After over 25 years of running the website, and the record label which itself is now over 30 years old, it has been decided to semi-mothball the operation which means that the label and website will no longer be operating in a commercial capacity.
To those that have been contacting me regarding merchandise and downloads, apologies if I haven't responded but I can confirm that there will be no more merchandise for sale and the digital download store has been shut down.
Vinyl sales were brought to an end some time ago after the UK voted for Brexit which made it impossible to send records abroad without incurring high fees.
It has also been decided that there will be no further third party publishing or licensing of Fine Balance / Casey Tucker material.
This is not the end of the line for the website however which from now on will be focused on providing streaming audio in the form of exclusive tracks past and present and full length albums from me along with regular uploads of DJ mix sets showcasing the best in old and new electronic dance music.
So if anything there will be more activity happening here at the main website during the foreseeable future as I'm able to dedicate more time to managing it.
In fact the timing might be just right as many people are becoming more disgruntled with social media and video sharing sites, not least the content creators who are experiencing a rough time at the moment due to ever tightening rules, copyright disputes and the advancement of AI.
Then there's the push to restrict access to social media sites, which is slowly being implemented by governments worldwide. It could result in an exodus of people leaving social media and reverting back to independent websites again, which in my opinion is what people should have been doing all along, especially the content creators.
But owning and running an independent website is no different to owning a real world business. You have to pump money into it and promote it. You can't just hope to make something catchy for the algorithm and wait for the ad revenue to roll in.
Most content creators bought into the convenience of social media which promised to do a degree of the heavy lifting for them but is now pulling the rug from under their feet.
But why should social media and streaming services pay content creators chunks of their revenue when they can use AI generated material instead which can be churned out way more quickly than any human content creator can manage?
I believe this is why platforms like You Tube are making it more difficult for people to earn a living there. But the creators, or many of them, seem to be in denial or suffering from ignorance and delusion and refuse to accept the new state of things.
They try to adapt to the new rules but are confused when they continue facing accusations of hosing 'inauthentic content' or whatever and their channels remain demonetised.
Trying to run a commercial business on a third party streaming service is no different to operating a franchise. It's not really your business and the owners of the franchise can change the rules or pull the plug whenever they want.
There also appears to be a bit of a backlash going on against music streaming services which are being accused of exploiting and under-paying artists and are now filling play lists with AI generated content.
There seems to be a bit of a paradox happening where artists are being penalised for alleged use of AI but then the streaming services themselves are making deals with record labels who are in turn making deals with AI music generation companies.
Again it's a case of why do these streaming companies need to give a cut of their revenue to artists when they can get AI to do it for the fraction of the cost?
The way to solve the problem in my opinion isn't to try and tackle it head on or boycott AI or any of that stuff. Just merely distance yourself from it all.
If platforms like Spotify are flooding playlists with AI content then why bother hosting your music there? Independent website creation is the way to go. It's the only way real artists can take full control and make sure they aren't being leapfrogged by AI.
It's reported that 80 percent of the tracks on Spotify never get heard so you might as well build your own platform and be the ruler of your own empire rather than being a mere citizen in someone else's.
And this is where AI can help in a positive way because it's more than capable of building and tweaking websites with the right prompts. So unlike me, who had to go back to school to learn, you don't even need any web building skills.
Critical Mass mixtape
Up in the digital store right now is a brand new 'mixtape' compilation consisting of specially mixed reworked and re-edited tracks from Casey Tucker /VFT spanning the past 3 decades.
Stream the entire project for free or purchase the audio in MP3 or WAV formats for a better listening experience.
The mixtapes will come as a package including high quality audio files in either 320 kps MP3 or WAV format, a video file containing information and trivia about the tracks in the mix, plus a couple of exclusive unreleased bonus tracks. The tracks are also available to buy separately.
14 February 2025.
Celebrating 25 years online
After being partially down for the past few months I'm pleased to report that the site is now back up and running at full capacity again. The download store has been
re-opened but there have been some changes, more about these shortly.
Some visitors will have noticed that we have 'turned the lights off' as the site reverts back to its original black and green colour scheme from when it was first launched way back in the year 2000.
Other changes to the site include a more stripped down digital store with fewer tracks for sale. The plan is to remaster and compile the back catalogue tracks into a series of 'mix tapes' such as the one that has just been released for sale on this site. See article below.
The blog pages have been removed and replaced with a DJ mixes page featuring streaming audio of various old and new DJ mix sets plus a few old radio broadcast recordings from back in the day.
Many changes since 2000. . .
There have been a lot of changes in the time since this site was launched and it's hard to believe how quickly the time has gone.
This might not have been the most active or frequently updated website in the world but it has stood the test of time and predates many of the sites that are around today having been born in the web 1.0 world.
There were no such thing as social networks in the early 2000's, back then it was all about link swapping with other websites.
That was until 2005 and the advent of a site called MySpace, then a bit later on Facebook, who would go on to dethrone MySpace.
Then You Tube, Instagram and Tik Tok came along and then we have what we have today, a world where most people spend the majority of their time on social media platforms having everything they do and say monitored and censored and manipulated by algorithms. Welcome to 2025.
Three eras collide in this live mix, featuring a bunch of bass heavy bangers from around 2009/2010, mixed live at Fine Balance studio June 2026. Listen for free on the DJ mix page
Back in 2010 a new sound emerged - house music with the dirtiest nastiest basslines imaginable. They nicknamed the sound 'Fidget house'. VFT revisits those old music folders and provides a mix recorded live in June 2026.
Listen for free at the DJ mix page
