"Bardo" refers to my perceptive state of limbo with public life, as lockdown measures appear to ease but the pandemic is still a realistic fear that could persevere; caught in between feelings of motionless and change, stillness and activity, reflecting on the months prior when self-isolating and the slow, future reintroduction to greater society.
The song also serves as a point to further mark my diversion from the live band-orientated element of this project to a home recording venture, while I begin to ease my focus towards a new band project as the bassist.
The music is defined by a gradual build of layered vocals and looping instruments introduced incrementally, leading to a wall-of-sound influenced crescendo and release, bookended by ambient soundscapes.
From Wikipedia: Bardo is an intermediate, transitional, or liminal state between death and rebirth. It is a concept which arose soon after the Buddha's passing, with a number of earlier Buddhist groups accepting the existence of such an intermediate state, while other schools rejected it. In Tibetan Buddhism, bardo is the central theme of the Bardo Thodol (literally Liberation Through Hearing During the Intermediate State), the Tibetan Book of the Dead.
Used loosely, "bardo" is the state of existence intermediate between two lives on earth. According to Tibetan tradition, after death and before one's next birth, when one's consciousness is not connected with a physical body, one experiences a variety of phenomena. These usually follow a particular sequence of degeneration from, just after death, the clearest experiences of reality of which one is spiritually capable, and then proceeding to terrifying hallucinations that arise from the impulses of one's previous unskillful actions. For the prepared and appropriately trained individuals, the bardo offers a state of great opportunity for liberation, since transcendental insight may arise with the direct experience of reality; for others, it can become a place of danger as the karmically created hallucinations can impel one into a less than desirable rebirth.
Metaphorically, bardo can describe times when our usual way of life becomes suspended, as, for example, during a period of illness or during a meditation retreat.
lyrics
In the middle of the crust
In between the molten core
Is where I obtain my gem
The purest ore
Cascading from rivers
That have directed me
Towards this moment
What I've been living for
Passing over the hills
And the farmlands below
The mines and mountains
Show me where to go
Circling trees
And the earth beneath
A glowing leaf
Floats into tomorrow
What's next
What's next
For my lukewarm life?
What's next
What's next
For my lukewarm life?
What's next
What's next
For my lukewarm life?
credits
released July 26, 2020
Derek Sasu - vocals, acoustic guitar, electric guitar, bass, keyboard (strings, trumpet), drums/percussion programming, guitar programming, piano programming, ambient, effects, samples, recording, production.
Dense but cool, the EP feels like entering through a empty battlefield where you don't know which direction the shots flying above your head are gonna come from. Soft Construction
A jagged but pretty collection with lots of neat effects and warm, sweet personality. Listen for an exquisite fusion of noise and shoegaze and indie pop. Soft Construction
The Arizona band do right by post-hardcore on their immersive new LP, leavening untempered breakdowns with carefully-measured catharsis. Bandcamp New & Notable Sep 20, 2018
Expansive, genre-exploding avant rock collective bring their dizzying ideas to fruition on the auditory and visual planes. Bandcamp New & Notable May 20, 2016
