visuals is the software that I use. And I just started playing with it lightly. You know, it's a very approachable node-based software. And it's hard to recommend because it's honestly a little bit dead in the water. The developer hasn't really released anything in quite a while. But it's, again, very approachable. So I started putting together some simple setups with that. And what I was doing initially was I was using the webcam that I had. And I was kaleidoscoping the actual output of that into a kaleidoscope. It's kind of a ranged kaleidoscope. And I was using my hands and my arms to essentially make like flower patterns. So you wouldn't really be able to see my face all that often. You would, you know, I'd throw myself into the corner on webcam or whatever, but I was largely overlaying my webcam over like video loops. And it was very simple at the time, but it was very, very fun because I essentially didn't have to push many buttons. I kind of just got to dance in front of the camera, you wiggle my arms and make something interesting. So as I experimented more with that, I happened upon, as I mentioned, Zia's Reflections. She was posting a good bit on Twitter. Stonebot was putting out promo videos for the shows. And I was just like blown away by both the production quality and the vibe. You know, Reflections is such a, it used to be a very small box. So people kind of got crammed in together and it was very, it was just super engaging and fun. And the walls are enormous screens. So I was like, I want to go play with those. So I hit her up. I ended up working with her for quite a while. And that kind of got me into a lot of the other different scenes and shows that are available over time. And I gradually worked my way towards using a virtual webcam. I was essentially using the VRChat camera as a webcam and using my avatar's arms instead of my own. And that opened up a few things. I could use fans in my hands, things like that. I could mess around with the avatar in that regard. But it gradually became more and more involved in the sense that I had to buy a new controller. I bought yet another controller. And I have a mix of, it's both a pad of buttons, like a drum pad. And also I have a handheld keyboard and mouse. So it's a whole keyboard and mouse crammed into a little handheld controller. So I can use the keystrokes from that to trigger MIDI controls. So when I was dancing, I would trigger different video effects or loops using the controller that was in my hand instead of having to worry about looking at something outside of VR. So that gradually just kind of grew and grew until there was kind of a, I guess it was a fateful day. I was turned down from a gig because they already had a dancer VJ. they had kind of reached their quota of like well we want some variety so you know we already have somebody who dances on camera and like we kind of want somebody else and like i appreciate their honesty but it made me realize that i had kind of pigeonholed myself to some extent i had been doing the same thing for quite a while and i decided that it was time to try to break that mold so i think the event that really helped spur that on was uh are you familiar with pshq camp i've never been but i've heard of it yeah Yeah, they're a good time. They're definitely more no holds barred. You know, obviously they try to look out for the people that attend, but pretty 18 plus events. But they're very open minded about what they do. And they don't host them nearly as much now, but they used to do an event called Full Moon EXE. And for all their sort of like club events, Full Moon was meant to be more of an emotional event. and experimental events. So you could count on the DJs. It's almost similar to like Night Under Light, where you can kind of bring almost anything you'd like when it comes from music. And the visualists usually tried to do something new compared to what they usually did. I used to work with Steph a good bit. That crew was pretty familiar with each other. But every time they invited me to go do Full Moon, I would take whatever I was working on and basically throw it in the trash and just do something totally new. And it was super eye-opening as to what I could do with Magic. I really don't do webcam stuff anymore. It's something I'd actually like to try to get back into to some extent because it's very, it's super raw. I love being able to just dance and provide something through that. But that was truly transformational and really helped open up what I could do. And even now, I still feel a little bit pigeonholed in the tools that I use within Magic. I'd like to learn Touch Designer or Tool 3 a little bit more. But it's kind of just gone from there. Honestly, Full Moon was the big one that really helped push me. And then I think the next big push, which got me to where I am now, was finding Modular Monday. It was through Adidas and Apple and that whole crew that I found her particle system. I was kind of interested in working with them. I had a lot of fun doing sets with them, especially because the way that they work, they tend to do like half hour improvised sets. And I would do like two hours. So I do four sets worth of just improvised visuals for people doing stuff totally live. And it was very, very different than like a pre-planned DJ set. So it was fun to try to keep up with that. It really helped me learn reactivity, you know, timing and timing. how to use your tools to make something new when you've already used those tools five minutes before. You have to try to improvise a little bit. But finding Her Particle System, especially in its infancy, really changed a lot of how I understood what you could do with video. She had a few worlds where her particle system was on the wall as a screen. So you'd kind of be wrapped around the room and it would pelt you in the face. It was very, very intense. And it was really cool to see something that at that time, particle screens really weren't that popular. I think that she helped popularize them. And then as more and more people picked up on it, it's kind of spread now. But between seeing her worlds... I think the moon pool itself was directly influenced by both seeing her particle system and also Tara, who works with Rue often, made a world called the cupola. And she had way up at the top of the cupola, there was a little circular thing oculus and it was filled with a particle screen that wasn't particularly reactive to luminance you know like the height of it wouldn't change much but it made this beautiful stained glass feeling so whatever the dj or vj was putting out would show up on that that screen way up at the top of the world and i went up there with a friend and you know we play space stars our way all the way up to the top of the world and we were kind of just laying in the particles, on the particles, under the particles, just kind of like looking at this effect. And that was the beginning of Moon Pool, was that similar feeling of sitting around the edge of the pool and looking at the particles in it was directly influenced by Terra's world, for sure. And I just realized that I needed another screen on top of that because as much as engaging as it was to have the screen kind of around your feet, there was a whole lot of open air up above you. So I came to Apple and we talked about what we wanted to do and she put it together. In the beginning, she was the one that really, you know, she had the shaders, but she also did all the 3D modeling and setting everything up initially. So big round of applause for her. She's put a lot of work into it and I've really enjoyed working with her. It's always stressful, but what isn't when you're trying to put things together like that? But since then, it's mostly just been me and her. We had Baby Jack make the new, the pouches, the bed couches that we have in there now. I'm probably going to be leaning on Baby Jack for more 3D modeling in the future too. I'd like to add a few more things to the pool. And we have other plans too, but... I think that summarizes pretty well. I don't think there's much more in between. There are tons of shows I've done in between. I did a lot of growth as a VJ, but I think that one of the biggest takeaways has been going to events and participating in events that are outside the norm of what we expect for the club environment really helps open your eyes to what is possible. you know the fact that i can do what i can do in the moon pool just by putting out a 16x9 video is still mind-blowing to me you know i'm a little desensitized because it's my home world i spend all my time in there but sometimes i see other people do things like the last null that we hosted was just crazy like some of the things that people come up with is just still mind-blowing to me and i love seeing people push themselves to do something different

[00:20:23.732] Kent Bye: Yeah, I wanted to share some of my reactions to the Moon Pool, and I'd love to hear some of your encounters with the Moon Pool and the start of this collaboration of this latest set. So, yeah, I had a conversation with Apple Blossom in Adidas last year, the SNR Lab.

[00:20:38.277] TehArbitter: Lovely interview.

[00:20:39.557] Kent Bye: And, you know, just kind of talking around how they had developed this and also a number of the DJs and VJs that participated in that Night Under No Lights moon pool. Unfortunately, we didn't include you in that conversation, which I regret in retrospect, but I'm glad that we could have you here today to kind of give a little bit more of that backstory. So my experience of the Night Under No Lights, well, first of all, is I think it's magic to be able to take all the data and encode it into a 2D video and then like record look at some sort of process to create this whole spatial architecture of the particle effects and having it both at the bottom and the top and having like light emitters on them so that you get these reflections really reminds me of this larger movement of the light and space movement of folks like James Turrell and others who would take a more of a minimalist approach to create these more ambient effects and having just the white moon pool you really see the impact of the light reflecting off that pool and so it becomes so much around like the color that you're juxtaposing together but also the shapes that you're able to create and yeah it's just a it's a really beautiful effect that i i just really love and So thanks. I'd love to hear from you, like your encounter with the moon pool and how you wanted to start to collaborate with RB in terms of creating this set that's closing out rain dance and, you know, what your process was to, you know, start to, you know, really flesh out the set that you put together.

[00:22:04.774] TrainingFangs: Yeah, certainly. So, um, I guess we'll go back to my own deeper involvement with Raindance when it began in 2022 with a few different behind the scene things. But it wasn't really actually until last year when Maria tasked me to curate a category again, which was the best music experience category. And I'll be honest. When she first asked, I was super excited, but I was also extremely anxious because, as I was saying, I had been a part of the music scene since late 2020, 2021, but mostly lurking quietly in the background as a wallflower, listening, watching. But when it came to curating, especially narrative-based music, quote unquote, experiences, this was all very new territory for me, and I didn't really have a full Rolodex. So I just sort of started from scratch. I dived into the music community, trying to find different music communities within VRChat and Resonate. And the anxiety got really real. I suffer from RSD, rejection-sensitive dysphoria. So reaching out to people, putting myself out there and curating made me feel incredibly vulnerable, but... i pushed through it bit by bit you know i started to find my rhythm and in february of 2024 i came across a post by reverse butcher an artist who i have great respect for and also the winner of best art experience this year in rain dance she had posted something from night underlay and it was a show called defib and i'm looking at this video that she posted on twitter or x or whatever and i'm like wait What the hell is this? It stopped me in my tracks. I'd never seen anything like it before. So I started to poke around, trying to find my way into this event. I was asking through the grapevine. I'm like, do you know any of these people? And eventually, I landed at a Night Under Light. I think it was Night Under Light 5 in early March 2024. And I only went there just to get a little peek. And I ended up spending five hours in there. I just sat there absolutely captivated. I sat there so long that nearly all my tracking had died. Like my, you know what I mean? Yeah, it was just a floating head. My hands were like, you know, my controllers were dead. Everything was dead. I was just like sitting there, like, you know, back in my computer chair, just like in awe of what I was looking at. And it was really clear to me right then and there, like I had to curate these people because what you are all creating over there is really something special. And not long after that, well, I think it was pretty much like that night, Starheart got me in touch with Arby. And that was that. Moonpool went on to create one of my favorite Raindance experiences to date, which was Night Under Light Presents the Seasons at Moonpool. It's absolutely breathtaking, and it's replayable. So by the way, if you haven't seen it, go to the world. You can experience it. It's really something to behold. So I guess that brings us to now. When we started planning for the Raindance Immersive 2025, Maria asked me if I'd organize the closing wrap party. We already had the wrap party for Saturday all set and ready, and that was going to be done by Metarik and Screaming Color, which was also a really incredible show. And, you know, at first I was like, oh, maybe I'll reach out to different people. But then I started to think, you know what? I want to do this. I wanted to make something basically as like a thank you to the community that I love so much. not just a performance, but like a love letter to the rain dance fam, because I care very deeply about all of them. Yeah. So not only that, I also looked at it as like a, like a chance to show people what I'm capable of as a musician and a producer. And, you know, as someone who's kind of been quiet, but passionately active within the space and, I also kind of wanted to show the community why I am the curator of the music and live performance categories, because many of them didn't actually know I was an artist myself. So the first person I reached out to was Arby. I asked if they'd be down or if they knew someone who would be down, you know, into creating something special in the moon pool for the wrap party. And Arby, in true Arby fashion, was all in. We teamed up, we poured ourselves into it, and yeah, we made some magic happen. And, you know, like my approach to production is always kind of chaotic in this really classic, creative way. We joke around about throwing spaghetti at the wall. And honestly, that's what it felt like. I was just sending Arby a bunch of tracks I had written, hoping something would stick. And the first song I actually sent Arby was something I was calling A Rainy Day, which I ended up renaming A New Day. You know, a little hat tip to the uncanny alleys. A New Day immersive theater experience, which was in the selection this year. And the song opened up with these textured layers of rain and storm sounds, definitely another hat tip to the whole rain dance aesthetic. Yeah, I don't know, I thought that was a good jumping off point, but that's where things kind of got interesting and Arby, being Arby, took all this raw material and saw a much bigger picture, which I wasn't really seeing quite yet. Yeah. And they came back with this really cohesive thematic arc for the whole show that gave the performance structure and a lot more heart. And that theme actually instantly clicked for me. And I just hit the ground running and started like producing tracks and transitions to make that happen. And I'll let RV talk about that part a little bit more because I think their vision deserves its own spotlight. But from my side, that moment felt like we weren't just making a party or a DJ set anymore. Well, I don't DJ. I, make my own music but um no no shade to the djs we need the djs we love the djs but i don't actually own dj decks i produce my own music but yeah we weren't making a party set anymore we were building like a new narrative so yeah

[00:28:08.976] TehArbitter: Yeah, I want to mention, I don't think that I'll ever forget seeing you at Null the first time. I've told you this before, but it was so funny. The first Night Under Light that you attended, I popped the instance, I pulled my headset up off of my forehead to fix something. I put my headset back down, I turned around, and there you are. It was almost instant. Usually, yes, I expect people to come in quick, but they usually give me like, oh, hey, or whatever. i put my headset back down i look over and you're on the opposite side of the pool from like the stairs just sitting in the beanbag ready i'm like i've never seen somebody yeah i've never seen somebody just like so just ready to be there and witness and like you said you were there the whole five hours yeah you just sat in that exact same spot the whole time and just melted it was so funny to watch

[00:28:57.924] TrainingFangs: I was like, yeah, like I said, I was ready. I was so excited to see this in person because I'd only ever seen compressed videos online.

[00:29:06.871] TehArbitter: Especially back in the day, those are bad.

[00:29:11.394] TrainingFangs: It was enough to get me hooked and I was there and yeah, I was just obsessed. I think we messaged each other that night. And I was like, oh my God, would you folks please be interested in making some sort of narrative-based experience for Raindance? And you folks were all in. And that, again, to date, my favorite music experience at Raindance, for sure.

[00:29:35.766] TehArbitter: To be honest, you know, yes, we were all in after a point. But initially, I think I discussed this with you. I was essentially going to go on hiatus after that. No, like you caught me as I was trying to step out the door and you offered me something that I couldn't pass up. And, you know, by all means, you didn't coerce me into it. You asked me and I saw the opportunity and took it and do not regret it. The Seasons is still one of my favorite shows that I've done and my friends have put together. It's really, it was something special and I'm glad that we had the chance.

[00:30:06.930] TrainingFangs: I'm so happy y'all agreed to it because it is, it's very special.

[00:30:11.633] Kent Bye: Yeah, like I said, it was my favorite experience from last year in terms of certainly in the music realm. And, you know, as I was in the moon pool this time, I have since since last year had a chance to go to Cosm, which is kind of like a mini sphere in L.A. So the sphere is like 18000 people in Las Vegas and Cosm is like 1500 people. But I went to a couple of music shows that they have there. And what was interesting was that, you know, when you're in a VR headset, you have kind of like a 90 degree or maybe 100 degree field of view. But in Cosm, you basically have like a little bit more than 180 degree field of view, depending on where you're sitting, you are completely immersed. And so, but at the same time, there's no depth. It's all like the skybox far field. So you can imagine if you're in a VR chat world, it's like if it was just a skybox show rather than something that actually has a near field and middle field that has like the depth, the stereoscopic effects. And I think having like immersed in that pool, I was like trying to think, would this translate into a dome experience, like a half dome, like a Cosm or something? or a sphere. And I don't think it would really necessarily translate as much as like the spatial experience. And so it's going beyond just like a 2d DJ set. There's something around being immersed into something like the night and the lights with apple blossom shader, where it has this more spatial architecture with the light that's reflecting everywhere. So it takes a little bit of a different brain of thinking in more of a 3d context, rather than just in a 2d context. And I think the seasons did that really brilliantly in a way that had different approaches for creating like more pixel art to the gear styles, a little bit more of like the symmetrical shapes that are auto reactive, but are getting a lot of like distinct colors. And so as you were going back and forth, it sounds like you had a narrative, you had a theme. And so I'm just curious, like the type of language that you two use to speak around the flow of the music, the theme of the music, but also, you know, if it's just also creating something and sending it and having your own feeling and vibe and then an intuition for what would work and then more feedback on that level. And if it's putting together the architecture of something that you may be able to do live mixing, or if it's something that's a little bit more edited and timed in music. So just curious to hear how you start to flesh out the arc of a story that you're telling. And yeah, just curious to hear a little bit more around what those themes were and the language that you were using to put together the show.

[00:32:37.096] TrainingFangs: I think Harvey should talk about the arc that they created and I stuck to.

[00:32:45.608] TehArbitter: You speak as if it was like a big thought. It really wasn't. It was. I'm glad that it inspired you. The whole point of when I collaborate with people is the whole point is to work together and come up with something. But I think that historically, both for DJ sets and for VJ sets, I have a very easy time, I don't know if visualizing is the right word, but I can kind of see the flow of energy when it comes to intensity and intent. And I generally think that some of the strongest sets that you can listen to or witness are ones that have a curve to them. If you just play the same level of house music through an hour long set, it's stable, but it doesn't really go anywhere. So I personally love both in my own sets and seeing other people's performances. I love seeing somebody start somewhere and then either go up or down in terms of intensity and then come back or back and forth. Some of my sets have been pretty hectic, but that was kind of the intention with ours is that I mentioned to Fangs, I thought it'd be nice to start kind of middling or kind of light and then work our way down into more intense, darker, heavier tones and then come back up to the light. You know, it meant to be a, what was it? It was a sprinkle or like a shower into a downpour into a sunny day of just this natural flow of, you know, weather changing and intensity levels again of like how heavy you want the moment to be. So it's something that I think I kind of do naturally with my performances anyways. I like them to be interesting and to try to keep people on their toes a little bit. And you picked up that beat like it was nothing. It really I need as much as What I contributed helped to form what we did. You put together an hour's worth of music over the course of, what, a month? Not a lot of people can do that, to be honest. I have some producer friends, and they probably would have been able to make a few of those songs that you put together. And yes, they're kind of built to flow together. They're not total songs all by themselves necessarily, but... It was a really impressive effort. And I'm glad that I helped you push forward into making that happen because I know that it can be paralyzing trying to figure out where you want to go with something. And I mean, even leaning back on how the seasons went, it was much the same. The important thing was the collaboration. We had a group chat. We had calls. We met up and talked about what we wanted to do. And I think it was Turk. Turquoise was the one who was like, can we do the seasons you know we were like looking for a topic something to cover and especially you know with rain dance the whole point is to have a narrative so we were just like let's you know can we find something and we talked and talked and then turk just threw you know like can i'm like can we do the flow of time and he's like the seasons sound cool like you know changing seasons And we all agreed. And it was really that simple. It doesn't require a lot of deeper thought initially. The important thing is to get that idea out and again, establish the flow of energy. Where do you want to start? Where do you want to go? And where do you want to end?

[00:35:54.487] TrainingFangs: Absolutely. Yeah. Cause initially I had just sent you what was a rainy day, um, which I changed to a rainy stove. Yeah. I was like, and I had started the track with like these rain storm sounds and textures. And I was like, Oh, I want to like, kind of like harp on the whole rain dance aesthetic and bring in like lightning and thunder and rain. Cause I know you can create that particle effect in moon pool where it looks like rain is kind of sprinkling through. And you gave me this like arc, yeah, like sprinkling, downpour, then, you know, out comes the light. And I'm like, oh, that is just freaking perfect, you know, because we got the rain dance and then we got the step into the light, which is the whole theme of the entire festival. And even though I had had some songs that, you know, initially the set list didn't really go the way that it was, you know, by the end of production. I had stuff kind of all over the place, but I was like, oh, yeah, this is great. And so I incorporated all these, you know, different sounds to make it seem like we were going through a storm. And then, you know, the storm calms down and then there's birdsong. And eventually there's like all these like really high energy, high energy, string, ethereal things, just kind of signifying like, you know, the sun has come out, the light has come out, like it's time to, you know, go out into the sun and step into the light. Yeah. It came really organically for me after you gave me like the purpose, gave me like the cue, like, oh, this is what we should be doing. I was like, oh my God, you're so right. Cause there's something to be said, like not just for a set and like you're saying to like when things don't really go anywhere in a set for me, like I'm the kind of person who likes to listen to an album front to back, like as a body of work and to kind of see how that is like as a whole, that was sort of the approach I was taking when it came to making this set. I, you know, I wanted us to start at a place to go through something together and then come out on the other end, like victorious. So that was, yeah, that was just kind of my mindset. Yeah.

[00:37:55.526] Kent Bye: Yeah, it definitely has a little bit of a concept album type of field in the sense that there was quite a lot of diversity and the types of feelings or vibes or the journey that you're taking us on. And, you know, as I was listening to it, I watched the video right before our chat. And some of my favorite musicians are like Tycho, this real ambient musician. There's like Erlich Schnell, a lot of like shoegaze. And Dan Deacon is one of my favorites. I love

[00:38:21.528] TrainingFangs: Dan Deacon.

[00:38:23.031] Kent Bye: Good. I can sense a little bit of Dan Deacon in there, but this kind of like... Oh, man. I'm sorry. Dan Deacon, by the way, puts on one of the best live shows I've ever had. He does an amazing, amazing like crowd, like immersive, like emergent kind of social dynamics. He's brilliant. But I've, I've lived in Baltimore for a while and had a chance to see a number of Dan Deacon shows, fortunately. So, um, but he's incredible.

[00:38:49.162] TrainingFangs: It's like gym class for adults.

[00:38:52.145] Kent Bye: yeah yeah he gives instructions to like try to do like big movements of the crowd it's just the captain of the dance the captain of the dance i've been the captain of the dance many many times i've seen him every time he tours i love him i love him yeah sorry okay so there's a i sense a little bit of like you know this kind of reminds me of dan deacon but there's also this kind of compliment this kind of like video game synth, like chiptune type of vibe. So just curious how you describe your music, your style, your genre, some of your other inspirations for music.

[00:39:25.686] TrainingFangs: Man, that just makes my heart burst. You don't even understand. I love, love, love, love Dan Deacon in a big sort of way. I want all his albums. I have his poster on my wall. I'm a big fan. Anyways, yeah, I don't know. I guess my production process is kind of a mixed bag. I've never really liked to stick to one genre. Yeah, I noticed. No. You don't say. I don't like to box myself in like that. I think it can be kind of monotonous, for lack of a better word. I don't know. When it comes to making music, I think it's really important to be an open book, to experiment with different things and pull inspiration from all different directions and just... experiment and see what you come up with. As you were saying before, the word shoegaze, I was like, yes, shoegaze. I really love the lush shoegazy walls of sound you get from, I don't know, I really love M83. I also really love M83. I've loved M83 since high school. Then another throwback, I really love any industrial grooves from Trent Reznor. And then I also like, you know, hyper pop, chiptune-y stuff that has a lot of energy, like Anamanaguchi and even Porter Robinson, which is very, very popular in the VR space. I did lend a lot of that aesthetic to my set with the like vocal samples and whatnot. So I'm also really drawn to like atmospheric music textures that make you kind of feel like you're in a place. So yeah, I don't really like to just hit one note emotionally and sonically. I find that a little monotonous on a personal level, not that I don't enjoy stuff like that outside of myself. So I did try to instead sort of create this sonic atmosphere, a way for all these sounds and songs to kind of talk to each other. The transitions definitely were a huge help in that. So not just like the, you know, what would you say, like the storm and the birdsong and the rain sounds and samples, but also, you know, just kind of like textural sense that sort of like melded and glued the different tracks together. And then there was also some reoccurring motifs. There are reoccurring samples that you wouldn't really notice be in all the different tracks unless you kind of like broke it down on a technical level, certain tones and textures and synth voices that kind of reappear throughout the journey of the set. And then I also leaned on like a palette of instruments that like really spoke to the cohesion. I really like old synthesizers like the Sequential Prophet and the Juno 106, you know, these old analog synthesizers, which I use as soft synths. I don't own those physically as much as I would like to. I'm not a millionaire. And then I also utilize one synth in every single track called the Soma Terra, which is a really whacked out synthesizer. If you're not familiar, it's a really unique digital synth with a touch-based surface and built-in sensors. It kind of looks like a synth from space, but also on a tree trunk. And it lets you interact with the sounds in a super tactile, intuitive way. The harder you press down on the little brass knobs, the more it kind of swells in. And it just produces these really raw, ethereal, and sometimes even atotal sounds that kind of lend to transitions. And it also has a lot of zitar and dulcimer tones. They're compressed, but they're there, and I really fell in love with them. And that's a little bit personal because... My dad plays the hammer dulcimer. So anytime I hear like percussive string qualities coming through in a synthetic yet organic feeling way, it really kind of hits home for me. Yeah. So even though like the styles of the songs vary, having those unifying timbres like made everything feel like it belonged like sort of in the same sonic world, so to speak.

[00:43:37.698] Kent Bye: Yeah. Brilliant. Yeah. Thanks for that description. I had trouble pinning down like a single genre. So it makes sense that you would have such a wide variety and diversity and influences. And it's really helpful to hear that description. And so Arby, I wanted to ask a similar question to you in terms of like how you start to describe your style of VJ, especially in the moon pool, because, you know, I see a lot of like use of color, like distinct flashing of color. There's some kind of more kaleidoscopic symmetrical shapes that are sometimes like rotating and mirroring from top and bottom. There's a lot of like waves, like it feels like Mathematica has like a curve that looks like more of a shape that is kind of undulating. Mm-hmm. But I'm just trying to get a sense of how you start to describe your style when it comes to the moon pool, especially because you're creating these 3D shapes in space, but also trying to match the music and have some bits of audio reactive, but not always explicitly audio reactive. So yeah, just curious to hear some of your style and how you start to describe from the same way that you were talking around the arc and the journey of the set, like how you were trying to match that visually with what you can do in the moon pool.

[00:44:49.457] TehArbitter: Sure. So a couple of things. This setup in particular was actually very audio reactive. I've been playing with, in Magic, I essentially made like a spectrogram. I'm trying to think of how best to describe it. I essentially made it so that I can have elements react based off of individual note frequencies. I've mapped out all of the individual like small frequency ranges for each note. So whenever, you know, if you were to play a keyboard into my stream, you could essentially play a visual keyboard, you know, kind of look like a MIDI keyboard. And then I can take that input and twist it however I like. So I used somebody actually just recently, was it Jenks? I think somebody on the, there's a VJ friends discord. It's a whole bunch of VJs that are in VR as well as outside of VR that collaborate and offer each other opportunities and talk about what they can do. And he put out a waveform shader that has input. The one that's built into Magic is a standalone node that can only output. And he produced something that has an input. So I took what I made beforehand and just plugged it into what he made and came up with a circular waveform shape that is reactive on a note basis rather than just a whole waveform. So that quite a lot of what I did at the show was built around that system. But also the other thing I wanted to mention that really helped influence what I wanted to do with this show was Apple has been pushing updates for the pool gradually. And one of the most recent updates that she put out was something that lets you go beyond the slider limits. So the control panel itself has a bunch of sliders and the sliders range from about zero to two. you know you kind of like the default value of one and then you can go up to two and then down to zero she made it so that the output for those settings is saved in a json file and you can access that json as a text box within vrchat so you can open the control panel click on the button and it pops up a little text box that gives you the full string of all the settings commands essentially so you can take that put that in notepad or whatever and edit it and then put it back in and you can essentially push the system past its limits so combining that with the presets that she also included in i think it was a little less than a year ago i essentially made a bunch of pre-made settings variables so i could just press a button and a whole bunch of the variables on the panel would change for me because i had already set it up ahead of time But something that I try to show at the Moon Pool when I do my shows is that the system is yours to do with as you please. A lot of people tend to leave it very benign or like a lot of performers, the VJs, they'll establish their settings at the beginning of their show and then just leave it as that. And there's nothing wrong with that by any means. It's nice to be able to focus on just making the visuals and not messing with the pool. But more often than not, I'll actually approach them and be like, hey, do you want me to be your light designer? Do you want me to handle the in-world lights? And some people would rather just stay as it is, but... I like seeing, and I'm sure you saw it a number of times at the show. I love throwing the particles in a way that you don't expect. And that's what I did with this one in particular is I inverted the screens to some extent. So the ceiling screen was lowered all the way down into the pool and I had it on a vignette so that it wouldn't really hit people around the outside of the pool, but very much the upper screen kind of became the lower screen and lower screen kind of became the upper screen to some extent. And then I just combined a bunch of different effects. The waveform, the rippling effect that you mentioned earlier is exactly that. It's just a rippling effect with a bit of a gradient to it. And I kind of just had it flow in and out. And that's what the tower in the center of the pool kind of was. It was just a rather simple rippling wave effect. And then I just, I put a bunch of things on top of it. When it comes to color, I like to work with the raw, simple colors. I think I always have. And part of that comes with when I'm doing my performances, I don't make preset color arrangements. I have full control over the RGB values of whatever I'm working with. It's just on like a fader. Any colors that you're seeing change, I'm doing live, pressing my fingers into my controller and having intent with it. So it's a little bit limiting compared to say somebody like Namuron who works with like gradients a lot more. And gradients are probably the biggest thing that you can do in Moonpool. It's just like the flow of color is really beautiful in there. But I tend to work with just like static colors. You have like two or three layers of just like raw color, not gradient. And... it can be kind of limiting in a way but i love having that direct control i think that really speaks to what i like to do with my bj performances and especially working with modular monday i usually just build a toolkit out of things that i'm familiar with and you know have intent and then i just play with it i make things live a lot of what i did at the show was not practiced. You know, I listened to the music that thing sent me for weeks and, you know, I definitely quote unquote practiced, but I didn't have a script that I was really working off of apart from, again, that flow of energy of starting kind of middling, going down into deep and heavy and more intense and then lightening up at the end. So there's a good bit of thought That goes into it live, but I didn't script very much of that. Again, there was intent, but it wasn't fully thought out. Compared to, say, The Seasons is a good example of the opposite of that. That was almost fully scripted. I had each scene, her song mapped out and was ready with timing, which also comes with the person I was working with, Yuna. She provided me a set that was... to the second essentially what she did live so like we had a lot more time to work on it and i prepared a lot more for it this was definitely closer i kind of wanted to match fang's vibe of like you know as much as you prepared stuff you also did things live to some extent so i kind of wanted to fall into that vein as well

[00:50:56.926] Kent Bye: Yeah, that's really helpful to hear all those descriptions. And I'm really looking forward to when you get it up and running as a replayable with all those other additional settings you were talking around to watch it from start to finish. Because I watched the first part of it during the party, then I started chatting with folks and then I had to leave early and then I just watched the video. But it's a completely different experience being immersed there. So I'm looking forward to once it's live to re-enter it.

[00:51:20.310] TehArbitter: It's funny because I need to go sit and rewatch it myself. I watched the recording too, but it's a very different experience when, like, I specifically made it so that Fangs and I would have a safe place in the middle of the pool to stand. You know, it was a black circle so that we wouldn't get blasted by anything. But when you're standing in the middle of it, it's just this storm of particles around you. Yeah. As much as when I was practicing, I kind of had a sense of what it looked like, but going into the show itself, I still don't really know how it looked. I watched the recording, but that's just the recording. I need to kind of go watch it myself.

[00:51:51.729] TrainingFangs: Yeah, I'm looking forward to sitting on the outside of the pool and watching it from the outside looking in.

[00:51:56.571] Kent Bye: Yeah, for sure. Awesome. Well, thanks. I did want to ask one final question and then we can start to wrap up. But so I was really struck by how you introduced this set. It was really heartfelt. Like I could tell you put a lot of energy into it and you really were kind of entering into a new phase where it sounded like a lot of your collaboration as a musician has been with your sister and When I first saw you perform, it was with your sister. And I believe it was at like a Rain Dance opening party. I'm not sure if that was like one of your first shows. So your avatar was very much almost like a twin with your sister that I had seen a lot of and then noticed that you were wearing like a new avatar. or a different avatar. So I'm just curious to hear a little bit about this moment in time with what that set meant for you as a solo artist and also your expression of identity with, you know, having a new avatar, if that was coincident to this new phase or if that's something you also had. And I'm just curious to hear a little bit more around that dedication that you had at the beginning and kind of reflecting on this moment in time.

[00:52:56.780] TehArbitter: It almost made me cry in the beginning.

[00:53:01.514] TrainingFangs: That's what I was going for. No. No, I mean, it was heartfelt. It was real. I mean, you could tell I was crying. But to answer upon the avatar thing. So, yeah. So my Cynthia avatar and the avatar that people very much recognize me in is my Cynthia avatar. And it's the same avatar I've been wearing, God, since like the end of 2021. And it hasn't changed much. Because Cynthia is a concept band, we are twins from the future, and we're sending signals from the future to the now to help save the future of humanity. And that just kind of became my aesthetic in VRChat for a while. But back in November of 2024, I partook in the Filmmakers of VRChat 48-Hour Film Festival event. And I was the main character of a script that I had wrote and Khan, I was actually working with Quinster and Khan from Penrose and they had given the, yeah, they're amazing. And they had given me this avatar to wear and I put it on and I was like, wow, this feels right. so much to the point where i went and i purchased the model and since then i've edited it a little bit you know i gave it freckles and i kind of gave myself like this makeup that makes it look like i'm extremely tired which i always am and khan helped me out you know big shout out to khan because they definitely helped me out with that a little bit but um yeah just this avatar really spoke to me it actually looks a lot more like me in real life you know with the brown hair and the glasses and i don't wear anything but black i'm not really i don't really have an affinity for pink pink's not really my thing um but that's the whole cynthia thing and that's like the color that kind of you know cynthia largely represents is pink but i don't ever really wear that color in real life so when i started wearing this avatar i started to wear it kind of like when i was just out and about and i didn't really want to be wearing my cynthia avatar not like i didn't want to be recognized i'm not famous or anything like that but you know sometimes you It kind of speaks to like the duality, not the duality, that's the wrong word. The multitudes that you have as a person in VR, like you don't have to adhere to any one sort of shape or whatever. But when you find an avatar that really speaks to you, just kind of, like I said, feels right. I felt the need, I needed to wear it. And yeah, and no shade on my sister. I love my sister and I love making music with my sister, but she's been largely unavailable because she just had a baby this past December. And Congratulations to her. And I'm very happy auntie. But we haven't really been able to make music together because of that, because she's got more important responsibilities and me not making music, which is such a huge part of my being was really kind of eating up, you know, me inside. So, yeah, I just kind of. I decided I needed to start making my own music. I've always been in other bands. I'm still in other bands, but I needed to start making music for me and stuff that, you know, spoke to what I'm into. And I just, again, too, I wanted to kind of like... step up and show my merit as a musician and a producer, especially as someone who has the responsibility to go and curate these people who make music in live performance categories. I kind of needed to, yeah, show off my chops a little bit. So it has been... You killed it. It wouldn't have been as amazing as it was if it wasn't for you, Arby. And I'm so grateful to you. I'm very grateful that we got to team up on this because it was a really cathartic experience for me in a big sort of way. And yeah, since then, I've put the music on Bandcamp. Arby is talking to me about how we can make it replayable. And all I want to do is just start getting out there and playing more stuff as a solo artist because... It's very much who I am. You know, I'm a musician and I want to get my music out there. I want to, I want to perform for people. It's the biggest thing that makes me happy. So yeah.

[00:57:02.714] Kent Bye: Yeah, I could definitely feel that feeling of like the starting of a new chapter and honoring the journey that you've been on, but also that you were, you put a lot of time and energy and intent into producing this show. And I think it really showed, it helped prime me to be like, oh, I should pay attention. Something's happening right now. Because it was kind of a funny moment where Kip is like dancing right in front of you. And you're like, you're like, all right, I have something I want to say.

[00:57:26.733] TrainingFangs: And it's super serious.

[00:57:27.814] Kent Bye: And he's just kind of like dancing, like da, da, da, da, da, and so.

[00:57:31.337] TrainingFangs: And I was like, back it up. All right.

[00:57:33.078] Kent Bye: And then he's like swimming around the pool.

[00:57:35.519] TrainingFangs: And so anyway, I saw that in the video and that actually made me crack up so hard. But yeah, I don't think he really realized I was trying to like have this like, you know, heartfelt address to Lorraine Dan's family, but that's okay. You know, Kip is a very lovable person. I can't be mad at him.

[00:57:54.079] Kent Bye: His friends were reeling him back. I think they noticed it, but yeah, it made me pay attention in a particular way. And it also, because the music was so like my vibe in terms of the stuff that I enjoy listening to, I think it was another aspect of like an alignment between music I really loved. There was like really beautiful visuals and aesthetic and yeah, just the ability to kind of in VR chat, turn off from a body embodiment into a ghost and just kind of witness So yeah, I'm looking forward to when you get it back up online to be able to really fully see the full set in its full context. But yeah, it was just really powerful. I'm really glad that we had a chance to talk a little bit more about it. And that video that you mentioned, the 48 hours, was also really my favorite from that that whole 48 hour competition. It was so heartfelt. It was good writing, good acting. And yeah, it was just really kind of like a little meditation on grief and just a really interesting sci-fi story as well. So I'm really looking forward to, to see you develop that out into a full, full feature or a short, or, you know, it sounds like it felt like a very beginning of something that could be developed into something much larger as well.

[00:59:02.233] TrainingFangs: Yeah, that was the actual, that was, it was something I had sitting on the back burner and it, none of this technology is real, but it was based on real events. Um, and that's what inspired it. And I was, it was cool to, you know, make a seven minute short out of it, but I do intend on making a full script and yeah. And again, that avatar really stuck with me. It just, it felt, yeah, again, I felt right.

[00:59:25.124] TehArbitter: So it's it's you.

[00:59:27.742] TrainingFangs: Thank you. I think so, too. Yeah, I don't know. It was it was a really cathartic experience being able to perform for everybody, especially wrapping off like the very anticipated 10th edition of Rain Dance and getting to do it with someone that I admire and, you know, many, many ways, Arby. So I think it all worked out again. Super cathartic. I'm very grateful. And thank you for all your kind words. I appreciate them.

[00:59:58.080] Kent Bye: For sure. Yeah. Awesome. Well, I guess as we start to wrap up, I'd love to hear what each of you think is the ultimate potential of virtual reality and the intersection with music and what it might be able to enable.

[01:00:10.889] TehArbitter: I can start. I think that one of the most crucial things that we can try to hold on to going forward, which I think will be the most important, is the Wild West feeling that we have in VRChat still. It has been super corporatized. It hasn't been cookie-cuttered yet. And I think that even if VRChat doesn't end up being the place down the line that people gravitate towards for that freedom, I think that that freedom is what we should pursue. Light of Sky and PSHQ's Full Moon events and similar things have really opened my eyes to what is quote-unquote acceptable. Within the club scene, there's this expectation and a pipeline, a ladder to climb, and you kind of work your way up and you're gradually more accepted, if you want to put it that way. But There's always going to be acceptance for people that want to try something different. And I think that the whole reason that I have the Moon Pool as a public world is because I want people to go in there and just mess around and do whatever they want. I made things laugh pretty hard when I put the G.I. Joe PSAs on the video screen. G.I. Joe.

[01:01:14.886] Kent Bye: G.I.

[01:01:15.667] TehArbitter: Joe. It doesn't have to always be serious. I think the important thing is to just keep pushing. There'll always be something crazier to experience, especially as technology comes along. I'm looking forward to haptic suits and that sort of thing. The more immersive we can get with it, the better. I really want people to just feel free to just try things. That's how I got to where I got. It's much like streaming. You just got to hit the start stream button. Just do something and try it. And I'll just mention if anybody's ever interested in doing something with Night Under Light or just wants somebody to talk to to figure out VJing or what have you, my DMs are always open. When it comes to people that I curate and put into my shows, I tend to prioritize the people that reach out to me because they want to do something. As much as I'll reach out to folks, I definitely put the people at the top of the list who are like, that show is incredible. How do I do that? Cause I'm more than happy to facilitate that. And that's the vibe that is infectious and really, really important. And again, big shout out to Rue of Kaleidosky for providing that every Saturday, you know, it's just, just come do the thing. You know, what do you love? Show us. And like, that's the important thing is the acceptance and open-mindedness.

[01:02:30.690] TrainingFangs: Beautiful. Yeah. Big respect for Mama Rue. Big, big love. Yeah, I agree with you. I think just seeing people experiment in the space more would be great. I will harp on the thing that I said in my last interview is that I really wish that despite all the art that we get to see here in the space is largely free, And that provides a lot of value to the community, but I do want to find some way, and I'm not a business person, so I can't give the answers, but I do want to see some way for artists to find a sustainable living creating their art, just like any other artist would in real life. Right now, there's not really much of a market for it, but I want to see that. I want to see that for me. I want to see that for my friends. We pour our heart and our souls, all of our free time into creating these experiences for people, and it's largely for free. No one really makes money doing it. And that's going to be great for a while, but something's got to give eventually. And I'm just hoping that there will be some sort of way that there will be a give and take for artists and the guests who are coming to see these things. And a lot of people don't agree with me on that, and that's okay. I'm just looking at it from someone who's made money with art outside of the virtual realm. I just want to see someone give us money. I'm wording it so wrong, but in essence, that's what I'm trying to say. Where are the investors? They should be investing in the people like Arby and Apple Blossom who are creating these incredibly just... out of this world, you know, shader and particle effects and all these different elements that create what we experience on social VR platforms. I would like to see them be able to make a living doing that. So they don't have to go do a nine to five, doing a job that they don't love, you know, because this is what we love, you know? So yeah, again, a lot of people don't agree with me, but that's where I'm at. I really, I really want to see that in the future somehow. And if you have an answer, DM me, because I want to know.

[01:04:44.179] TehArbitter: It's not a problem with an easy solution, but I even said that to Turquoise at the end of the last Night Under Light. I'm like, if I could make a living doing this, I would. It's not something that I'd want to do weekly because that's kind of part of the magic of Night Under Light is that it's not all the time, but... It isn't sustainable in the true sense of the word. Like it takes a lot of time to prep these things and organize people. And in the end, you know, when it comes to people getting paid out, I pay my artists sometimes, you know, I donate to charity. I take the money that I earn in my nine to five and I throw it out. the people that i work with sometimes yeah it's and and it can't always happen but it's there i already said that there's no easy solution to the problem i think that we're gonna have to get creative and i'm kind of curious to see where it goes it's it's also i mentioned earlier that maybe vr chat isn't the place to stick around in the long term you know we have no idea how things are going to be you know people used to hang out on facebook all the time and now everyone looks at meta like it's the devil which it is but like uh But it's just a good example. Times change, places change. There are places like Resonate and stuff that offer alternatives. And I'm really curious to see where all that goes.

[01:05:51.753] TrainingFangs: Yeah, same.

[01:05:53.223] Kent Bye: Yeah, and I have a conversation I recorded with some VRChat folks talking around the avatar monetization, but it's an issue that I think VRChat as a platform is trying to figure out how to bring more of the transactions that are maybe happening off-site on places like Gumroad or Booth and bring that onto the platform, but also to help to support more artists. So some of the avatar creators participating in that are able to pay their rent with the avatars that they're creating that are being featured. So at least that's a small start, but in order to really get to what you are talking about things, I think the whole entire platform of VRChat is something that they're also trying to figure that out.

[01:06:27.828] TrainingFangs: Yeah. Well, as someone who's experienced trying to do ticket sales in VRChat, largely, it's almost like a 30% revenue has to go to VRChat just to charge ticket sales on VRChat. So people usually are at the mercy of donations because the second you have the word ticket, charge tickets, in the description of anything, that's when VRChat jumps on it. And rightfully so, they have the right to do that. It's a free platform. But yeah, something's got to give. We got to find some sort of compromise. And I'm hoping that that happens in the near future because there's an immense amount of artists creating incredible things here and they deserve to be paid. That's just my two cents.

[01:07:13.683] Kent Bye: Yeah, and it's 50%, so 20 to VRChat, and the 30% is actually going to Steam, Apple for iOS, or probably more Android and Google Play. So there's more of the platform fees that are eating into that as well. So not just VRChat, but also the larger ecosystem of all that. So anyway, is there anything else that's left unsaid that you'd like to say to the broader immersive community?

[01:07:39.309] TehArbitter: Keep on keeping on. Like I see something new every day and I said it before and I'll say it again. The best thing you can do is just get started, you know, try something. You know, I wasn't, I was a DJ before I was a VJ. I never thought I'd make visuals and here I am largely VJing and barely DJing. So you never know, you know, times change and I hope that you find your way. I'm always happy to help if you need some insight.

[01:08:03.940] TrainingFangs: Yeah, same. I just want to see more cross-pollination, more co-creation, cross-platform co-creation with people in this space. The community is small, you know, and I think that people kind of get caught up like, oh, this person has got sort of a name to themselves and they get scared to like kind of reach out and talk to them and co-create. Like, don't be. We're literally all in this together as virtual artists. And yeah, I just think that people need to take the leap and start

[01:08:31.963] TehArbitter: know collaborating you know like me and rb yeah yeah expect more like that from night under light i've been itching to do like solo artist highlights so i'd love to work with fangs again you know doing a music video would be cool but i do want to bring some other people that are familiar from rain dance in particular to do some like like star heart and similar people of like do an hour-long show that's like a lot more intent focused

[01:08:59.513] TrainingFangs: I love that. Yes. All about it.

[01:09:02.954] Kent Bye: Awesome. Well, Fangs and Arby, thanks so much for joining me here on the podcast. I really loved the show that you did as a closing night show. And also last year with the seasons, that was one of my favorite shows. And Fangs really enjoyed your music and enjoyed the film that you had produced in that competition. And yeah, just looking forward to seeing where each of you take it here in the future and continuing to move forward. And, you know, all the also curation of Rain Dance that you're involved with. Um, as well, things so excited to kind of dig more into that programming and that aspect as well, as I continue to do my rain dance 2025 coverage, but yeah, just a real pleasure to have a chance to sit down with each of you and hear a little bit more around this set that really moved me and really looking forward to having a chance to revisit it here sometime soon. So thanks again for joining me here on the podcast to help break it all down. Thank you, Ken.

[01:09:51.110] TrainingFangs: Yeah. Thank you so much, Ken. And thank you, RB. You're the best.

[01:09:55.151] TehArbitter: It was fun.

[01:09:57.793] Kent Bye: Thanks again for listening to this episode of the Voices of VR podcast. And if you enjoy the podcast, then please do spread the word, tell your friends, and consider becoming a member of the Patreon. This is a supported podcast, and so I do rely upon donations from people like yourself in order to continue to bring this coverage. So you can become a member and donate today at patreon.com slash voicesofvr. Thanks for listening.

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#1649: Fangs & Arbi Close Out Raindance with a Breathtaking Music and VJ Show at the Moon Pool