Someone suggested that Suss Müsik repost our contributions to the weekly Disquiet Junto projects, because they enjoy reading the explanations of the tracks. While you’re reading the original post, make sure you check out the other contributors’ works as well.
“What does it mean to be alive and awake in the universe right now?” asks David Sneider, the inventor of Galactic Tick Day.
Suss Müsik has always been interested in the idea of time, particular as a construct that disintegrates upon close inspection. The idea that Earth revolves around an object called the Sun, that itself exists in orbital flux, can be unsettling to casual observers. We always assume that we are the center of the known Universe, and yet all we are is a speck of light and dust circling a supermassive void. It’s humbling and awesome.
This short piece uses a series of piano fragments played roughly in measures of 6 at a BPM of 174. These are numerical nods to the amount of time between Galactic Tick milestones (633.7 days converted to 1.74 years). The voices are recorded through a Boss RV-6 direct and split through a Korg Toneworks 411X. Various percussion fragments were added, mostly banging random objects with pieces of metal. The violin was a last-minute addition and sounds like it, but Suss Müsik isn’t afraid to leave a few rough edges here and there.
The piece begins with a strong sense of structure, almost to the point of being a proper song, yet the tone changes quickly into something darker and more mysterious. Perhaps this is to signify the uneasy relationship we have with the unknown; the further into the center of the Universe we travel, the more we hope there is a familiar voice to reassure us that home isn’t really that far away.
The piece is named after Hans Lippershey, inventor of the telescope.