I'm Climbing Up Those Walls Again

Before I hand over the last three songs in the latest CD, I'm going to talk a little bit about Ren.

Even before I learned of the legendary Coheed and Cambria and their story-driven music, I wanted Ren to be about something. All of my cds trying and take a step in post-shareware electronica (pretty much my own genre for the kind of music you'd hear while playing a new .exe in DOS back in '92), but all of them have tried to take on the "video game hero" feeling.

Never Been There was more of a practice run. The world presented was very strange, disturbing, and sometimes grotesque. It never left any room for a hero to come in and save the day. In fact, looking back, I imagine Never Been There was the game world that the hero failed to save. Imagine that great evil triumphing and then fading, leaving behind a broken landscape. It was the village where a mother and father had to explain to their child why no one ever came to their aid. All this was brought about by the 3 central songs: "Future Collision", "Present Situation", and the fading "Past Accident".

By the time I finished Dehack I had mapped out what I really wanted in an album. It was a fair bit more experimental and free form (i.e. I used drone for a change). Like the beginning of the previous cd, the opening of Dehack has a very somber opening. This still isn't a pretty universe we're dealing with, but by the middle of the cd it is revealed that there is some good out there. The hero that Dehack presents is a young one: the young boy who receives advice from his elders before going off to save his best friend/love interest. When he dies in his attempt in "Game Over Man" we soon find him resurrected in "Continue Girl." After all, this is an ideal video game. After a final journey in "Descent to Asgard" his triumph is documented in "Saved Princess."

Now we have Ren which tries to take a different approach. I intially intended to have it narrated by robot voices, with a grandfather robot telling all these little robots about this great hero, but that idea was eventually cut, so all you have is the music.

Our introduction to this game world is no longer dire and full of despair.. it's pondering. Throughout the cd, we're faced with war, long journeys, love at first sight, but then terrible failure. This hero, Ren, is much older than your coming-of-age Link persona. After falling in love, the 'princess' is of course captured. Put through your standard video game level to save her, Ren makes a terrible mistake that costs him dearly. The last few songs on the cd, which are in this post, deal with his goodbyes, and his regret. Here's to failed heroes, and how they can inspire us anyway.

1. 0101 Star
2. Life In Trocadero
3. Monoscope
4. The Insider's Blessing
5. Allowing for a rule
6. Heartford +2b
7. Novai
8. Last Night's Synthony
9. The Glory
10. Bionic for a Second
11. Prepare to exhale
12. Waiting to inhale
13. Four days in the dark
14. Eye contact at the dress rehearsal
15. Exact detail
16. Safely Now
17. Who do I have to save?
18. Level 1
19. Rather than a god
20. Knee Play No. 5 (Philip Glass)
21. I Remembered Her Wrong

If you missed any of the previous songs and want them, let me know. If you want mp3 versions of the original two cds, I can send them as well.

Thanks for listening!

I don't know why most of my blogs are written after 1 am, possibly because I spend most of the day working, and the last few hours playing with a little more work stuck in the middle.

My mind is typically scrambled and salted at this point in the evening; my emotions are being warped by whatever I'm listening to, so I find it hard to convey the sounds I hear into emotion.

Mogwai pretty much hits it home. Their collection of leftover songs Ep+6, pretty much hits every emotional nerve a college student feels, with great songs like Superheroes of BMX, Small Children in the Background, Stanley Kubrick, and Burn Girl Prom Queen.

So what am I holding on to at 2 am? I'm trying to suspend reality for a few moments. Most others have gone to bed, as should I, considering I have to run at 8 am tomorrow morning, but for some reason I don't want it to go any further. This is our last year here, and while I'm happy to be back, I'm not ready for it to all be over.

I saw someone from my high school the other day. I know his face pretty well, as he used to pick on me in middle school. He looked right at me without a slither of recognition, so I decided not to approach him.

It's just another example of how I've cut myself off from my past. I'm worried I'll do it again, out of the need to survive in a new environment. Will I delete my IM list and start fresh? Will you see me on the street some day and pass without a word from me? Will I be caught up in some other web? I sure as hell hope not, as my college friends have been some of the best friends of my life, but then again, I'm a strange person.

Strangely enough, I'm not adverse to making more friends in this final year. It's like I'm trying to grab ahold of something that can never be there. We're spent goods: no longer full of the piss and fire that freshmen and sophomores have. We're just 20+ and are already tired.

I guess I'll just have to find my answers on the running track, where I'll let all the stress run out the bottom of my feet, as I glide....

I thought it might be interesting to analyze our typical PC game heroes, and so I've decided to start with Max Payne, as he's one of the more complex examples.

As their cheesy title implies, Max Payne games might not take themselves completely seriously. Max is known for using far too many metaphors to convey the gravity of a given situation: "Winterson was a ghost, her presence only felt by the chill of the air like the cold hands of a widow shivering in the rain."

Sure, Max spouts off horrible teenage-angst poetry like it's his job, but you can't help understanding his pain. Maybe I can justify this a little more if I give you his back-story.

Max was your every day New York cop, until one day, his wife discovered some information on a very powerful lady and her involvement in the designer drug "V". Max came home from work just in time to find several junkies hopped on V slaying his wife and baby daughter. After the incident, Payne immediately transferred to the DEA and dedicated himself to hunting down those responsible. Soon enough he got too close, and so the mafia behind the drug attempted to frame him for murder. One cold, stormy night, Max Payne racked up the biggest mobster headcount known to date. He shot his way through to the answers he needed: the woman behind V was a member of an 'inner circle' of wealthy and powerful people, compliments of Alfred Woden, a fellow inner circle member.

With half of New York's finest on his tail and with the help of an assassin with her own agenda, Mona Sax, Payne fought his way to the top of the woman's skyscraper, and exacted his revenge. During the final fire-fight, Mona took a bullet to the head, and disappeared behind some elevator doors, and was presumed dead.

In Max Payne 2, we find him back on the force, thanks to some effort from the Senator Alfred Woden, who made Max into a hero. Soon enough, a sighting of Mona indicates to Max that the story isn't over. In his own words: "I lied to myself that it was over, it wasn't over. My loved ones were still dead. I was still alive."

This is all a little melodramatic, but think about how it contrasts with you stereotypical PC shooter hero. Max Payne 2 is full of senseless violence, except behind the wheel of Max, you feel like you are living out this man's nightmare. The title of this post "Waking up from the American Dream" is taken from the third chapter, when Max is again plummeting down into the depths.



Payne's tale is grittier than normal. He doesn't treat his wounds with medical packs, he just pops painkillers, as though his relief can only be temporary. During the game, he is sent to the brink of death twice, and returns with wounds that would hospitalize any normal man, to continue fighting until his cause is finished.

You know early on that the fight can never be won, but you know Max would fight it anyway, and so you elect to join him. Right before the final spurt of violence at the end of the game, Max recalls that "old familiar feeling." He might not the most glamorous of computer game heroes, but he certainly knows how to pull a player along his own journey.

At the end of Max Payne 1, you felt as if revenge was all it was ever about, but by the end of Max Payne 2 he develops in a significant way. As the graphic at the top suggests, Mona becomes a love interest, yet Max cannot let go of his dead wife and child. Add mobsters to the equation, and you have a rollercoaster of a romantic John-woo style noir thriller.

For a taste of the Max Payne experience here is a link to a trailer of the latest game:

Watch the trailer labeled "Full trailer"

16. Safely Now

This song is waking up with her, getting up, then looking out the window

17. Who do I have to save?

Who do you think?

18. Level 1

"Ren, reach Level 3 or she dies!"

Level 1 is inspired by the musical transitions you'll find in multi-level platform games, such as Sonic the Hedgehog.

Next time, Ren: Part 7 (last part)