The Rat Race

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Time is the measurement of all motion according to a standard. The truth though is that time measures the movement of the Earth around the Sun and this measurement divided into ever smaller increments becomes seconds, minutes, hours, days, weeks, and years. Age too makes its impact on our lives as time affects the condition of our bodies in addition to our use and maintenance or lack thereof. But nothing can prevent our age from catching up with us no matter how well we treat our bodies, over time age, bad habits, poor eating, genetic predisposition, and hygiene, will break down the body and stop it from functioning.

The ticktock of time is accentuated in The Rat Race as it impresses the listener with the silent pressure that clocks and schedules provide to working people. Every second is a moment either invested wisely or wasted, never to return, time lost and never regained. Beginning in an appropriate minimalistic style, The Rate Race quickly adds elements that float around the main minimalistic riff. Without a clear tempo, the listener has to rely on the pulse provided by several song elements such as the downbeat on the multitracked guitars and strumming.

Whether we’re overworked, stressed with the kids, or frustrated with other people and our conflicts with them, life is full of friction and can become unbearable by forcing us to adopt the mindset that we’re in a kind of prison of craziness apparently out of our control. The Rat Race tries to represent this chaos of drama by showing this combination of elements in a cloud of sound that goes in different directions and different speeds. Some elements are slow and relaxed, spaced far apart and reappearing at varying intervals of time unpredictably. While other elements are constant, quick moving, and altering their activity in rapid sequences of change.

Change too is a factor that calls our attention to time. Basically, time is the change of objects and people through space, which produces time, and as such The Rat Race demonstrates this with all of its sonic components colliding with one another in chance events occurring in an unplanned manner, you know, just like life. How often does it occur where one of our plans are thwarted or come to fruition in a version we had not foreseen? Change is inevitable and events emerge spontaneously as the motion of time waits for no one.

Another interesting feature of time and change is the development of opportunities. As things remain in motion they sometimes align into a fortuitous series of events that benefit us or those around us. Even unfortunate events oddly enough can sometimes push us into circumstances that are not totally harmful. Even in adversity there is much to be gained, a lesson to be learned, and even if a bad thing happens some good can come of it. Sometimes we can anticipate such moments as when we “feel lucky” or somehow interpret a day as possessing a particularly useful quality where things are working for us and not against us, perhaps, a day filled with good omens or signs leading to a positive result on the order of a “sure thing.”

Every day, these factors of time - the motion and change of objects and people into certain alignments forming opportunities - reveal themselves in unique ways, but only to the observant and sensitive individual. The real world Rat Race is filled with so many obstacles and ways to distract ourselves from achieving fulfillment or happiness that it’s not always possible to change our mode of perception to see what opportunities are developing and being presented before us. If we let the stress of everyday life beat us down until our heads are hung low, we may miss the potential of new possibilities in other directions than we normally travel.

The Rat Race was composed with these concepts and images in mind and as music stresses how we use our time and that our use of time is governed by our freedom of choice. To defeat the real world Rat Race it is up to us to choose a new way of living by pursuing what it is that life has to offer and changing something about ourselves, because after all, the world we see is simply a reflection of ourselves. But if we change ourselves, we can literally change the world we see and live in. Seek a new idea, a new way of thinking, or a new way of being and test what it’s like to live like that. What new things and people have been attracted to or repelled from the “new” you? Interestingly, by changing little parts of ourselves we can remake our image of the world and become born again into a new experience of life and break free of The Rat Race.

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Related Music:

The Rat Race

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Marc

https://stereothesis.bandcamp.com/

Big Cloud

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GET “SONIC WEAPONS: The Official Stereo Thesis Music Sampler” FOR FREE. To get your FREE full-length album…click here. ____________________________________________________________

The vibrato and minimalist riff at the start of Big Cloud represents the forces of wind, cold, heat, and light that interact above us all day, every day of our lives. This is the backdrop and environmental factors that provide us with a field in which to act and build the structure of our lives. Everything from an individual’s life, a society, a culture, flight, navigation, and all types of construction that make human life bearable occur because we’ve learned to cope with the forces of nature with the creativity of our adaptations and inventions.

The opposing forces of heat and cold interact in the sky generating a motion of air. Frost and moisture fall and rise within the dome of the earth to form clouds, rain, wind, and storm. Above us, these elements and processes operate to add beauty and randomity to the conditions in which we experience the action of our lives. The mix of earth and sky are the environment, the arena under which we live and breath the miracle of elements that make life possible for one and all.

A smooth transition indicates a harmony between man and his environment, an understanding of the laws of nature, and of how to use these laws to anticipate changes in our surroundings, thus making it possible to plot a course of action and to make long-term plans across many generations, for many years in advance. A melodic statement says it all and what it says is man is worthy of living and capable of solving the problems of survival and of being able to face existence on this planet without fear, so that he may triumph with the weapon of his mind. The theme and melody repeat until an ominous note signals a change in the weather and a confrontation between humanity and their environment.

A struggle ensues. The push and pull of factors of man’s survival against the brutal forces of nature uncaringly proceeding with their unfeeling motions of death and new life born of the old. Storm, fast moving winds, wildfires, earthquakes, flood, avalanches and much more all contradict what the human mind can conceive and what he builds with his hands. But nature, in truth, is not against Man. The correct view is that Man must learn the ways of nature of mitigate the damage those processes will inflict on his desire for permanence and immunity from the laws of nature. While these are noble goals to strive for, they will never be realized as the keynote of this universe is time and for time, change. Things change and Man must learn to accept change or nature through the environment will force him to change whether He likes it or not.

When the forces of nature seem to attack and Man’s emotions bid him to protect his creations, he experiences fear and grief from loss. Loss of possessions and the lives of those he loved, prolong these emotional states, but these too are experiences from which he learns to cope with nature of her vicious changes. Apathy is that state where all he can do is watch all of what he built get washed away and flattened by a more powerful force that his ability to design and build what he imagines.

Man is a force of nature in himself and can live despite the liabilities that living exposes him to from birth. The bridge is a sad statement underscoring a comprehension of loss and the element of change that all people must come to terms with as a result of being alive. This section ends with a courageous note and a strong phrase leads into it to point to the hope of rebuilding everything that was lost, but by persistence can be regained yet in a different form. Destruction and rebirth form a cycle of life that becomes new growth by sweeping away the old.

What will survive in the aftermath and live to thrive another day? No one knows for sure, but those who do have a responsibility to prepare for those who will come one day soon in the future to make their own contributions to the survival of our species on this and other planets. Normalcy returns, those who have gone into hiding come out, we gather to examine the damage, and from there we begin to rebuild. The danger has passed and life must go on. We bury the dead, clean up the remains, and settle in for a new beginning. Up in the sky a Big Cloud hovers as a sign of what has just occurred, but it soon becomes distant and dissipates with the heat of the sun and eventually disappears.

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Related Music:

Big Cloud

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Marc

https://stereothesis.bandcamp.com/

Snake People

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The snake has deep symbolic meaning in all societies around the globe both for good and evil. Some of its significance ranges from sexual connotations, notions of evil intent, all the way to a deity or god form that is capable of imparting wisdom to mankind.

In this song and music composition, “Snake,” I wanted to bring out the elements of the snake that I felt I could related to and express with convincing dramatism. To do this I needed music to establish that vibe. So what I did was use a micro-tonal tuning on the guitar, which worked perfectly by creating a variety of exotic textures as I experimented searching for the right combination.

The music was designed to make you feel like you entered a ritual chamber where something (or someone) was going to be sacrificed. The darkness of the space was lit with the dim light of candles and filled with the smoke and odor of incense. The rattle at the introduction and throughout the song present the Snake as a mythical man-animal hybrid luring a new victim into his sex ritual ceremony.

Snake people come in two forms, men and women, who assume the characteristics and behavior of the animals as we understand them. When they speak they use slippery words that sound good to the ears of others, but hide their true intentions. When they act to do good, they do so with the expectation that such labors on their part will derive some reward, repayment, or enslave those who they’ve assisted. All in all, their thoughts are drawing boards for the spinning of social webs that are designed to ensnare others in traps of their own making.

Having fallen into one of a Snake person’s set-ups, the target strangely feels grateful for receiving such an invitation because Snake People are extremely talented at charming their victims. There’s even a sense of obligation for going or showing up to the ritual chamber that occurs in the mind of the person to be used and sacrificed, since Snake People are expert at eliciting other people’s confidence and cooperation.

In the song “Snake,” the main character is a mythical man-creature who greets and invites his female catch into the sacred space and proceeds rapidly to begin the act for which he had intended for his victim. Once the Snake-Man reveals his true intent and nature as a person, the reaction of the victim changes and becomes a massive let-down. Her hopes were raised by his smooth words, cool demeanor, expensive taste, and nice possessions only to be shattered by the reality of the situation and the act in which she is engaged.

The Snake-Man, in contrast, experiences elation at seeing his victim’s reaction when he finally exposes the truth about himself. As she is going through all the emotions associated with her feelings of deception, the way it changes her physical appearance actually brings the Snake pleasure.

The spell that overcame the victim was initially generated when the Snake enveloped her in a web of psychic energy which he placed over her as they first met. The effects of this web lasted all the way until she arrived at location of the ritual chamber. Now as the sex ritual begins and demands further involvement, the spell became a deep trance which increased with every form of compliance she allowed herself to commit.

In the second verse of “Snake,” the victim at one point starts to look for an exit, but the Snake-Man anticipates this and thwarts her effort by diverting her attention to the next action she must perform before she’ll be released again into the wilderness of human society.

Pain, distress, and worry - emotional or physical - in his victims is a source of joy for him because to him what he does and how it affects others is nothing more than fun and just the way life is - eat or be eaten. The rule of the jungle is a male or female Snake’s philosophy of life.

“This is why I love you,

This is what I love about you,

This is when I love you

This is how I love you.”

Wrapping up the piece is the chorus, which is actually the Snake persons mantra. When they’ve succeeded in manipulating, humiliating, using, and destroying their victims, they actually mix complements with the humiliation to make the experience even more hypnotic for the victim by spinning it with confusion. Their goal is to break the will of their victim and remake them into loyal pets, but for those who will not comply and are not easily broken, Woe! To them who will not bend into the fold.

To hear the track “Snake” from the album
Dynamo Symphonia by Stereo Thesis...click here.

Marc

http://stereothesis.com/

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The Music Vault: Overflow of Creativity - Revisited

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Creativity cannot be contained or regulated since it flows to hidden recesses in the mind or soul and pools into reserves waiting to be harnessed. When too much creative energy is forced into a pool of reserves and is not allowed to flow freely into artistic production, pressure builds in the mind of the individual restraining himself.

This scenario occurs all too often in the field of the arts and the entertainment business, which is totally out of alignment with the needs of the artist and their desire for complete freedom of artistic expression. Instead, what happens, for example as in the case of Prince, is the record label decides how much and how often the musician/composer will be allowed to release their work publicly, so the artist can either wait for the label to dictate their rate of production, break the contract to move forward on their own, but risking a lawsuit, or start a new project under a different moniker, then proceed from there.

Some of the recent revelations about Prince’s music vault illustrate how much unreleased material there must be in the music vaults of most top bands and other solo artists in the music industry that’s just waiting to see the light of day, but won’t because the record labels want to control as much of the production process as they can to protect their investments in the works of their artists. It can be safely assumed that there must be as much unreleased material as there is released material in every artistic field, but for financial reasons or investment purposes labels aren’t allowing the artist the freedom to push their material out publicly.

At one point, Prince in his battle with his record label demanded that he be allowed to release albums at a much faster rate than they were allowing him to, specifically 2 albums per year, in order to keep up with his speed of production and the immensity of his creative vision. This would account for his vast unreleased music collection as well as additional materials and media.

Interestingly, no one doubts that Prince was in possession of such material and that it consists of at least 50 fully produced music videos, full-length albums, and many other kinds of media produced by the artist. In total, there are probably hundreds of hours of music ready for release in the vaults, but rumors are that the material is likely to be released slowly over the next 2 decades. It is also believed that this material includes songs that the artist once said contained some of his finest work.

When a person’s creative capacity is restrained or unnaturally regulated, from within or without, the soul of the person quietly determines that the vehicle is inadequate to serve its aims, therefore the body or restraining influence must be destroyed. Whether the artist restrains their creative capacity by withholding their artistic output or by hiding or withholding their artistic creations, the pressure of withholding becomes a kind of psychic pain, which is formed from the artist’s inability to freely offer their creative work to their audience.

Without resolving this dilemma completely, the psychic pain can morph into physical pain, which forces the artist to find ways to reduce or eliminate the pain. Too often, when artists go through this process of degradation, they self-medicate and frequently overdose. When the artist destroys their body, using one method or another, their decision is swayed by choosing the lesser of two evils. Instead of fighting the record labels in court, which could completely wipe the artist out emotionally and financially, they find other ways to escape the situation.

Prince, along with the many other artists, musicians, and composers, who are trapped by the restraining influence of music labels made his choice and for that we lost a tremendous talent whose absence became an immense void in the soul of humanity. This type of artistic departure I term “black hole creativity” because of the vacuum it leaves in the collective creative mind of all people.

Creativity needs freedom of expression to ensure the physical and psychological health of the individual in possession of an immense artistic capacity. In fact, our physical bodies are the vehicles or tools for artistic production, so when a person works in harmony with their creative capacity, their mind and body are at ease with the nature of the creativity that resides within them. The artist must be free to create as often and as quickly as they are capable and for this they should be amply rewarded and revered.

Click here to learn more and read the article “Black Hole Creativity.”

Click here to learn more and read the article "The Overflow of Creativity: Why Artists Need to Find New Areas to Conquer, New Worlds to Explore"

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Related Music:

Dutiful Son

Lonely King

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Marc

http://stereothesis.com/

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Black Hole Creativity

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GET “SONIC WEAPONS: The Official Stereo Thesis Music Sampler” FOR FREE. 

To get your FREE full-length album…click here. ____________________________________________________________

The immense gravity pull within a dead or dying star is so strong that it's capable of holding light. Where light would normally travel away from its source, within or near a black hole, light circles and gets pulled back into the center of the dead star.

Creativity and light possess many similar qualities in that they flow when expressed from a central source and that they illuminate objects when they surround them in their energies. In other articles, I've also discussed how creativity is also like water in that it flows, fills a space or activity, and overflows into other areas of conquest or expression.

The person who possesses creative impulses in such extreme quantities, but who fails to express them to a sufficient degree fails to live up to their potential and wastes the reserve of artistic force with they were born.

Celebrities who’ve built their careers on an immense output of artistic production, but who die during the course of that process of discovery and unfolding of their abilities to become like black holes of creativity that pull in and do not release the light from those gifted minds. The industry, fans, and collaborators with which such an individual shared their vision and work not only lose a person, but also less tangible qualities like hope, sympathy, understanding and enjoyment.

Even non-celebrities who chose to stay away from fame or were left undiscovered by the mainstream can also become black holes of creativity within their own spheres of influence. The friends, family, and colleagues of such individuals who benefited from their energy, inspiration, and stood in awe of their incredible talent lose something very rare and special by losing a part of themselves when an artist they know dies.

When such rare talents depart the world, life losing something of its lustre and the question remains as to how it will be possible to fill the void. It’s from the existence of this void of creative talent and artistic output that a black hole of creativity is generated by leaving a vacuum in the wake of the death of an artist.

Prince was such a person, as was Kurt Cobain, Michael Jackson, Elliot Smith, David Bowie and many others. Artists in all categories of production and at whatever level of talent belong to this classification of humanity.

Their existence in this world is necessary and very important because they add beauty and imagination to human life and in them we differentiate ourselves from other life forms. Through them we experience how it might be to live in heaven, where our thoughts can be expressed into pure forms of creative energy amongst souls irrespective of time and space.

The world as a whole mourns the death of artists, both small and large, whose creative output might range from a few songs, poems, a film, paintings or a single dance performance to a career and lifetime of such artistic productions, because no matter the volume of their output whenever an artist dies, the world loses more of the light of creativity by reducing the amount of vision, beauty, and imagination that exists on our planet.

Black hole creativity is just one way to refer to the death of the irreplaceable artist who leaves a massive vacuum in human life by their departing. In fact, the impact of such a loss is palatable and borders on the disastrous.

Even greater than flash flooding, snowstorms, tornadoes and earthquakes is the death of an artist since humanity’s collective creative mind, which makes human life possible, is damaged. The vacuum from the black hole that is left from this loss cannot easily be filled or totally replaced, but eventually humanity recovers by the emergence of new talent or the reincarnation of old talent that can provide us with a fresh infusion of beauty, hope, creativity, and imagination.

“Man does not live by bread alone,” but instead on the work of the imagination that fills us all with a certain degree of creative energy that sustains us throughout our lives. Our very souls are made up of creativity and is what provides our minds with a foundation on which to base its activities in the world. Artists give humanity its soul, so when an artist dies humanity loses a little bit of its soul, but when a massive talent like Price dies, humanity loses a huge part of its soul and the loss requires a much longer time for recovery.

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Related Music:

Creative Flows

Lonely King

Homecoming

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Marc

http://stereothesis.com/

Remember to join our mailing list.

To support Stereo Thesis with a financial donation securely through PayPal, click here.