Day Three hundred and sixty five - A solitary reign

Jesus fuck, I'm actually here. I actually made it.

And I'll own up to it - many times in these past few months, especially in this last quarter, I felt like giving up. There were so many days and nights when I sat here in front of this screen, and I just stared at it, the blank 'page' all but taunting me. 'Come on', it said, 'I dare you. I fucking dare you. Do it. Write. Come up with something.', it would say, and I'd stare back into that void, minutes stretching into hours of being unable to come up with a single word, and as time ticked away each day, the screen would say 'I thought so.', and those days... man, those days I didn't really want to write anything at all. Not even an album 'review'. And then, a word, or an image would come to mind, and I'd start typing away, sometimes furiously so, just to make sure that I wrote the post for the day. And, you know, it's like I'd set up myself to fail in the first place.

As I sat here in this room a year ago, thinking about what this year would be like, I made three somewhat unofficial resolutions : one of them was to write every day, every single day of the year, and to write a minimum of 500 words a day. I know that here and there, there were days where I didn't hit that mark, there were days where I wasn't feeling well or whatever and I wrote maybe a couple of paragraphs only. But then there were the days where I far exceeded those 500 words, so maybe it makes up for those where I didn't reach that mark. I'm not very inclined to compile the data for every single entry I did for this year, so my guess is as good as anyone's as to whether or not I managed to maintain that average. The real problem with that 500 word a day target was that it required me to be very sparse with my daily posts when it came to the bit where I wrote about my life. Sometimes I had to edit myself, weeding out what stories I felt weren't going to be told, but then also I had to pad out whatever I wrote, so that I could stretch it a bit longer. And I wish I could say that doing this every day, that writing here every day, was fun - but most of the time it just wasn't. There were days I dreaded having to do this, but on the other hand there were days where what I wrote came easily and flowed well, and on those days I felt like I could do it forever and ever. To be sure, I'll never do such an undertaking again, not unless it's for good money.

The second resolution dealt with cleanliness. By no means do I live in a pigsty, but I admit that sometimes my laziness keeps me from keeping my room as clean as I'd love to, so that's a work in progress. The final resolution is at once my greatest achievement of the year as well as my biggest failure. You see, my one great ambition for this year was to start taking better care of myself, health wise. And that proved to be a daunting challenge in and of itself. I succeeded, in part, during those first four months of the year, because I was for sure eating much healthier, I wasn't drinking at all, and then May came along, and what began with a beer or two turned into a month long binge drinking session. I was drinking every day, eating all sorts of nasty shit, and by June I had to decide whether I wanted to live or whether I wanted to die. And I chose life. 

I started going to the gym pretty much every day, my resolve unwavering. In time I began losing weight - not all of it, but some, enough weight to make me feel much better about myself, and unfortunately enough weight for me to somehow think that I had reached where I needed to be, and thus, relax a bit and... try to do 'normal' things again. I completely misjudged everything, and both November and December would prove to be crucibles that I would not be able to come back from unscathed. The things I put myself through... man, they did a number on me. And as well they did, for they helped me harden the resolve I need to feel for what lies ahead, but it still hurt, nevertheless. It fucking well hurt. So - idiocy heaped upon idiocy - here I 've found myself barely going to the gym these past two months, facing health issues again, imbibing poison by the gallon again, stuffing myself with shit again, and guess what? That weight I lost decided to make a come back. And what do I do now? Now I start again, that's what. That'll be my reward - not my punishment, but my reward : the pleasure of beginning it all anew. And this time.... motherfucker, this time we stick the landing.

This year wasn't the hardest I ever had, not by a longshot, but that doesn't mean it was an easy one. There were certainly some... interesting and unexpected developments this year, and sure, they had their effect on me. I am only human. And as I started to look forward, and at what's coming next, for the first time in many a year I decided to be something I'm usually not : strong. In many different ways, I suppose. I had to figure out though, what does being 'strong' mean? Well, this year I found out that sometimes it means resisting the pull of our smartphone, and not texting that very special someone and telling her how much you still love her, and you resist that motherfucking temptation no matter how drunk you are. It also means finding it in you to go through your contacts list and eliminating those phone numbers and e-mail addresses that serve no purpose other to maybe re-visit aches that ought to remain in the past. This is such a big part of the act of letting go, of finally letting go, and yet it goes so unnoticed. It's mostly gone now, my contact list full of people I haven't talked to in ages, wouldn't really want to talk to again, or just don't care enough about anymore. From now on, I'm only keeping what's essential to me. And I write this even as I wrestle with the possibility of - yet again - divesting myself of my music collection; not only would it help further the steps towards where I want to go, it would also be testament to how much this year changed me. I don't know, we'll see. 

But, having said all this, I have to look back now and be really thankful that I had to go through this year - I see it as necessary bridge for me, though the crossing of it, and the fording of the raging river that runs beneath it will be a monumental task. There was pain, most of it of my own creation, most of it invited by me, but it wasn't shapeless pain - rather, it helped forge the way forward. But there was also honesty, and this year - for the first time in many years - I was honest with myself. I hope I can continue to be so, in the future. I also wanted to have reached the end of the year with a clean conscience, that I had tried - one last time - to see if I could live the way 'normal' people do, want the same things, do the same things, and this year was the year I realized that no, I no longer have it in me to want, to actively want and seek those things. It's all just too... too trying, too exhausting, and I had what I had, and I have to be content with that. This is the path, this is the way forward, the moment where I become one with the void - the void where one does not want, one does not desire, one does not look for, the void where there is finally only peace. I tried, I failed, I screwed up, I was screwed over, it is what it is. There is no shame in living one's life in a solitude of one's own making, and there is no shame in living with an unrequited love that will never be known to another living soul inside one's heart. It's not even a choice, it's nature. There's no shame, and I will never feel it, ever again.

This is it - the end was always coming, and now it's here. I'm certain I wanted to say something else, and I'm sure I'll remember it tomorrow. But today is what matters, and tomorrow? Well, tomorrow will be day one of year one of the new epoch - the epoch of the Invisible Man. My name shall be Invisible Man the first. 

Again, I thank any soul who was foolish enough to waste their precious time reading my words. I didn't do this seeking an audience, and to know that some wandered here - and have remained here, I do look at my stats - is somewhat humbling. 

I end this year with a bittersweet taste in my mouth : there's only the one thing left to do, but unfortunately I couldn't time it so that it was done ere the year ended. It's something that'll be done in the next few days, and oh how I wish I could have started the coming year with that hardship fully behind me. 

Let's do this, aye? Let's close the doors on this project, and on this year. Let's say our farewells, our goodbyes, let's say one last hurrah, and be done with it.

I'll see you in the next life.

[This is the playlist for December.]

Day Three hundred and sixty four - Everything

So... was this everything? Like, everything, everything? No, not by a longshot, and it wasn't even a lot - but it was enough. I told all the stories that had to be told, and I omitted a number of other stories : there was the one story that I only told one single time in my entire life that I elected not to tell now, and nor shall I be telling it ever again. There were many, many stories I chose not to tell at all. Some out of respect for the parties involved, and others - on the opposite end of the spectrum - just weren't worth my time. It'd be a kindness to even consider them a footnote in the story of my life. What I wrote here about my life, was what mattered, or at least what mattered enough for me to commit it to the ether. And yet... that said... and with the benefit of hindsight that nigh on a year brings... would I do things differently, were I to begin anew today?

That's a tricky question. In truth, I myself don't really know the truly, one hundred percent, accurate answer to that question. There's a part of me that thinks - no regrets. Things are as they were meant to be. They unfolded the way the way they were always meant to come to pass. It's fate, written in the stars. But there's the part of me that rebels against such notions - and maybe because I think I am the one who decides my fate, but also because deep down I think that all things can ultimately always be improved, perfected, even if by the teensiest bit. 

Recently I wrote about how I wished I had been more kind to Sofia when I wrote about her part in my life; though I may claim that when I revisited those days, I invited pain and suffering back into my soul, and those feelings tinged my words somehow, that's no excuse. I failed when I wrote about her, but not only her. I have known for a long time that I wasn't often loved by someone in my life - and let's not confuse all the 'love' I was offered, when in fact it was not 'love' but rather passion and libido and loneliness speaking for whomever it was that proffered it to me. There were two, only two instances of love, both of them very intense, both of them very, very different. One, I can only remember now by the hurt that coloured it for half a decade, the other I will always carry within my heart. But them two, them two they cannot be denied. And I ought to have paid a more dignified tribute to them. This I regret, and I have somewhat atoned for the injustice I did to Sofia's, but I have not yet done the same for Silvia's. And maybe I should not thank her - maybe, in truth, I should apologise to her. But I've already done that; I've already written about my repentance for how I allowed our story to pan out. Theirs are stories that I will always cherish, but must remain firmly left behind. It's a strange dichotomy, this - feeling that I am at once immensely grateful for having been graced by the light of their loves once upon a time, and that I must at long last put that light behind me. If there's a lesson I ultimately learned this year, is that there's nothing wrong with carrying a love inside me, e'en if it means I must needs carry it for as long as I live - it's just the way the cards were dealt, and I can - always - choose to be destroyed by it, or be defined by it, or be uplifted by it. I know what I have chosen. I know where that choice will take me. It takes me... north. And I will arrive there with a smile on my face.

Day Three hundred and sixty three - Nepenthe

Was there a last time? Was there ever the last and only moment when we were alone? There was, though it happened only in mind and soul, it only happened within the spheres of imagination and within the realms of dream. You held a solar knife in your hands, and as you saw me approach, as you saw me descend from the lunar seas, you held out your knife, and sliced through time and space itself : all stood still - for a millisecond that lasted for as long as we wished it would last, nothing in the universe moved. There was utter silence, utter stillness, utter order. It wouldn't be long until chaos set the norm again, but for this instant, this all too brief instant, it was just the two of us again.

Under a night sky full of stars we sit - we sat - we will sit; but for now, for now in this perfect moment, we sit, and we look at the stars above, hanging still in the heavens above, their light frozen in time. Where we're at, it's where there's time without a time, where there's no time, where there's everything without a time. Had we already been here? It feels so familiar, and yet it feels like that undiscovered country. It feels like returning to a place one had never been to before. Maybe echoes of us were here once upon a time, or maybe they are yet to be here. Here we are, at the end, at the end of everything, but there is no end, there is no goodbye. There is no last kiss. There is only one last touch - my hand on your heart, and your heartbeat melds with mine; we beat in time for a fraction of a second. Once, there had been a possibility that our hearts would beat together, once there was the thought that our steps would always rhyme, but all that's gone, all that's in the past. Our time approaches, so near that I sigh. Our time here is almost done, and we both know that. There's only time for one more thing. There's only time for one final question. 

'Is it far, this place you're going to?', she asks, already feeling that time is about to burst into its inexorable passing again. He turns and looks at her, a sad half-smile on his lips. 'Is it far? It is as close as the harvest moon in the evening sky, as distant as a dream upon wakening; Near as a rainbow, and so remote you could walk for ever and never reach it. Is it far?', he asked softly. 'No, my love. Not far.'

Day Three hundred and sixty two - Here's where the story ends

There are regrets. Of course there are regrets. But regret, oh that motherfucker, regret is also a time travel machine. It's June 2011, and I still love Silvia with all my heart, with all that I am, and months after we'd said our last, fateful goodbye in Geneva, I'm sending her a text telling her how much I still loved her, though by my side lay Filipa, she of the most amazing breasts I've ever seen, she who gave up on all she dreamed of and was but a hair's breadth away from achieving until I came along. I'm saying to Sil that I love her, so so much, and her curt reply, some hours later, is 'No regrets. Ever.', and that was the moment I realized she would never love me again. It would take me a bit longer for me to realize that I too didn't love her anymore. And when I realized it, then a part of me also felt like that I would never love again. Not like I loved Silvia - and to be fair, I didn't want to love anyone like I loved Silvia. There was so much pain there. So, so much. And I didn't want to live through that again. I wanted the fairy tale. The 'happily ever after' - and between Silvia and my one true shot at that, there was an ocean of bodies, most of whom I can barely recall their names.

And then, jesus - Sofia. Sofia was an unexpected presence in my life, I never imagined that someone such as her could come crashing in through my life, fuck me, what an intelligent, assertive, determined, explosive, firecracker she was - and still is, I'd wager. Shit, not 'wager', I know she is. What a bombast of a woman, she is. And as I type this, in the very same room where I wreaked havoc upon her body, where I did things to her she'll never allow another living soul to do to her, this room where we fucked the living daylights out of each other, this room where I told her I didn't know how to make love, all I can think about is... regret. 

But not regret for her, no, but rather regret for what I wrote about her in this here blog. I knew... I feared... that when I got to to the portion of my life where Sofia graced me with her presence, that it would hurt, to think about all those things I'd forbidden myself from thinking - seriously thinking - for over a decade. And naturally, I found myself revisiting those days, those legendary days, and the pain I felt was awakened anew in me. And... what I wrote about her was unfair. I ought to have written about her in a far more positive way. You see, in all these years between then and now I never blamed her for not wanting me. I always knew the whys and wherefores of it, and I understood - I wouldn't have wanted me either. But if there was sacrifice - from me - it was always born from a place of love. And I am to blame if I didn't take into account what she desired to attain for herself without any help or input for me - and though I may say that what I did and what I gave her came from that love for her, I wish I could've understood just how much it meant for her to be able to do those things on her own. It also shows how different we are - and how sadly broken I am. In my life - especially so in my adult life - I'm not used to being given things very often, whatever the intent. And so I give, because giving is all I know; indeed, I give though I expect nothing in return. How could I, when I myself deem myself unworthy of receiving the barest of minimums? I couldn't. As that splendid bugger W. H. Auden once wrote :

[S]he was my North, my South, my East and West, 

My working week and my Sunday rest, 

My noon, my midnight, my talk, my song; 

I thought that love would last for ever: I was wrong. 

If I'm honest, then I'd have to say that the main reason why things haven't really worked out between me and the others, is because they really can't compare to you. They - or anyone else, for that matter - will never be you. They can never make me feel like you used to make me feel. And, you know, I neither ask it or demand it of them. It's just a hard and cruel and inescapable truth. No one will ever be able to replace you, though I drowned myself in an ocean of bodies and noise, though I have heard giant proclamations of love that I would never be able to respond to, though there is - between you and me - a chasm that's so far apart and so darkly deep that will never be bridged ever again.

But that's ok. I am fine... content. There is a sort of happiness in this. I know that I love you with all my heart, and I always, always will. Even if I wanted, I could not kill the last, good part of me - the part that loves you still.

Believe me, this is not about being bound to the past. It's far bigger - and better - than that : I am bound to this one love I feel for you, and it makes me so happy, to feel it, to just feel it. I know that we will never be together again. I doubt that we'll even see each other again. But damn, if only you could imagine how much I miss you, and how much I miss your voice... these are the things that make my heart ache every now and again. 

Still... it's time to look forward, to move on in another direction. If I've told you this once, I've said it a great number of times : I am glad that you've found someone who really loves you. And it also gladdens me that you have found someone whom you really love as well. It's rather easy to find someone who loves us, not so easy to find someone who deserves our love...

I hope that your life shall ever be full of good things for as long as you live.

If it leaves you more at ease, know that I no longer entertain the notion of a possibility that we may ever be together again, so don't worry, I shan't be bothering you ever again. Truth be told, I know - I have known full well - that I no longer mean anything to you on this emotional level.

I will never regret telling you that I love you. I will never regret you or wish that I'd never met you, because once upon a time you were all I ever needed.

I'm not ashamed that I love you - I am a better person for it. I do wish that you were still mine, and that you still wanted my love. This love... it can never be taken away from me, it's mine, and it's something that I treasure above all things. It won't ever disappear... does not happen.

I leave you now, and I promise, I leave you to be happy and devoid of my presence forever. It's for the best, mine and yours, especially yours.

But even if I have written all this, and poured out my heart, you know that I couldn't just pass up this opportunity to tell you once more that I love you. Always and all ways. Forever and for ever. World without end.

Day Three hundred and sixty one - Kaleidoscoping

Some things that I knew about this project early on : I knew exactly what the last two posts would be called, and - for the most part - what they would consist of, though I briefly entertained the idea of combining them into a single post, but I ended up deciding against it. Then, some time after the half way mark, there was something that happened during that time in my personal life that helped me steer my path towards where I am heading. In truth, I always knew I was heading somewhere after this, though I did not yet know where that would be, and now I have a much clearer vision of that. That chance encounter with a ghost from my past led me to listen to what was my favourite record from 2019, by miles ahead of any other record that came out that year - even topping Mono's 'Nowhere Now Here', something which actually contradicts what I wrote yesterday, but them's the breaks. That record is by a band called 'Her Name Is Calla', and is titled 'Animal Choir'. I wrote about it some years back on this post, back when I was addicted to listening to it - and I was, I listened to it all the time, so much so that I highly doubt I listened to anything else for months on end other than that record, and shortly after I wrote the aforementioned post, me and singer Tom Morris engaged in an online conversation where I showed him my thoughts about the record, and he was kind enough to read my words. 

As I returned to the record, midway through the year or thereabouts, I found myself fixating - yet again - in everything it originally held sway over me : Tom's amazing voice, the beautiful, haunting melodies, and above all - his words. This album is nearly perfect to me, and most of all I prize two of its songs : 'Frontier' and 'Bloodline'. The latter is especially relevant to me, and to now, and to all the decisions I've been making. There's a line in it that I have always loved : 'I don't want to be a part of this'. And as this year moved on, and wore on me, I found myself repeating it over and over again. It came to steel my resolve, in order for me to take the steps for what lies ahead. It also came to inform much of my writing from July onwards - as the tale of me came to an end, I started writing down some stories; some I came up with, others were dreams I'd been having. It wasn't until I'd written a bunch of them that I realized I could connect them, tie them to a sort of thematic recurring idea, that of repeating patterns. Loops. The ones we don't want... and the ones we want. Whatever fiction I wrote this year ended up touching on those ideas, and maybe, had I been born more ambitious, I could have crafted a decent story out of all those dangling threads.

But loops, man, those damned loops. They always, always remind me of this bit from 'Bloodline', this bit that's run through my head so, so many times, especially this last quarter of the year : 

'We wanted this loop and we’ll live it out now for as long as we can

I don’t want to be a stranger in a strange land anymore.

There’s nothing else to say, there’s nothing else to do

This is the part where we change or we fade or we dig even deeper down

I’ll see you in the next life.'

In 2020 I wrote :

'These decisions are the type of stuff that I've never been good at. I never knew when to stop. I never knew when to let go. I never knew how to move on.

And as I listen to these words, all I can say is 'I don't want to be a part of this'. I'm exhausted. Life has been draining me and I have so little joy in the mere act of living. Maybe I don't live at all, I just exist. 

Maybe I'll learn these lessons. Maybe now. Maybe in the next life. I'll see you then.'

I've changed since then, especially in this year that's about to end. I haven't changed enough, not yet, that much I know, but it's something I'll be working on with more dedication henceforth. I found strength in me to do things and make decisions that I wouldn't have been able to do four years ago. I wouldn't have been able to do them a year ago, even. But now, for my sake, for everyone's sake... I'm finally letting go. And letting go isn't synonymous with forgetting, and it isn't necessarily the same as moving on - in this case I mean I'm finally making peace with what's inside me, and what I carry in my heart, and the fact that it will be mine alone for as long as I live. I raged against such notions in the past, I do so no more. I accept it, I welcome it, and acknowledge that it is no burden - it's just a facet of the ever changing prism that is me.

Day Three hundred and sixty - WE

Who : Arcade Fire

Album name : We

Formed : 2001

From : Montreal, Canada

What do they play : Indie rock / chamber pop / art rock / baroque pop / symphonic rock (at least according to Wikipedia)

Release date : May 6, 2022

I only know one thing about this record for a fact. It's the only Arcade Fire record I have two versions of : a cassette version and a picture-disc version, because that came in a bundle when I purchased the album. But other than that, I know nothing of it. I have never listened to a single song from it. Never, ever. For some reason I can't explain, I have never felt tempted in the slightest to play this record. I knew, right from the beginning, that this was a record I was buying for no particular reason, other than maybe a slight feeling of guilt for never having bought the previous record, 'Everything Now'. And today... well, today was the day. Today was the day I finally queued it up and pressed play. And what did I think about it? It's ok, it's nothing spectacular, probably a bit more balanced as a whole when compared to the previous entry. In a sense it feels like it condenses a bunch of everything they've done since the first record up until the latest : there are the galloping piano sections, there are the sing along songs, there are the electronic elements that were so prevalent in 'Reflektor', now more subdued and restrained - and that's probably for the better. There are the songs that evoke nostalgia - I'll confess to have not really paid that much attention to the lyrics, so I can't really attest as to whether or not that nostalgic slant is present there, but in terms of music, there are songs here that certainly could have been recorded in the late 70's or early-to-mid 80's, they have that familiar sound from that era. Especially maybe the 70's - I could hear some prog in some songs, and also those pastoral melodies that wouldn't be out of place in something that came from a Canterbury scene record. 

There's good stuff here, but again - it's all mostly unremarkable. Listening to this album - as well as the previous two - made me think about my writing here on my blog. Very often I find myself struggling to come up with a viable idea for a post, and I resort to these little reviews/critiques, and I end up littering it with filler. That's the impression I get from the band, that sometimes they just use some half baked ideas and use them as filler. And not a particularly interesting kind of filler, either. Truth is, I wouldn't be able to name a single song that stuck in my mind. And maybe that also serves as a metaphor for where I am now, and where I'm going. There will always be some things from times past I will always love, and there'll always be something very specific for which I will always hold an eternal love, but maybe it's time to realize that what captivated me in the first place is no longer there - because I remained stuck in love with a memory, while live moved on. It's good, but not great. Fond, but not in love. It's all just so very... ok. And it's ok, to be just ok. Not everything needs to be super duper amazing, really. It's albums like these - to be fair the last half of their discography - that make me realize just how much of a desert island disc 'The Suburbs' really is. That's the benchmark, and if nothing else by the band holds a candle to that, then there's nothing wrong with that. At least not for me, not anymore. I don't even know what to give this one. A six seems a bit low, but I don't think it's a seven either. Maybe not even a six and half. Fuck it, a six it is.

And so we reach the end of the Arcade Fire discography review. I chose not to review their eponymous E.P. - I never did like it - and nor shall I be reviewing the soundtrack they wrote for the movie 'Her'. I am not inclined, not even one bit, to listen to soundtrack music from movies, at least not now. Maybe one day later, I'll pick it up and play it. So, all this done, was it worth it, this little experiment? Yeah, it kinda was. It was fun to revisit those early albums, and think about the stories that brought me to and bound me to them. I'd say that at least that first half of the discography was a fun thing to do, and the other half I knew would bring some challenges with it. 'Reflektor' didn't give me anything new, that I really feel like going back to time and time again, but 'Everything Now' certainly contributed with a heap of songs that moved straight into my favourites. And who'd've thought, considering my initial impression of the record? There were positive things to take away from this, for sure. And so the march towards the inevitable end continues. I can't wait to get there.

Day Three hundred and fifty nine - Time is running out

Yesterday, as a sort of early Christmas 'gift' to myself, I did something I had only done once before in my life. Then, as now, it completely broke my heart, it left me in a sea of tears. I've cried so much, my tears are becoming a sea. Every single word hurt, every line came straight from my heart, and left me feeling empty and mangled. But it had to be done, it's part of the process of saying goodbye. It's also a guarantee that nothing similar will never happen to me ever again. But look, it's Christmas, after all, and though I do not celebrate these days, today I come bearing gifts.
These gifts come in two forms : for me, from me; and from me, to you. For me, it's always for you.
The first gift - for me : I gift unto me the act of fading away, and now, I am becoming increasingly harder to find. This I gift to me. This is how I begin to disappear, this is how I start to become a memory, one that will grow dimmer with each passing heartbeat. Maybe it's already been noticed, maybe it hadn't, but the first steps are already taken.
The second gift - for you : I gift you my choices for my two favourite albums of the year. They have a number of things in common : they are both from Japanese bands, they are both from (roughly) the same genre, though they accomplish their goals in wildly different ways, they are both from the same label (Pelagic Records) and last, but never the least, they are the only two albums that came out in 2024 that I actually listened to, so the odds of one, if not both of them, being my favourites were always pretty high.
Let's look at the first : The band is called Envy, and the album is called 'Eunoia'. It's a really hard band to describe, their sound ranging from the hardcore and heavy metal worlds while also touching on post-rock, shoegaze, post-hardcore, screamo, and god knows what else. This being their eighth studio record, it's an indredibly tight, melodic, emotional journey, a whole that's made from individual slices of art, each episode a venture into climatic bursts of joy and sadness. It's very nearly a 10/10 for me, and I'm looking forward to finally getting it on vinyl sometime next year.
The second - and my undisputed favourite - is by a band called Mono, and the album is called 'Oath'. True story, they are the only band in existence that I'd buy an album by them without listening to a single song from it, because I know it will be trasncendental. Which makes it all the more confounding the fact that I do not, in fact, have this record... yet. I missed out on the initial pressing, and I'm waiting for Pelagic to release a new one, they always do with this band. But that didn't, obviously, keep me from listening to this record as soon as it came out, and in typical Mono fashion, they delve into the post-rock, contemporary classical soundscapes, though they themselves eschew such terms when it comes to describing their music. But Mono isn't just music, it's beauty, it's poetry, it's peace, it's catharsis. Though I knew of the band for a long while, and listened to a song of theirs here and there, I've been a dedicated fan of the band for a fairly short amount of time only - it was the the release of the 10th anniversary edition of their majestic that finally convinced me to get to know them better. And what a payoff it's been, they keep getting better and better, their music more poignant, more laden with beauty, more emotionally charged. I highly doubt there'll ever be a year when one of their releases isn't my favourite from that year.


That's it then, six days to go, six more entries, then the inevitable comes.