The First 10,000 Hours: Building the Vesper Media Labs Empire in 2.5 Months

If you had told me three months ago that I would have created and released over 300 songs, launched two YouTube channels, and built a system to do this every single week, I would have called you crazy. This isn't a story about a viral hit. It's a story about systems, consistency, and a little bit of stubbornness.

Welcome to the Vesper Blueprint. This is the story of how it started.

The Spark: A Pension Gap and a Bigger Dream

It all began with a simple, sobering Excel sheet. Like many people, I faced a pension gap. But I didn't see a problem; I saw a project. The goal was clear: build a digital asset that could generate €1,500 per month within a decade.

But this was never just about money. It was about freedom. The freedom for my partner to work one less day per week. The freedom to travel more. The freedom that comes from knowing you are building your own future, brick by digital brick.

I had two decades of experience in fitness and mindfulness coaching, and a lifelong love for music. The idea was to merge them into something functional. I wasn't trying to become a rockstar; I was aiming to become a digital utility.

The Engine Room: Building the Audio Assembly Line

The first pillar was audio. The goal was, and still is, 1,200 tracks per year. To do that, you can't rely on inspiration. You need an assembly line.

• Week 1: I uploaded my first track to DistroKid. The feeling of seeing my music on Spotify and Apple Music for the first time was surreal. It was no longer an idea; it was a product on the global shelf.

• The Stack Took Shape: Suno AI for rapid ideation and composition. My original input (coaching cues for tabata timers, singing, beatboxing, sounds and sound effects for social songs and more) for original creativity. BandLab for arrangement and final touches. LANDR for AI-powered mastering. DistroKid for distribution. This became a non-negotiable weekly cycle.

• The Three Audio Pillars Emerged:

  1. Vesper Audio Labs: Tabata and HIIT timer songs.

  2. Milkyway Drift / Seoul Sleep Radio: Hopecore and Dreamcore soundscapes.

  3. Social Media Songs: Short, funny, viral-ready tracks in multiple languages.

The numbers started to stack up. 124 tracks in the first month. 123 the next. The system was working.

The Expansion: Becoming a Media Company

Audio was the foundation, but I knew the real scale was in video. YouTube, with its potential for higher revenue, was the obvious next frontier. But this meant building a second production engine from scratch.

• Vesper Mind Labs: This channel became the home for the mental wellness audio. I started with simple, looped nature videos. I battled through the infamous "YouTube upload hell," learning to re-render videos by adding a single second to fix glitches. The first 1-hour video felt like a monumental achievement. Now, producing six per week is the standard.

• Timer Lord: This channel gave the Tabata music its visual component. Creating the timer graphics was a nightmare of manual keyframing... until it wasn't. I built a template. It broke. I built a better one. This process of building, breaking, and improving became the rhythm of growth.

In two months, these channels went from ideas to libraries housing dozens of long-form assets.

The First Signs of Life

You know you're on the right track when the outside world starts to signal back.

• An email from Apple Music showed my Tabata songs were being used in workouts from Milan to Moscow.

• I discovered my Halloween songs were being used in Instagram Reels.

• DistroKid sent me a statement. It was for one dollar. It was the most valuable dollar I've ever earned—proof that the machine was not just running, but beginning to produce.

Why I'm Telling You This

This is just the beginning. I'm writing this not because I have all the answers, but because the journey itself—the systems, the failures, the small victories—is a blueprint.

This blog will be the ongoing log of this build. I'll share the data, the workflows, the templates, and the lessons learned.

The mission remains: To create functional music and video content that helps you be more human. And in doing so, to build a life of greater freedom and purpose.

The next chapter is about scaling, optimizing, and documenting the process every step of the way.

If you're building something too, whether it's an empire or a side project, I hope this story gives you one thing above all: the permission to start.

Take a peek at this Tabata Timer New Wave Rock album. Even better, let's do a tabata on one of the songs, I suggest air squats and sit-ups: click here

Renato, Vesper Media labs