1 Billion Years of Rock

I recently bought an RPG by the name of Numenera. It was written and developed by a very creative guy named Monte Cook. To put him on the map as best I can, he wrote and developed the rules to the 3rd edition of Dungeons & Dragons. To explain him further, or in terms the common layman can understand, he is responsible for about %80 of virginity spanning from the early 90’s up until about 2000.

This however is not what I’m writing about (although if you’re interested I highly recommend checking it out). I merely use the game to start this idea of mine. The game is set 1 Billion years into Earth’s future. The tectonic plates have moved back into a Pangea like continent, and the people of earth live along side mutants, bio-engineered creatures, robots, and relics and technology left over from 8 great civilizations, which are now dust and ruin (or sleeping! muahaha). My favorite part of all this is the lore. The story. The history. The lay of the land. 

But something always pops into my head when I start thinking about the future, or reading a science fiction book. It’s a pretty natural thought for someone like me. I start to think about music.

Primarily I begin to think of what the music would be like! We only have 12 notes to work with, but look what we’ve done. Some cultures have even more notes in their traditional scales. It’s sort of this strange, exciting idea that is very zen in it’s nature. Like trying to imagine the sound of one hand clapping. It seem impossible to imagine what that would sound like to me, but If I really sit and think I could imagine all kinds of wacky stuff.

Most sci-fi movies, or visions of the future can be glowing, impressive landscapes of vision and thought, or they can be terrible, goofy, uninspired mistakes featuring Fores Whitaker making the worst acting choice of his career.

What amuses me is to see what music is added into a film, meaning, what music is written to represent what people are listening to IN the context of the reality of the film. Take for instance the movie Star Wars. You walk into a Cantina in Mos Eisley and a group of aliens are playing strange space Jazz, using giant instruments that look like Water Picks made out of car engine parts. Then take a movie like Starship Troopers. I remember seeing that movie when I was in 5th grade, which as far as I’m concerned might as well have been in 1976. However, every scene with music happening IN the movie was just awful. It was clearly an attempt at painting a picture of ‘future’ music but using the 90’s as the basis. The 90’s and the future just don’t mix. It didn’t even mix in 1985 when it was technically the past.

So this is kind of my never ending mental search for a movie that can present an adequate approximation of what music may be like in the future. Really we’ll never be able to tell what it will be like. No one can adequately predict what strange tones and melodies will be popular in the future. The fact that Dubstep got so wildly popular (and that many college aged kids threw their lives out the windows to pursue a career as a ‘Dubstep DJ’) was completely unpredictable, and I don’t think even Mozart or Mendelssohn in all their vast musical genius could have predicted at all, that in the future, the younger, taste-making generations of the world, would use small, but immensely powerful thinking machines to create ‘symphonies’, using digitized and electronic fart noises.

But I digress. Either way, I’m excited to see what we come up with, and I think I’ll be around (God willing) long enough to see some interesting changes in music, for worse, or for better. 

-Nik

Getting ready for Acoustic Bistro tonight. Playin’ some new songs.

My good friends Dave and Anghelika Maddalena have been a big artistic support to the band in the past, and in a very different way than you would expect. 

Anghelika’s grandfather, Spiros Vassiliou was an amazing artist who gained recognition starting in the 1930’s for his work. Spiros worked primarily with paints, along with set and prop design for theaters, and even some Greek film in the early 60’s, but when World War II hit previous, and paint was pretty much impossible to come by he turned to engravings and woodcuts. Dave showed me some of the woodcut works, and I was floored. There was so much detail in these little blocks of wood (basically used as ink-stamps) and the imagery and posturing was powerful and almost fantastical. One particular piece caught my eye.

It was of a monk, reciting prayer and blessing over a ship beset by demons. The image was so perfect in my mind, and it stuck out to me. At the time we were looking for art for our album ‘Dulce Et Decorum Est’ and I took the leap of faith and asked Dave if he could check in with Anghelika’s family about getting permission to use the piece. Spiro’s family was so gracious and kind, and said yes, and it became our album artwork for that EP.

Tonight I was at Dave’s house with Brian and my girlfriend, and as we sat in the living room, something caught my eye. It was a wooden frame/stand with Ikonography painted in the center, and in the fold out panels. It was incredibly beautiful, and I could see that it was painted by hand, and one of them wasn’t completely finished. I asked Dave what it was, and immediately begged a picture of the artwork.

For those who don’t know what Ikonography is, Dave explained it in greater detail to me. Ikonography is the artwork of the Greek Orthodox church, and depicts stories from the Bible, as well as religious figures. One cool detail he pointed out, is that at the center-bottom of each center panel, is the image of a Bishop. This was to remind faithful during prayer, to pray for the well being of their particular churches Bishop or elder. 

I asked Dave after we took the pictures “So was Spiros well known in his day?”. Dave replied rather nonchalantly and matter of fact “Oh yes, he was”. Little did I know how well known. When I read about him further last night, I found out that he received The Benaki Prize from The Athens Academy (which lead to his initial recognition), The Guggenheim Prize for Greece in 1960, and has even had his work shown IN the Guggenheim, and The National Gallery and Alexandros Soutzos Museum. His home is now a museum which is open to the public. The list goes on though.

At the start, in my brain, when I conceived of doing this blog post, it was mainly to share some really killer art that I thought was fantastic. Now, I think it also takes the tone of being humbled. Initially I just loved Spiros’ art (which is why it’s not surprising that I was so immediately drawn into his Ikon work without knowing initially who had painted it), and was hoping that it could be a part of what I do with music. Now to know that even in the most remote, fringe, distant way, we were blessed by his family, and allowed to use his art, feels pretty galactic. Meaning, it really makes you think how big our crazy world is, and the strange six degrees of separation that can occur.

A big thank you to Anghelika and her family, and a huge thank you to Spiros for his amazing art. Rest in Peace.

-Nik