Cognition

Cognition
Album by Mike Shinoda
Recorded:	2020
Released:	June 4, 2021
Length:	78:49
Producer:	Mike Shinoda
Label:	Kenji Kobayashi Productions
Mike Shinoda chronology Platonic Love (2021) Cognition (2021) Ziggurats (2021)

Cognition is an instrumental album by Mike Shinoda from his CoronaJams music that he created in 2020. It is intended to be an album of quiet, instrumental music meant for sleeping.

The album was accidentally released as Sleep For Students on November 20, 2020 through Acoustic Sounds and Hoopla. It was expanded to thirty tracks and over an hour of music.

The official release happened on June 4, 2021 exclusively on the Calm app as a single track under the title Cognition. This version is mastered differently, 14 seconds longer and features some white noise in the background.

Background

In March 2020, the global pandemic created by the COVID-19 coronavirus caused communities to quarantine at home. During this time, Mike Shinoda decided to start live streaming online and inviting fans to watch him create new instrumental music.

The Cognition project began on August 28, 2020 on Twitch. A fan suggested that Mike create a long and relaxing "sleepy time" track, so Mike opened music requests for a minute and another fan redeemed the theme.

On September 9 when asked about the track, Mike said, "Yeah we're working on it, I don't have definitive news yet. But Sleepy Jam is on the horizon, I want to get it out as quickly as possible so you guys can start using it for your sleepy time music. Remember if I told you if I put it on streaming services that it'd make royalties when you listen to it? My concept is actually, I have a scholarship at ArtCenter College of Design that I funded forever ago, and I realized, 'Ah I'd really love to do something with the income from the Sleepy Time Jam that's really cool.' I want to try to send those royalties there, I want it to help fund the scholarship. When you are doing something like that, if I donate it from my royalty income, it gets taxed on the way to me and then I can donate my portion to the school. So I'm like, 'Is there a way I can do it where just donate the album itself to the school?' So if it makes $1,000, then the thousand dollars is taxed and then a portion of a thousand dollars goes to the scholarship. So I'd rather the whole thing go, if it's possible. My scholarship at ArtCenter, it's big enough for a graphics or illustration student based on financial need and merit. So they have to be really good and they have to need the money, and they need help going to school. So we'll figure it out, that's why it's taking an extra second. We aren't going to just put it up on SoundCloud or let you download the thing, I want to do something like that with it. It's complicated enough... the government doesn't want you to use charitable donation as like a tax loophole basically. So you've gotta do it the proper, legal way and I'm not super educated on how that works so we’re figuring it out. So that'll be that with the Sleepy Time Jam."

Release

On November 20, 2020, it was accidentally released as Sleep For Students, exclusively on AcousticSounds.com, for U.S. purchasers. It was taken down a few days later and appeared on the streaming service Hoopla at some point around the same time, where it remained at least until March 2021.

Mike commented on Twitch that he wanted to change the name of it and was still working out a way to release it.

On January 7, 2021 he said, "Some of you were asking about the sleepy time track. It's been getting pushed back over and over and over. It's still happening."

On February 18, 2021 he said, "Dude I put the Sleepy Track in the queue. I wanted that shit out before now. I wanted it out already. It didn't happen, it's not my fault. We're going to have to do something else with it. Watch, we're just going to have to put the whole fucking thing up on Zora. It might happen. I know you guys could rip it... and whatever you want to do with it. Should we do that? You guys could just rip that.... it's just an hour of audio. Right? It kind of leaked, it didn't really leak. SoundCloud? Wait a minute, on SoundCloud can you generate income per stream on SoundCloud? Because again, the idea was to put the Sleepy Time Track out where when you listen to it every night, it generates money for the scholarship."

On March 5, 2021 he gave another update, saying: "Sleepy time track is still being discussed. An interesting twist in the story showed up and I'm dealing with that. I can't really tell you about it. I hate that I can't tell you, but I can't."

On April 15, 2021 he finally hinted an upcoming release, saying: "It's almost ready, it's almost here".

On the release date, Mike talked about "Cognition" on Twitch: "I thought to show up and say hi, let you know that the chill/sleepy track/study track is gonna be out today. Finally, right? Big cheer for that. It took a really long time. We were gonna do it on regular streaming services and trying to get the income from that to go to my scholarship at Art Center, and that wasn't gonna work. And then we got an offer from Calm, to do it in their app, as an exclusive, and is a great fit. So here's the story about that track, so... For those who are new... Somebody requested a "sleepy" track, a "go to sleep" kind of track. And I basically did one... just like stream of consciouness track one day, where I just did very chill sounds, for the entire session. So I made it live on Twitch, somebody can send you the link if you want to see the making of it, I don't remember what day it was. I don't remember how long ended up being the final version, let's say it's an hour, I don't remember exactly how long. Here's the information, so... It's gonna be called 'Cognition'. That's gonna be the name of the track, or the name of the experience. So, 'Cognition' is gonna be available exclusively in the Calm app. You need to be a subscriber to listen to it, but they have a free 7-day trial. You might say 'Oh man! I really don't wanna subscribe to the app!', but they're giving you guys a 40% discount as members of my community here on Twitch for the annual subscription, so that's great. So it's almost half off, just use the link calm.com/mikeshinoda. And if you're not ready for that just check out 'Cognition' for the next seven days for free, and then you can see if you actually want to use it. But I like the app, it's a good app for meditation, for going to sleep to, they've got all kinds of other experiences. One of the reasons why we chose that one... I should say 'Why I chose that one'... is because they've got other stuff from other musicians, from other celebrities, notable people, whatever... They've got stuff for training your mind, for meditation... they've got nature sounds, they've got more sound design-y kind of relaxation experiences. So, if you want to check it out, go check it out. Who else is in there? Diplo is in there, with a very chill thing, not a dancing thing. LeBron James has like a... what's his called? 'Train your mind'... he also has a meditation one... So yeah, there's a bunch of folks on there who have made these very cool chill experiences."

Artwork

On September 21, 2020 on Twitch, Mike said, "Check this out! The ambient track, the sleepy track, is coming along, and a did an artwork for it, I did a cover, for the sleepy track. Fun, right? I started it black and white, and then I added a little textures on the edges, and then I started just lightning and coloring it, so I wanted it to be more sleepy and chill. Yeah, I like it, it came out pretty good. I did that this weekend. Just to show you that I haven't forgotten about it. It's happening, it's on the way. I mean, I don't know what's going to happen with it, actually!"

Track Listing

Cognition

No.	Title	Writer(s)	Length
1	Cognition	Shinoda Michael Kenji	1:19:03

Sleep For Students

No.	Title	Writer(s)	Length
1	One	Shinoda Michael Kenji	2:02
2	Two		2:44
3	Three		3:06
4	Four		2:12
5	Five		2:01
6	Six		2:06
7	Seven		4:15
8	Eight		2:25
9	Nine		3:46
10	Ten		1:50
11	Eleven		1:54
12	Twelve		2:46
13	Thirteen		1:59
14	Fourteen		3:29
15	Fifteen		3:29
16	Sixteen		3:05
17	Seventeen		2:58
18	Eighteen		1:54
19	Nineteen		3:49
20	Twenty		4:47
21	Twenty-one		2:09
22	Twenty-two		3:16
23	Twenty-three		2:07
24	Twenty-four		3:40
25	Twenty-five		1:57
26	Twenty-six		2:25
27	Twenty-seven		1:37
28	Twenty-eight		1:47
29	Twenty-nine		1:30
30	Thirty		2:11

Personnel

• Mike Shinoda

Gallery

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  Sleep For Students

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  Cognition

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  Cognition (Twitter Promo)