Meet the man constructing an immersive soundscape for Lord of the Rings, Jordan Rannells!

Jordan Rannells has a great love for Tolkien and collaborative experiences that further the enjoyment of Tolkien's worlds. Learn what inspired Jordan to delve into Tolkien and what continues to fuel his passion for Middle-earth!

You'll love Jordan's passion for bringing Tolkien's words to life! 

Be sure to visit his website here! 

We hope you enjoy this interview and let us know what you think!
What did you learn, and how did hearing from Jordan inspire you?

Interview Transcript:

Leah: “Well, thank you so much for being here, Jordan. I’m really pleased to be meeting you face-to-face and we've been trying to get in touch—you were trying to get in touch with me—so here we are. We're finally in the flesh, face-to-face, sort of. So, Jordan Rannells, tell us a little bit about what you do. What is your mission and purpose in life right now, and how does that tie into the Tolkien community and this love of that world?”

Jordan: “Yeah, there's—first off, thanks for having me. I'm excited to chat with you and meet you. And yeah, I've got a bunch of stuff on the go. As I always do. I am editing episodes for the Prancing Pony Podcast. I work on my own podcast called The Music of Middle Earth, where I break down every theme from Howard Shore from the movies and kind of discuss how it was built and things like that. And I also am working on a very big Kickstarter project that was successfully funded, which was awesome. And basically what that is, I'm creating a kind of accompaniment for reading the books.

So it's going to have sound design, original score that I'm going to write, all these elements that are going to be kind of presented in 3D audio so that you can put headphones on, sit down and read the book and have all these things happen around you, like horse hooves kind of galloping in the background, the creeks of Fangorn Forest, and the Balrog in Moria and things like that. So I'm super excited for that, and that is gonna be finished for Tolkien Reading Day next year, so.”

Leah: “That is so cool and exciting. And I have to ask, because I was just looking into this. I'm working on my album, my fifth, sixth album right now. And I was looking into this type of mixing, this 360 type of mixing. Like, are you doing like Sony 360 or one of those types of newer technology?”

Jordan: “Yeah, definitely. I'm mixing it in Dolby Atmos.”

Leah: “Ah!”

Jordan: “Yeah. I have all the, kind of, gadgets for that. And it's quite the experience that I hope to build. And I've done some tests of it on my Music of Middle Earth podcast and it's worked out well, but this is the first time that I'm going to be able to have time to research everything. You know, I'm going chapter by chapter saying, okay, you know, Gandalf's fireworks. How many, what do they sound like? Things like that. Going into, as Tolkien deserves, the kind of detail that—the most detail that I can manage, like when we're in the scenes close to Boromir's death, do you hear Rauros in the distance? And how far away is it, and how loud would it be if you could hear it, things like that.

So, all these kind of micro details to try and bring the experience to life. And I'm really excited about the potential of various ways it can be used. So I've talked with a bunch of people that have backed the project and you know, their own enjoyment of it, but also thinking of playing it for classrooms to get kids to experience the story that way. You could have the soundscape play and have teachers reading while the soundscape is on, or you could, you know, have a family moment where you put it on and you all read it together kind of thing. And just cool stuff like that I'm excited to see how people take it and use it.”

Leah: “That is really exciting. And as you know, I'm all about immersive experiences and like trying to—because we don't want to, we don't want a two dimensional experience anymore. We want, you know, 10 dimensional if that's possible, right. We want all the senses involved. And so audio is so powerful. And I also think that the sense of smell is super powerful. They're all powerful. They really are. Next thing, you know, we'll be like—someone's going to have to start a bakery or something like a second workers bakery, so we can eat it while we're listening, while we're burning the candles, while we're doing the whole thing. Right. We want to feel like we're there.”

Jordan: “Yeah. Yeah. And I—my thoughts, you know, in these last few years with the kind of advancement of this Atmos tech and things like that, is that I've said this a lot and people will hear me say this a lot is that I just don't believe that audio book publishers, we’ll say, are being brave enough and daring enough with what it could be. And I think that if this is received well, you know, I would love for it to be a jumping off point for publishers to say, wow, you know, what if this soundscape did have voices for each character and it was performed dramatically and things like that, because of the kind of point of how I'm doing it is that you are the narrator still.

So it doesn't have voices in it that are reading the actual text. I mean, I can skirt around that a little bit with, you know, having, you know, maybe some elements of Tom Bombadil kinda humming or singing or whatnot in the background, and it'll still work. Same with the Ents. You know, you can have Ents kind of ‘speaking’ in the background still, just not using actual elements of the text, but it does make me hope that something like this, you know, you imagine the experience you could have, if some, if each character was an individual actor that was hired to do each part. And I really think that if Lord of the Rings were to do that, then everything would switch to that kind of presentation.

Like, I love Game of Thrones and I would imagine that kind of thing would be amazing as well or Dune or something like that, and I just don't think that it's being pushed as far as it could be. And I hope that I can, I dunno, in some small way help push it towards that. So.”

Leah: “That's a really good— as a musician myself, my brain goes wild with that too. I'm not a soundscape creator, but you can imagine—well, there's already a lot of playlists out there for D&D and things like that. People want background music to help set the right atmosphere. And the right tone. One question I have is, do you have to be reading at a certain pace for the music to work, or is it going to be like an infinite loop or something?”

Jordan: “The perfect question. The answer is that each chapter is specific. So the things, the sounds, the music, et cetera, that you hear are specific to that chapter, there won't be anything looped, which means, you know, when you're listening to it, when you get to a certain point, you know, you'll hear Tom Bombadil in the background because that's his chapter, and this is the music that goes with him. And themes that hit when he's around, that kind of thing. Now that does raise the question of, you know, what if I read quicker or slower or whatever, what's the deal with that. And my initial point to make sure that people know is, first off, I'm going to do a, how to listen, little kind of pamphlet that's going to be released with it, because you kind of, as you would imagine, you have to want it to work. First of all. And if you do that, then you can choose from one of my three speeds that I'm going to have. So I'm going to have one speed that will match Andy Serkis’s audiobook. So if you wanted to play both of them at the same time, you could, and they would sync up perfectly with each other. So that's kind of the moderate reading speed version. But I will have a super slow version for people like me, that take forever and want to take forever reading, and then I'll have a faster version.

So the idea is basically that you just kind of have to figure out the one that fits with your flow, and then, you know, while we watch movies and things like that, you're guided by music in ways that you don't even realize. And I'm sure that I can, you know, end a cue to tell you to take a breather before you know, just dive right into the next paragraph, you know, take a second and think about what you just read and the cue will end. And then off we go into the next thing. So I think that I can guide people pretty well if they're willing and I think they will be with something like this.”

Leah: “Wow, that's really cool. I can't imagine how many hours this has taken you to put together. Like half your life, maybe?”

Jordan: “Well, yeah, I am in the midst of research right now. So I'm going chapter by chapter and just outlining everything. And this is a good point to highlight as well that, you know, Aragorn throws his sword down at the council of Elrond. I might not have specifically that sound in there because that would mean that you would need to read it and hear it exactly at that point. Right. So it doesn't necessarily lend itself to moments like that. But, you know, if you hear 20 seconds of hooves running in the distance, then it's going to work because you're generally going to be around that area. You know what I mean? So I call it kind of soft timing effects where it's not like right now this moment, this sound exactly now.”

Leah: “Because if you're like several paragraphs behind it and you're like, wait, I'm not there.”

Jordan: “Yeah. And it'll give you an instant kind of like, oh, where am I? But—there are things that I'm going to line out like that in my, kind of, how to listen guide, I'm going to have, you know, various time code, timestamps, to just kind of get you used to, if you're reading at the right speed or if you've chosen the right speed to read with, you know, like in chapter one—or, is it chapter one or chapter two—it should be chapter one where, you know, those fireworks go off and things like that. You know, if you're, you know, 30 seconds away from that and you hear them go off, then maybe you should choose a different speed, but it'll take a little bit of learning at the beginning, but I think that once you kind of find your pace, I don't think people fluctuate in their reading speed too much. And again, once I get to a point where it's finished, then you can kind of feel it guide you. And I think it’ll work well, really. So, yeah.”

Leah: “Very cool. I have a couple other questions. Well, first of all, congratulations, because is your campaign actually complete?”

Jordan: “Yes.”

Leah: “It is. Well, you did really—you went, you went over what you were trying to raise, correct?”

Jordan: “Yeah. I think, I think I ended up—I definitely ended up over 120% funded, so that's really cool. Let me see. I haven't checked in awhile, so my memory is a little bit iffy and I probably won't be able to find it quickly. So…”

Leah: “But you know, that's just, I mean, the fact that you raise the amount you were going for and went over, that tells you, hey, like people are excited about this project and that's really the goal. And must make you feel really good to have that success so far, just at the beginning of this project.”

Jordan: “Yeah, yeah. It actually ended up getting to 165%, which is really cool. Yeah. So that's exciting, but it's also, you know, I'm kind of the type of person that's always, maybe unfortunately, thinking about what's next. So, you know, I already have plans after this to do The Hobbit and, you know, parts of me really want to do, like I said, it would be amazing to do A Song of Ice and Fire and, you know, some of the moments in that would be insane, but, you know, it would also be really interesting to do Dune or, you know, some SciFi stuff or something, but anyways, so apparently there's interest for it. So that's really cool and I'm excited for people to listen to.”

Leah: “Yeah. So can you tell me in like a minute or so, what got you interested in Tolkien to begin with? What was the path that led you to even doing any of this to begin with?”

Jordan: “I think all of my thanks have to go kind of directly in one person's kind of influence, which is Phil Dragash, who did the unofficial audiobooks of the Lord of the Rings. And he added Howard Shore's music and he added sound effects and everything like this and did all the voices and the voices sounded like they were from the movies. So, you know, I think I had seen Fellowship or maybe Fellowship and Two Towers or something like that. I can't really remember. But then I discovered the audiobooks and I was like, wow, this is like the extended, extended, extended version of the movies, you know, everything's there. And, but all the characters sound the same because that's the way that Phil did it.

And so that's kind of how I first went through the books, actually, it was through those audio books and yeah, watching the making of, and appendixes for the Lord of the Rings movies, that kind of like seeing John Howe do his thing and Alan Lee and, you know, the sound designers and stuff like that just got me really interested in how things are made and it kind of cascaded from there to here.”

Leah: “Wow. That's very cool. What do you think people struggle with the most when they are first introduced to the world of Tolkien?”

Jordan: “That's a good question. What I see a lot that I think could be potentially a struggle is people kind of being shown or told that they should love every second of it and that they must understand that this is the best thing ever. And I think that's not helpful. I think that people need to discover it on their own and in their own way. And that's why I'm super excited for the show that's coming out and I love the movies and I've never had the mentality of movies versus books and what's, you know, acceptable or something like that. I just don't think of it that way.

And I don't think—it's fine if you think that way, but don't think it's fine to tell someone that they must enjoy it when they're just starting, because I'll, you know, I'll be honest. The Silmarillion is not my favorite book and it won't be because of how it's written. And again, not to say that it's bad or anything, but it's just not what I like the most. And that should be fine too. And you should be able to read Lord of the Rings the first time and say, you know, maybe I didn't like the intro because it took forever to do anything. And I love book one of Fellowship, and I would read till the end of it and start over if I could.

And I would just, you know, spend all my time there, but that's, you know, some people don't want that type of book and it's, I think it's important that it's fine either way. And, you know, there's a lot of stuff about pronunciation and things like that and whatever, and I think that it's just, you know, it's all good. Just, just enjoy it or not. And yeah, if I had to give any piece of advice, I guess if you can call it that it would be to, you know, enjoy the parts that you want and that you enjoy. And if you don't, then it's fine. And the thing that I have seen in the music world sometimes is this, kind of we're in this group and we all get it and, oh, don't worry, you'll get it.

One day you'll understand, you know, how good this is. And we all kind of have these kind of in-jokes and whatever, and we appreciate how good it is and you'll get there. But when you do that, it puts that person in a weird position where, what if they are honest with themselves and are like, I don't know if I like—this Treebeard chapter’s weird. It's like, it's so long. And it's so nothing. That's like moving the plot forward, you could say, and again, that's my favorite chapter, but, like, that point of view should also be fine. And you shouldn't say, well, you know, don't worry one day. You'll appreciate it. It's like, it's okay if you don't appreciate it.

And if it's not your favorite, and if you'd rather just, you know, skip to Helm's Deep and enjoy that instead. So, yeah, I think that's what I would say is you can enjoy it to different amounts and it doesn't have to be the best thing ever. There's plenty of days where I would much rather, you know, read Game of Thrones or, you know, read a Marvel comic or something like that, you know, there's days where I would much prefer that and where I connect to it a lot more and that should be fine too. “Tolkien shouldn't be this, like, pinnacle of experience and nothing can top it. So that's just my thoughts.”

Leah: “Yeah. No, that's really good advice. Really good. And I think helpful for people—there's like, as you know, with Rings of Power coming out and stuff, there's going to be a lot of brand new fans who were introduced, not through the books at all, but through the show. And that's going to be their first glimpse of that world and of the characters. And, you know, there's going to be, what I think could be confusing, might be all the new characters potentially where they're like, okay, so what's in the books. What's not in the books. It might be potentially confusing. Do you think that could be problematic for people? Or do you just say, Hey, just enjoy it all and read the books later. You'll sort it out. Like, what do you think about that?”

Jordan: “Oh, I think that Rings of Power is an interesting scenario, because, you know, if we get five seasons of excellent TV, which I am strongly inclined to believe we will, with everything considered and everything that I've heard about it, we get five awesome seasons, 50 hours worth of great TV. And then someone goes to read the books. What are you reading? A couple pages from the appendices, some kind of things here and there in The Unfinished Tales, maybe some things that are alluded to in The Silmarillion, but not directly stated because we can't do that because we don't have the rights. So what's—my kind of comment on that might be, what's the big deal anyways? There's no—you know, when people are like, oh, they're not going to follow the lore or whatever. That's because there isn't any lore directly to follow. There's no like chapter one, these are all the things that happened. It's like a couple sentences in the Tale of Years. So, you know, it's going to be—people keep labeling. I keep seeing people label it as fan fiction. And my answer is, of course it is because Tolkien didn't write it. So, and it's a show, so yeah, it's going to be fan fiction. So was Peter Jackson's movies. That's just what it is. And that's fine. It's fine either way. And I think that no matter what, if one shot from the show, gives someone an inkling to be like, hmmm, what's this book about? And then they open one. And again, they're probably going to go to the Lord of the Rings.

So it makes sense that they—that Amazon put those covers on the Lord of the Rings. That's what people are going to go to. And that's what people should go to first, because people are going to, if someone, if someone watches Rings of Power and then heads over to the store and buys themselves Unfinished Tales, they're going to be like, what in the world is this? It doesn't make any sense. And it's not really a book. It's not a storybook, is what I mean. And so they might be disappointed and say, well, I'm just going to go back to the show because I don't know what this is.

And so I hope that those people will eventually find their way to Lord of the Rings or The Hobbit, and that will eventually grow into, you know, appreciating more of the content or not. And I think that's the important thing is, you know, you can enjoy as much as you want of all of it and, you know, history of Middle-earth and, you know, all these like really tangential type of things. And, and that's cool, but it's also cool to like watch part one of Fellowship of the Ring and be like, this is great. And, and just enjoy it for that. And so I think that Rings of Power has an interesting job, because it will be so much made up stuff.

And it has to be. There's no way it couldn't be. And some people might say, well, why are they doing it? And it's like, because I'm sure there's great stories to tell. And just because it didn't come directly from Tolkien's hand doesn't mean it can't be good still. And that's really what the show is hinging on. If it's done well, then it'll be fine. If it's done mediocrely or badly, then it'd be a bad time. Yeah. It's the same thing. Like if you watch not the latest, latest seasons of Game of Thrones, because it gets a little bit iffy there, but the early seasons of Game of Thrones where they don't follow George exactly. It's fine because it's still so good. Right. So I think that's what the show is hinging on.

And it's interesting because we have these two shows, Rings of Power and House of the Dragon that are both creating from outlines, right. Fire and Blood, the show that—or the book that show’s based on is also just, you know, a little bit more detailed outside, but still kind of a loose outline. And so it has to be made up. And I think that the big thing is if it's done well, then it's done well and people will accept it. And I think if it's done kind of faithfully, then people will accept it. And I think everything that I've heard at least is showing that it will be, so.”

Leah: “Yeah, let's hope, right? And at the end of the day, like you said, it's a, it is fan fiction. That's a great way to look at it. It's like, Hey, we always have the books. They're always there and people can go back there and hopefully it creates more discovery and further love for that author and the world.”

Jordan: “Yeah. And nobody's ever gonna—you know, people have said this before, but no, Amazon guy is coming to your house and taking pages out of your books, it's never going to alter that. So, you know, don't need to worry about it and.”

Leah: “People can calm down.”

Jordan: “I think that's the—that's my kind of take on it is that it's not that big of a deal, so.”

Leah: “Yeah. Tell me, who do you really look up to in the Tolkien community and why?”

Jordan: “I could answer that with a lot of names, Alan and Sean, from the Prancing Pony Podcast and, you know, Corey Olsen and James Tauber and all these people. If I had to choose one person, I would probably choose John Howe though. I had the, kind of, honor of working on an audio book with John Howe, and it's an audiobook version of his fantasy art academy book. And I added sound design and things like that and music to it, which was a lot of fun.”

Leah: “That is so cool!”

Jordan: “Yeah. And got to work with him and things like that. And that was really an awesome experience. But like I said, back when I first started watching the appendices, the making of, for the Lord of the Rings, John Howe’s kind of passion and his approach to things and whatnot. And his, I think more than anything, his interest in the details of things is kind of what sparked my interest in—is really, I think what will help you delve deeper in a Tolkien that interest in the small things. And so I think that I have John Howe’s kind of attitude to thank for a lot of my interest in a lot of things. Really.”

Leah: “Wow. That's cool. So is he in your, like, your contacts, you guys text each other?”

Jordan: “I mean, I message him on Facebook, but he's obviously very busy and it's mostly about that audiobook.”

Leah: “But that’s awesome.”

Jordan: “I mean, one of my kind of non-Tolkien influences who's kind of at that same level as John is Victor Wooten, the kind of incredible bassist, virtuoso bassist, and I've had equal experiences with John and with Victor in that I've met Victor, I've been to his house, I've, you know, volunteered at his camps a lot and things like that. And the awesome moments of having a chat with these people. And, you know, it's a kind of a cliche, but realizing, you know—it's just, you know, the first day I met Victor, we played ping pong together kind of thing. And it's just like a normal, you know, whatever day and it's not a big deal to them.

And it doesn't have to be a big deal to me either, even though they're—they are big deals, you know, but they're just normal people when you're just hanging out. And of course they are, but it's really nice that kind of two of my idols or whatever you want to call them, I've had the same experience where they're both, you know, super down to earth and humble. And you know, when I did that audio book with John Howe, it was very, like, I sent him a message and said, I think this would be really cool. And he sent me a message back and said, that does sound cool. We should talk about it.”

Leah: “Seriously. Like, did you just approach him like that?”

Jordan: “Yes.”

Leah: “Wow.”

Jordan: “Yeah. That's kind of how I've done a few things in life and it's worked out that way. Sometimes you just gotta ask and…”

Leah: “For real.”

Jordan: “So yeah, I would choose John Howe and just his whole attitude and creative energy. I think.”

Leah: “That's fantastic. Good for you. Like, it's also inspiring to hear like, hey, sometimes you gotta make a bold move, a bold ask. And, cause if you don't ask, you know, you—I forget what the saying is, but it's like you—I dunno, some sport analogy that I don't know—it's like, you know, like you miss all the shots you don't take or something like that. So now that's really cool. To date, what are you most proud of?”

Jordan: “In the Tolkien world?”

Leah: “Just in your life!”

Jordan: “I think that not including the soundscape, I'm really happy with how that John Howe audiobook came out, but I think I'm just proud of—I think I'm just proud of the fact that I get to be part of these things. I remember again, I'm going to keep going back to this cause it was apparently such a catalyst for everything, but watching the appendices and things like that. I just loved how the team got to go and do this thing that was really amazing together.

And that's why, you know, The Hobbit movies are not as highly regarded, we'll say as the Lord of the Rings movies and that's fine, but watching the making of, for The Hobbit movies, I just love it still because of the team effort that went into making it happen and being part of the Prancing Pony Podcast and it’s a lot like that where it's like, this is, you know—I'm not on the podcast, I'm the editor, but to be part of it and be able to know that, you know, in I dunno how many years, like six years or something crazy when they're finally done to be able to look back at that and say, wow, that was a cool thing that affected a lot of people. And I was, you know, in some way attached to it, that's kind of what I think I'm most proud of. Is that being part of some project or something like that. That means something to some people.”

Leah: “Absolutely. It's like part of legacy now. So that's very cool. And equally, I'm going to ask an opposite question. What makes you scared or worried right now?”

Jordan: “Totally sounds egotistical to say—I don't really worry about things though. I, and that sounds really obnoxious, but I just don't really worry about things. If I were to maybe try and choose something, it might be if I can get to the deadline of the soundscape on time, but I'm not really, I'll make it happen somehow.”

Leah: “You sound like a true creator. Cause that's how I think. It's like, I don't know. It's like driving on a road at night with your headlights on. I can see 20 feet in front of me. I don't know what's after that. That's okay. Cause we're not there yet. When we get there, it'll shine on the road and then I'll know.”

Jordan: “Yeah. And I just, for a long time have just looked into a lot of Daoism stuff and I released an album about, kind of music that was made with a Daoist mentality in mind, which was a fun experiment. Totally different conversation though. But yeah, for a while, I've just always thought about that kind of thing and how like, it just doesn't matter yet and I'll deal with it when it matters. And I'm, I think that the, you know, that's easy for me to say, but I think the difference is that I'm confident enough in my problem solving ability that I know that when something happens, I can deal with it in some way, but also being okay with not dealing with it.

Like if something happens and I can't deal with it, then it's still going to be a thing that happens. And then the next day is going to come. So, you know, like it doesn't—it sounds again kind of obnoxious to say, but it doesn't really matter. One of my old bosses from the music school I used to teach at used to say, if it doesn't—if it's not going to matter in 20 years, then why are you spending even 20 minutes worrying about it?”

Leah: “Oh I love that. So good.”

Jordan: “So, things like that I just keep in mind, because, yeah.”

Leah: “Perspective.”

Jordan: “Yeah. It’s all good.”

Leah: “Puts everything in perspective. That’s awesome.”

Jordan: “I was going to say—that’s the same mentality I’m thinking of with these shows coming out. If it’s good, it’s good. If it’s not, then that’s fine. We’ll just roll on. And either way, some people put a lot of effort into being creative for these shows. And I think that that matters more than anything else. And there's another music teacher that I met at Victor's camp in Nashville, really amazing teacher, and this guy, Michael, he said, really, it's the kind of presence of somebody in front of you offering up their ability in some way that matters more than any—what he said was any means of comparison that you can think of. So, you know, this guitar player is better than this one because he's faster or what not, none of that matters. It just matters that that person was there and put themselves out to you and tried to do something. And the outcome is a different thing. But you know, I think that what matters is the presence of someone in front of you trying and that's it just trying.”

Leah: “Yeah. I love that. That's great. I love your thought process on this. And also really, like you're not stressed out about your projects or anything. It's like, Hey, like this is all going to happen. It's going to come to fruition. I feel confident in the journey of this. And I can tell, I can hear that in your voice. I think that's going to come through in your work and it's coming through your attitude. I love that. I think that we need a lot more of that. I love your perspective.”

Jordan: “Thank you. I think that it's a lesson that Tolkien's trying to teach us, and that's why I always point out that my two favorite chapters are In the House of Tom Bombadil and Treebeard, because those are the chapters that tell us that like, hey, it's not really about the destination that we're going to. It's about spending time here in the story. And you know, if we're going to spend two hours in a Tolkien chapter, or, sorry, in a Treebeard chapter, then that's cool. Like we're just here for the story, not for the finish line. And I would encourage people again that are new Tolkien to try and understand that it's not really about the plot.

It's about—you know, we spend the first book and, you know, screwing around the Shire, not doing much in quotation marks, ‘not doing much,’ but because I think Tolkien is trying to tell us to slow down and enjoy it. And I think that's—”

Leah: “We need that.”

Jordan: “Not to get too philosophical here, but that's what I think about with life as you just have to enjoy the journey. And I think that's what Tolkien is trying to say.”

Leah: “That is fantastic. I really thank you for sharing those thoughts. That's great. And I think I'm really looking forward to hearing your soundscapes and this whole project come to life. I think that it's really a wonderful endeavor, so yeah. Can you just tell people where they can—where would you like people to check out what you're doing, and is there any way they can continue to support this project? Or what would you have people do?”

Jordan: “Yeah, there's a few things. Like I said, if—I mean, if you haven't checked out the Prancing Pony Podcast, you gotta do that. My podcast is Music of Middle-earth. I'm actually in the process of getting all of the earlier episodes kind of re-mastered in a way, because I was kind of at that point, I was—I didn't have the newest or the best samples that I have now. So I would like to redo those. But if you were going to go check out that podcast, look up the council of Elrond episode. It's the Council of Elrond in its entirety with a full kind of volunteer cast, sound effects, and everything like that. Put some headphones on and enjoy that, cause we spent a lot of time on it and it was, I think it was really cool.

You can go to my website, JordanRannells.com. It has some of the artwork that I do for this Etsy store that I work on. So there's some Tolkien stuff there, bookmarks and whatnot. And then, yeah, there's details on the soundscape there, it'll lead you to the Kickstarter where you can read about everything and if you're interested in it, then you can send a message to me on Facebook. There's a page for it. Or you can just get it through the website. There's a pre-order that's up there now as well.”

Leah: “Awesome. That is great. Thank you so much. I'm sure people are gonna just be over the moon when they discover. So, you know, we have an audience and I think they're going to be just so excited to discover that this even exists. So really hope that you get some more fans and yeah, this has been amazing. Thank you so much.”

Jordan: “Thank you. Thank you. It's been a lot of fun.”