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The Experiments
In which is discovered the essence of weirdness …
It is interesting to speculate on the characteristics of differing species of complimentary creative endeavour, but with the caveat that it is far more interesting to blend them — and to make of them such strange and lurid concoctions that are liable to induce an intense psychological and spiritual trauma on the part of whomsoever is exposed to their allure.
It was while I was under the excitement of this impression that I embarked upon a highly dubious enterprise for which I and my accomplices have paid a heavy price (of a kind so often described by the authors of the tomes of our experimental subject matter).
It is true that I, too, have been an author of similar if somewhat obscurer reputation than those featured here — and true also that I have stained my character after similar accessions to the phantasmagorical gratuities of spinning such unlikely yarns.
But it is also true that I have assured myself of further infamy by revealing myself to be a practitioner of a no less subtle and darker art. Which is to say that I am a member of an ensemble of notable outcasts (some of whom are alleged wizards engaging in arcane revelries and mystical tasks) who refer to themselves in the collective as 2000 Ancient Tombs …
Which is to say, again, that I am the harbinger of compositions rendered not in writing but in amassments of sound.
Together with my anonymous collaborators (known only for their habitation of the wooded hillocks and vales of the North East of Scotland) — together with these heard but unseen presences, I have busied myself in recent months with a series of experiments involving the metaphysical extraction of the essence of weirdness from selected examples of Weird Fiction — following which I have enacted their transformation through the vibratory routes of songs constructed in their image.
I cannot reveal to you the secrets of our methodology nor describe to you the scientific processes of our techniques. To do so would be to unleash a force of calamity too great in a world which already contains too many among its governments, ideologues and other such squirm-pits of human endeavour.
I can say, however, that the process has required us to investigate the primordial sub-tracts of the human cerebrum which have materialised as metaphysical projections or deposits within the semantic residue of selected works of Weird Fiction, whereupon we have pealed them back to their taproots to reveal their meta-cerebral essences of weirdness which, accordingly, we have extracted to act as the shaping force of our musical themes.
The Results
In which the results of our experiments are revealed …
1. Theme for Perdido Street Station by China Miéville
From Perdido Street Station we elicited an essence of weirdness that was consummate with an epic feel (in the true sense of the word), wherein we were bound to replicate the novel’s titanic application of detail through a fiercely abridged vocabulary of musical images.
Miéville’s weirdness is accompanied by an atmosphere that, musically, reveals itself as solid wafts within a sequence of drones.
Notable antecedents are powerfully invoked: namely, the visionary London of William Blake and the colonial London of Conrad’s Heart of Darkness. Miéville bestows on his river the magnitude of Conrad’s Thames: accordingly, our theme facilitates the fittingness of this gesture (and its meaning) with an initial phase of gargantuan watery flux.
Various elements of the urban sprawl are conveyed within the general essence of weirdness — in words as in sounds — inclusive of the infinite prattle and mundane operations of a city that exists in contrast to its gritty extravagances of political corruption, its criminal underbelly, its slake moth scenes and Bohemian raconteur.
Our musical theme, like the novel, is characterised by its mutability that follows a path of changes rather than repetitions.
Importantly, our theme incorporates the infinite sorrow of the slake moths underlying their excessive dream-thirst and their hallucinogenic savagery.
2. Theme for ‘How the World Became Quiet: A Post-Human Creation Myth’ by Rachel Swirsky
‘How the World Became Quiet …’ produces an essence of weirdness that arises from its unique blend of simplicity with the complexities of its poetic manifestations of ironic loss within natural cycles of war.
The abundance of inherent musicality in the story has lent itself quite readily to a melodic emphasis that has assumed an effortless congruity within the structures we have provided for it.
Notable also is the passion of the piece through which its visionary appetites are expressed with consummate forcefulness, and which we have replicated, in turn, via the passionate intonations of a vehicle suited to the task — a cello.
We have aimed at capturing the essence of a weirdness which, indeed, is visionary rather than merely alluring and which combines a powerful sense of whimsy with an apocalyptic dread that succumbs, overall, to a definite pitch of tragic irony.
3. Theme for ‘Procession of the Black Sloth’ by Laird Barron
Arcane terrors and splendours released within a modern setting are perhaps the most terrifying and splendid of all, given the weight of their pastness — their inherent mystique — when pitted in relation to an average human lifespan, whereupon they are liable to seem infinite and overwhelming.
History contains mysteries for which it is a principal source of the unknown: it comes to us in disjointed rhythms and in absences of meaning which inform us of ideas without making any measure of sense.
Is there anyone better equipped at capturing the essence of this particular blend of weirdness than Laird Barron? Not according to our experiments, no.
Our musical theme for this blend is possessed of an utter failure to piece together a logical picture of reality, which is described in the song’s inability to properly assimilate the sum of its parts. Consequently, it fails to uphold the coordinations of its rhythms and riffs, managing only to aspire to the inevitability of its descent into an uttermost doom.
4. Theme for The Narrator by Michael Cisco
There is little we can say about the essence of weirdness in relation to Cisco. It simply is and, therefore, is an archetypal weirdness which, because it has no equal, is also atypical.
No other such type of weirdness exists.
Yet, The Narrator incorporates so many different essences of weirdness that our musical theme was compelled to enter a series of transgressive states of musical distemper, with emotional targets hinging on a decidedly neurotic impulse — except for the fact that, with Cisco, the neurotic impulse is also quite beautiful.
Our treatment of the reproduction of the effects of The Narrator also reflects on the fact that, when you enter the mindscape of Michael Cisco, your first response is to be amazed while your second response is to be even more amazed.
Truly, MC is the only writer for whom the critical descriptor of “Kafkaesque” truly applies.
The Lasting Effects
In which the effects of our experiments upon our personalities are discussed …
I have neglected to say thus far that, as part of the process, it was necessary for members of 2000 Ancient Tombs (not unwillingly) to store the captured essences of weirdness within the core of our own brains, given that these essences can only exist within the metaphysical dimensions of thought or imagination and the instinctive drives known (insufficiently) as “emotions”.
From there, we enabled them to take form through our conscious application of their impetus through the acoustic and digital outlets of our instrumentations, before assigning them to a condition of permanence within the apparatus of their digital capture.
Prior to this, it is true, we tested our process on a range of animals, which resulted in the deaths of six rats, four mice and three monkeys, several of whom committed suicide by squeezing their heads between the bars of their enclosures and thrashing their bodies in order to break their necks, perfected at such moments when we had removed ourselves from the laboratory to partake of our nocturnal compunctions.
There was evidence, then, to persuade us from taking the actions we took: but the incentives were irresistible.
Suffice to say that our period of perilous intimacy with these specimens of Weird Fiction has taken a subsequent toll on us in the form of strange sensations, agitations and tendencies towards behaviours we’d rather not discuss too openly.
These behaviours have since converged upon the production of a song whose standard rhythms belie a moral abandonment of the senses and a stark potential for lewd dancing manoeuvres on the part of the listener; not to mention a significant desire for actual nakedness and a pornographic fervour that might best be described not as music but as Hard Weird.
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