The Story Behind The Crystal Mountain
May. 12th, 2020 01:29 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
nightlightsuk"The Crystal Mountain" for those 3 people on the planet who don't know and don't own a copy, (and why not?!) was my debut Nightlights album. It was also the first, but hopefully far from last, release that had a physical release too in the form of a cassette, which - with help from Nostalgia Nerd and several friends sharing the link - sold out pretty swiftly last year.
In the notes section on Bandcamp, I did write a bit about the album and its background, but there's only so much room available on there - certainly not enough to really go into detail. So this blog seemed the ideal place to ramble in more detail about the album, and the story behind it, etc, for the few who may be interested.
Okay, so the basic premise behind the album then. Well, I'm a very big fan (it's all those M&Ms) of rose-tinted 80s nostalgia, which is no surprise to anyone who knows my music - mostly built around 80s style synth sounds, and with hints of synthwave - also a genre that deals with a lot of 80s style music and designs. I was reminded at some point of the soundtrack albums for the 80s Transformers film, and the 90s classic, The Crow - which told the story of the film across its fifteen tracks. Obviously I never had the chance to write a soundtrack for an 80s animated film, but there seemed no reason not to think up an imaginary story for an imaginary film, and write the soundtrack for that, as though it had existed. Or something.
So essentially the "Crystal Mountain" album is just that - a soundtrack for an imaginary 80s animated film. That naturally meant that I needed to work out at least a vague plot for the film, so that the music would follow that. The song titles only suggest a storyline rather than give full details, and it's up to the listener if they want to fill in the gaps with their imagination. But hopefully the titles and the music are enough to help that story take place in the listener's mind.
Something else that played a major role in the decision is the fact that I'm a big fan of Marillion. Over the course of their career, Marillion have written some outstanding concept albums that tell a story over the course of the songs - again, to my mind almost like having a soundtrack to an imaginary film. They wrote "Misplaced Childhood" during the Fish era, apparently loosely themed around the singer's childhood. Later they wrote "Brave" (which actually did have a film as part of the bargain) which told the story about a girl found on a bridge, about to leap to her death, and it explored what led to that moment and what followed, for better or worse.
Similarly, the band that played the biggest role in inspiring me to actually write music was Talk Talk, and although their "Colour Of Spring" album is maybe not a story in the concept album sense, I always felt that the songs had a common thread, and even more so with their legendary "Spirit Of Eden" - that certainly felt as though there was a story of sorts running through the 6 songs.
So writing a concept album, such as it is, was something that I wanted to do for a long time. Others within synthwave had also done similar things, such as Computronic's darn fine "Even The Score" or The Midnight's "Kids." (Was that a concept album? I kind of felt that it was, even if that wasn't the intention.) I suppose the genre is ideal for that really, given that the music can be so good at conjuring up vivid memories etc of the 80s - ideal for forming an imaginary film in your noggin.
As for the story told by the "Crystal Mountain" album, the influence for that also goes back to the 80s, specifically to role playing games and the Fighting Fantasy books. At some point when I was at school, a friend lent me his Dungeons & Dragons kit that he'd had for Christmas, and I found it to be fascinating, but ultimately a bit too complicated for a bonehead like me. And also, for reasons relating to one particularly paranoid parent, I didn't have many chances for friends to visit. So D&D wasn't realistically something I could get into all that much.
But the friend who lent me his D&D set also lent me a book from the Lone Wolf series, called "Caverns Of Kalte." And that book was essentially an RPG solo adventure in a single novel. And it was bloody fascinating. It had me hooked instantly, and although that book was part of a different series, it led to me finding out about the Fighting Fantasy books. I think, though I may be wrong, that in the USA they mostly had the Choose Your Own Adventure books, and we did have some of those in the UK as well. But mostly the UK seemed to go for the more advanced Fighting Fantasy books.
Those wonderful little gems were books where you effectively chose where the story went. You began at page 1, and that section of the story would end with a choice, along the lines of "If you want to head east, turn to 176. If you want to headbutt the iron statue, turn to 82. If you want to peel a satsuma slowly, turn to 67." So you might choose the satsuma option, heading over to page 67, and it would tell you what happened as a result of your choice, maybe leading to more options, and so on. That way, you'd attempt to work your way through the story, meeting different characters, locations, picking up useful objects, sometimes meeting your doom in the form of some hideous trap or a triple headed zombie, and maybe, just maybe, making it to the end of the book and victory.
The dudes behind Fighting Fantasy released masses of books covering all sorts of scenarios - mostly fantasy, but some were themed around sci-fi or haunted houses full of devil worshippers or vampire hunters. And in particular the ones that always stood out to me was a set of four huge books, the Sorcery series, which told an epic story of a hero crossing a huge map to recover an extremely powerful item held in a damn near impenetrable fortress at the other end. The four books linked together into one huge quest, and personally I don't think they ever topped that.
To anyone who has listened to my album and followed the storyline set out by the song titles, it's pretty clear that I followed a similar idea - a character (in this case, the kitty girl called Kiki who has been on many of my covers) having to go against staggering odds to recover something many miles away that would, in this case, be the difference between saving the world or the whole world ending and no more M&Ms. And, as with the Sorcery books, there was the tricky problem for the character - having to figure out how the heck to get back home again once they'd found the thing that they were looking for. Which is where a bit of unexpected help appears from. (But what was it? Well, with my album I imagined that it was some kind of a steampunk style airship or hot air balloon that turned up to rescue the character before the entire mountain went pop. Or maybe even Lucky, the poor doomed robot dog who made the ultimate sacrifice to save the day, leaving Kiki to complete her mission. Perhaps, just maybe, he survived after all...)
As a whole, I'm really happy with how the album turned out. There were a few tracks that had to be left behind because, for various reasons, they just wouldn't have fitted on the tape version of the album. Those tracks, "The Inventor" and "Distant Reflections" did get released later on Bandcamp as extra tracks on a couple of singles.
What would I have liked to have done differently or added to the album? Well, those two extra tracks I just mentioned would ideally be put back into the album where they belong. Someone suggested a while ago that it would be good to see a deluxe CD version of the album, which seemed a great idea, although financially that isn't possible at this time. But if that happened, those two tracks would be added to the track list, without a doubt. Also, the original plan was that the tape inlay would have folded out to show a hand drawn map of the area that Kiki travels across during the story. Unfortunately, partly due to the cost of the extra "pages" needed and also the fact that it would have been too small to read, that just didn't prove possible. Again, a deluxe CD version may be a chance to include that map, although I've lost the stupid thing so I'd have to redraw it...
A song with actual vocals on would also have been great, if possible. But I can't sing and won't sing, and indeed I have been banned from singing in 194 countries for public health reasons. But if there had been a suitable vocal available, that would have been perfect for the track intended to play over the opening credits. Also, some kind of art book could have been interesting to work on if I'd a) had the money to include such a thing and b) had the necessary skill to actually draw an entire book's worth of art themed around the storyline.
And... well, if Nightlights had been an actual band, able to tour and play live, I would have loved to have the chance to do what Marillion did, and perform the entire album live. For reasons I've outlined before on this blog, a few years back, live shows are pretty much impossible for me, but it doesn't mean I can't daydream about what might have been.
I think that's about it really. I can't think of anything right now to add that I haven't covered, though doubtless there are things. Obviously if anyone has anything to ask that I didn't cover here, by all means feel free to ask via my Twitter or Facebook pages, or by leaving a comment here, and I'll do my best to answer. :)
In the notes section on Bandcamp, I did write a bit about the album and its background, but there's only so much room available on there - certainly not enough to really go into detail. So this blog seemed the ideal place to ramble in more detail about the album, and the story behind it, etc, for the few who may be interested.
Okay, so the basic premise behind the album then. Well, I'm a very big fan (it's all those M&Ms) of rose-tinted 80s nostalgia, which is no surprise to anyone who knows my music - mostly built around 80s style synth sounds, and with hints of synthwave - also a genre that deals with a lot of 80s style music and designs. I was reminded at some point of the soundtrack albums for the 80s Transformers film, and the 90s classic, The Crow - which told the story of the film across its fifteen tracks. Obviously I never had the chance to write a soundtrack for an 80s animated film, but there seemed no reason not to think up an imaginary story for an imaginary film, and write the soundtrack for that, as though it had existed. Or something.
So essentially the "Crystal Mountain" album is just that - a soundtrack for an imaginary 80s animated film. That naturally meant that I needed to work out at least a vague plot for the film, so that the music would follow that. The song titles only suggest a storyline rather than give full details, and it's up to the listener if they want to fill in the gaps with their imagination. But hopefully the titles and the music are enough to help that story take place in the listener's mind.
Something else that played a major role in the decision is the fact that I'm a big fan of Marillion. Over the course of their career, Marillion have written some outstanding concept albums that tell a story over the course of the songs - again, to my mind almost like having a soundtrack to an imaginary film. They wrote "Misplaced Childhood" during the Fish era, apparently loosely themed around the singer's childhood. Later they wrote "Brave" (which actually did have a film as part of the bargain) which told the story about a girl found on a bridge, about to leap to her death, and it explored what led to that moment and what followed, for better or worse.
Similarly, the band that played the biggest role in inspiring me to actually write music was Talk Talk, and although their "Colour Of Spring" album is maybe not a story in the concept album sense, I always felt that the songs had a common thread, and even more so with their legendary "Spirit Of Eden" - that certainly felt as though there was a story of sorts running through the 6 songs.
So writing a concept album, such as it is, was something that I wanted to do for a long time. Others within synthwave had also done similar things, such as Computronic's darn fine "Even The Score" or The Midnight's "Kids." (Was that a concept album? I kind of felt that it was, even if that wasn't the intention.) I suppose the genre is ideal for that really, given that the music can be so good at conjuring up vivid memories etc of the 80s - ideal for forming an imaginary film in your noggin.
As for the story told by the "Crystal Mountain" album, the influence for that also goes back to the 80s, specifically to role playing games and the Fighting Fantasy books. At some point when I was at school, a friend lent me his Dungeons & Dragons kit that he'd had for Christmas, and I found it to be fascinating, but ultimately a bit too complicated for a bonehead like me. And also, for reasons relating to one particularly paranoid parent, I didn't have many chances for friends to visit. So D&D wasn't realistically something I could get into all that much.
But the friend who lent me his D&D set also lent me a book from the Lone Wolf series, called "Caverns Of Kalte." And that book was essentially an RPG solo adventure in a single novel. And it was bloody fascinating. It had me hooked instantly, and although that book was part of a different series, it led to me finding out about the Fighting Fantasy books. I think, though I may be wrong, that in the USA they mostly had the Choose Your Own Adventure books, and we did have some of those in the UK as well. But mostly the UK seemed to go for the more advanced Fighting Fantasy books.
Those wonderful little gems were books where you effectively chose where the story went. You began at page 1, and that section of the story would end with a choice, along the lines of "If you want to head east, turn to 176. If you want to headbutt the iron statue, turn to 82. If you want to peel a satsuma slowly, turn to 67." So you might choose the satsuma option, heading over to page 67, and it would tell you what happened as a result of your choice, maybe leading to more options, and so on. That way, you'd attempt to work your way through the story, meeting different characters, locations, picking up useful objects, sometimes meeting your doom in the form of some hideous trap or a triple headed zombie, and maybe, just maybe, making it to the end of the book and victory.
The dudes behind Fighting Fantasy released masses of books covering all sorts of scenarios - mostly fantasy, but some were themed around sci-fi or haunted houses full of devil worshippers or vampire hunters. And in particular the ones that always stood out to me was a set of four huge books, the Sorcery series, which told an epic story of a hero crossing a huge map to recover an extremely powerful item held in a damn near impenetrable fortress at the other end. The four books linked together into one huge quest, and personally I don't think they ever topped that.
To anyone who has listened to my album and followed the storyline set out by the song titles, it's pretty clear that I followed a similar idea - a character (in this case, the kitty girl called Kiki who has been on many of my covers) having to go against staggering odds to recover something many miles away that would, in this case, be the difference between saving the world or the whole world ending and no more M&Ms. And, as with the Sorcery books, there was the tricky problem for the character - having to figure out how the heck to get back home again once they'd found the thing that they were looking for. Which is where a bit of unexpected help appears from. (But what was it? Well, with my album I imagined that it was some kind of a steampunk style airship or hot air balloon that turned up to rescue the character before the entire mountain went pop. Or maybe even Lucky, the poor doomed robot dog who made the ultimate sacrifice to save the day, leaving Kiki to complete her mission. Perhaps, just maybe, he survived after all...)
As a whole, I'm really happy with how the album turned out. There were a few tracks that had to be left behind because, for various reasons, they just wouldn't have fitted on the tape version of the album. Those tracks, "The Inventor" and "Distant Reflections" did get released later on Bandcamp as extra tracks on a couple of singles.
What would I have liked to have done differently or added to the album? Well, those two extra tracks I just mentioned would ideally be put back into the album where they belong. Someone suggested a while ago that it would be good to see a deluxe CD version of the album, which seemed a great idea, although financially that isn't possible at this time. But if that happened, those two tracks would be added to the track list, without a doubt. Also, the original plan was that the tape inlay would have folded out to show a hand drawn map of the area that Kiki travels across during the story. Unfortunately, partly due to the cost of the extra "pages" needed and also the fact that it would have been too small to read, that just didn't prove possible. Again, a deluxe CD version may be a chance to include that map, although I've lost the stupid thing so I'd have to redraw it...
A song with actual vocals on would also have been great, if possible. But I can't sing and won't sing, and indeed I have been banned from singing in 194 countries for public health reasons. But if there had been a suitable vocal available, that would have been perfect for the track intended to play over the opening credits. Also, some kind of art book could have been interesting to work on if I'd a) had the money to include such a thing and b) had the necessary skill to actually draw an entire book's worth of art themed around the storyline.
And... well, if Nightlights had been an actual band, able to tour and play live, I would have loved to have the chance to do what Marillion did, and perform the entire album live. For reasons I've outlined before on this blog, a few years back, live shows are pretty much impossible for me, but it doesn't mean I can't daydream about what might have been.
I think that's about it really. I can't think of anything right now to add that I haven't covered, though doubtless there are things. Obviously if anyone has anything to ask that I didn't cover here, by all means feel free to ask via my Twitter or Facebook pages, or by leaving a comment here, and I'll do my best to answer. :)
no subject
Date: 2020-05-12 07:06 pm (UTC)*keels over* I never thought it of you! Never! :P
I found it to be fascinating, but ultimately a bit too complicated for a bonehead like me.
As a fellow bonehead, I can say that I had pretty much the same reaction when I was very, very briefly in my middle school's D&D Club.
If you want to peel a satsuma slowly, turn to 67.
If I'm not allowed to peel it with a Y-shaped stick, there will be trouble. You listening, Steve Jackson?
indeed I have been banned from singing in 194 countries for public health reasons
Only 194? It's 195 for me. I reckon... yes, it's those pesky Bhutanese. They're always leaving loopholes. Off you go to Thimpu as soon as you can and get recording!
Anyway, I can't think of any specific questions right at the moment, but I always enjoy reading detailed stuff like that, so thank you very much for posting it! :)
no subject
Date: 2020-05-13 09:13 am (UTC)It's true. It is admittedly quite a well kept secret, but I'm surprised a few hints didn't sneak out regardless. ;)
If I'm not allowed to peel it with a Y-shaped stick, there will be trouble. You listening, Steve Jackson?
He'd better be. I can remember the Y shaped stick fairly vividly, but I can't for the life of me think what it was actually for, or if it genuinely served a purpose in the book.
Only 194? It's 195 for me. I reckon... yes, it's those pesky Bhutanese. They're always leaving loopholes. Off you go to Thimpu as soon as you can and get recording!
I'm working on it. I've got a tea spoon so I can make a start on digging the tunnel even as I type this.
And of course, thank you very much for reading this behemoth of a post! I didn't think it would end up being such a lengthy piece of writing when I started, but there seemed to be more to say than I expected.