Opus Cipher: The Prototype
designation: WoO alpha
Release Date: 08.28.2007
TRACK LIST
Each track can be downloaded individually below.
Album Cover: "OCTP" - Joshua Wentz
1. "Prototype for the Neophyte" - Synthasium
2. "There we go" - Nervous Lathe Operator
3. "Instigator" - LEMMA
4. "Step Right Up: Magrathea Edition" - Mr. Glide
5. "There Is Profundity In Madness" - Carpentron
6. "Son of Man" - Chaos and the Dancing Stars
Listen to The Whole Thing!
ALBUM THEME
The theme of this album is "prototypes." Just what that means has been left up to the artist. Examples may be breaking new ground or simply stepping upon it. A test flight for test pilots. An experiment. A predecessor establishing precedence.
Not the storm, but the calm before it. Not a new day, but the predawn just before.
Songs about prototypes, on a prototype album, for a prototype project. On a prototype instrument? In a prototype genre? With prototype words from a prototype tongue spoken by prototype people?
This is Opus Cipher: The Prototype. This is music and art embracing the concept of prototype. These are The Very Us Artists joining together to show our prototype to the world.
THE DETAILS
Album Cover: "OCTP" by Joshua Wentz
1. "Prototype for the Neophyte (Always Save Your Work)" by The Synthasium 4:50 (download this track)
John LaSala, words and music
Chris Torgersen, music and words
"High on the extremely localized "success" of our first magnum opus collaboration, a staged monstrosity called Dimensional Rift, we became The Synthasium. We then spent several years meticulously piecing together the much-anticipated (by us) demo album, Prototype for the Neophyte. But just when we were ready to mix down some of the best work we'd ever done, disaster struck. A cataclysmic hard drive crash cast most of our precious music into oblivion. This was so deeply frustrating that Synthasium essentially winked out of existence for the subsequent nine years. But now, nearly a decade later, the reforged Synthasium revisits the tragic event whose occurrence most certainly altered the American musical landscape of the late 1990s (for us), through song." —The Synthasium
Chris would like to thank John for taking the rather predictable and poppy skeleton of a song he'd made and shaping it into something much weirder and more interesting. While John would like to thank Chris for coming back to NYC to help exhume this little project from its premature grave. The Synthasium thanks Kate for the good sense she brings to people who have none and Michael Keegan for conjuring up our brand new gem of a logo.
2. "There we go" by Nervous Lathe Operator 2:16 (download this track)
Will Pesta, computer
"I wanted to compose something that—in my head—sounded like the soundtrack to a successful first attempt at something. Perhaps an attempt that's just barely working, but one you know will lead to something just right very soon. I guess I wanted to evoke the sort of serene excitement something like that can make you feel as well." —Will Pesta
I would like to thank my computer for doing all of the difficult work for me.
3. "Instigator" by LEMMA 4:30 (download this track)
"This is our first attempt at a collaborative work, before we sit down and begin to compose an EP. By its very nature, this song is a prototype." —LEMMA
4. "Step Right Up: Magrathea Edition (Near Soulianis Is The Future Of Non-Rubbishness)" by Mr. Glide 5:53 (download this track)
Nick Parton, everything
"The concept came about from wondering what it would be like to be a fly on the wall at a consortium of businessmen that were potential investors in the manufacturing of a new version of Earth – a prototype for a series of new Earths, if you will. As the notion became more and more ridiculous and overblown in my fetid cerebellum soup of a brain, it seemed only fair to introduce an element of the absurd to stitch it all together. And so, Douglas Adams' fictional planet-that-engineers-new-planets, Magrathea, came into the fray. Also, the idea of it being the ultimate scam appealed to my sense of financial justice.
"I worked off the oxymoronic term 'skiffle metal' both as a way of kick-starting the writing and something partially tangible to aim for, but it just turned out... odd. I knew there would be rapping instead of singing, as my melody gland is currently exhausted. It didn't turn out too bad." —Nick Parton
Thanks to Sarah, for putting up with my general bullshit and not screaming the house down when I was still rapping like a twat at 2am.
5. "There Is Profundity In Madness" by Carpentron 8:50 (download this track)
Chris Torgersen, everything
John LaSala, a bit of co-production
"Today's cutting edge, hot new thing is tomorrow's yesterday's news. In a disposable world of disposable things, where new ideas come along faster than most people can adapt to them, how does it feel to be a discarded idea? A dead end that had once been a promising start? The former next big thing that never became the current big thing? And what if society, in its rush toward the next next big thing, overlooked the true potential of the previous next big thing. And what if that travelled along its own path to an unexpected future that would make people regret having ever ignored it?" —Chris Torgersen
"I've made it no secret that I regard Chris a genius. That his music has gone unnoticed I can only attribute to lack of exposure. But I can only imagine that once the world does catch a glimpse, it will surely take notice. Maybe not widely, but certainly deeply. So, I'd say I'm pretty honored to be the first to lend a hand in producing this, his first Carpentron song for VUA. May it be the first small step on a very long and fruitful journey." —John LaSala
I would like to thank: John for all his work and help with getting this track to sound halfway decent, and for going with this whole VUA idea; Rhonda, my wife, for returning with me to New York and putting up with my issues, and for pushing me to do this; and my boys Aidan and Jalen, who keep me grounded and make me happy when nothing else can.
6. "Son of Man" by Chaos and the Dancing Stars 9:55 (download this track)
Eric A. Radulski, words written and spoken
John LaSala, music performed and sung
"This music was sung, struck, played, and otherwise performed entirely 'by hand,' completely eschewing a sequencer, a rarity for me. In lieu of drums, I beat my chest, rattled coiled wire, rapped on a güiro, and dropped piles of butter knives... then ran them all through slews of effects, of course.
"Typically, music is scored to accompany something else, be it images, movement, or words. Rarely is it done the other way around. But here, Eric has managed to score text for established music—music which was originally scored for dance. If this prototype is any indication, Chaos and the Dancing Stars will chart a dark universe, indeed." —John LaSala
"I wanted to explore the fallibility of our gods and our belief systems as a reflection of our own mortal fallibilities. I also wanted to address my belief that many of us use gods as a shield to justify the brutalities and obscenities of war and terrorism. Finally, I wanted to explore the idea that our gods could be prototypes, in a way. As the needs of the people have evolved through the years, our gods have evolved as well. It could be argued that current myths could one day serve as the blueprint for a fully realized belief system.... Maybe there will come a time when we'll all drink the Kool-Aid and look for our own spaceships in the tail of a comet... unless we're too busy killing each other over whether we should drink the Purplesaurus Rex or the Rock-A-Dile Red." —Eric A. Radulski
Eric would like to thank John LaSala and the Very Us Artists for the opportunity to collaborate on this track, while John would like to give thanks to Noel MacDuffie, whose twisted mind and dark choreography for “Mamnum” directly inspired the disturbing music, and to Eric for giving it a new life. Chaos and the Dancing Stars heartily thanks Michael Keegan, who cooked up our logo in his very own stellar nursery.
