Track By Tracks: A Primitive Evolution - Becoming (2019)

1. I am an Infinite Cycle:

This is our classic intro track. All the albums we loved growing up always had a great intro that set a mood for the album you were about to embark on. We always loved that so created something for this album to set it up. Its core is a mangled drumbeat that's been run through an old Boss GT-3 fx unit with the whammy bend on the foot pedal, it creates the monster-like sound that continues throughout the song. We were messing about at a jam session once and made it, we knew it had to be used somewhere. I made a spoken word for this one that I thought would help build the concept for "Becoming." My voice is processed heavily to sound sort of like transmission of sorts. "In my dreams, I saw the future..." The subject here has had a revelation of sorts. Discovering that they, in fact, an infinite cycle, there is no beginning and no end, "this is our becoming." 

2. Who's Your Maker?:

We fade over into "Who's Your Maker?" with another voice, this time more robotic. It says "I was sent here to report." The concept lyrically behind this track is that an alien life form was sent to Earth to report on human life, the lyrics are about what he discovers while on Earth and his realization that humans are in fact destroying themselves and the world they live in. It's essentially how I fell about being here in this moment of time, in this culture. Do you ever feel like you're an alien? Do you hopefully wait for the day where you'll be taken back to the place you were meant to belong? I know I do haha.

So within the stories, there's always a little taste of my own beliefs or feelings about my life experiences. Sonically I just love this track. It hits so hard and has one of my favorite guitar tones on the whole album. HM-2 pinned banging into a modded JCM800 while on fire and traveling at the speed of light. 

3. The Beauty:

This is one of those songs that just came together so easily. I think it's the last song that we wrote that made it onto the album. We often write in jam sessions but this one Stu had actually come up with the electronic loop first and then Steph started chugging along with that bass line in the studio and before we knew it we were in a full-blown progression of the entire song. Lyrically this song is again a lot about the way we view the world. I'm always so enraptured by nature, I love watching bees gather pollen and often collect shells and rocks whenever I travel, often feeling at one with the universe only to be violently pulled out of this meditation by the shitheads of the world; hell-bent on destruction and consumption and only focused on making gains for their stockholders. I wanted this song to reflect that. It heeds a warning but also has a positive message within. I feel like it encompasses the human experience on those levels. I feel like we need to look within ourselves and cherish the world around us before it's destroyed. We all have the key within us to change the course of humanity, but perhaps many will die before we realize this as a collective. 

4. Close Your Eyes:

"Close Your Eyes" is the love song of the album I'd say. This song is really saying, let go, let go of everything you're holding against the people you love so you can enter a place where you can be yourself.

Of course, there is a battle to let go... haha for me anyway. Hopefully, in this life, we can find that a companion that we know that whatever crazy shit happens they'll be there, in the end, standing by your side. 

5. Ghost:

Ghost is probably the most personal song on the album. This song is about the death of a loved one. For me, it was my father when I was a teen who was killed by a drunk driver on his way home from helping some friends move. That event changed me forever. The song is about the energy that haunts you when someone like this is taken from you. Could be a friend, a wife, a parent... it always lingers. I've had many great conversations with my family about the dreams we have of my father, some still to this day. In our dreams, we can connect and resurrect this person. The song takes us through a dream-like state and into a nightmare as we walk with our ghosts forever. 

6. Dead Skies:

This song is about the war machine and how it is constantly breeding hate and fear. Holding on to ourselves and trying to not be consumed by this fear is what the song struggles to convey. I have a lot of dreams about the apocalypse and what it might look like. I'm dreaming of dead skies. 

7. We Are the Truth:

I wrote this song after reading "Do Android's dream of Electric Sheep." This novel deals a lot with finding one's self I thought. There are desires and fears expressed here, we are always searching for our identity. What defines who we are as humans? I love the idea of a machine believing it's real or capable of the same life as a human. If we could see the future and how we die would we then be able to change ourselves for the better? Again, this comes back to reflection on one's self. The truth is within us all and not found in material items or even others perhaps. 

8. Becoming:

The title track of the album. "Becoming" is about the current split in our culture. It's about the rich and the poor... the educated and ignorant. 

Left vs right, good vs evil. "Evolve and love or crumble and fall."

It's about all the horrible things we do that are "becoming the norm" in our society.

I wanted this song to feel like the final battle. You're loading up and the enemy is at the door. You're ready for this, this is the end of everything. 

9. Skeleton:

Skeleton is a story of lost love. In this song, the subject is searching for someone they lost. When they find what they lost they actually discover their own skeleton.

A ghost of themselves, trapped in this moment of sorrow. Their love left them for a reason, but perhaps it was of their own doing and now in death, they must find a way to return to their lost love.

10. Picturesque Hell:

Stream of consciousness here. This is one of those songs that I feel like I can't remember writing the lyrics. Sometimes you put your head into the ether and pull this shit out of there.

I imagine a beautiful picture of Hell hanging on a wall, it's almost enticing enough to want to visit it yourself. It reminds you of how you long to escape There's a person that makes you feel this way. You know they're a nightmare but you love it at the same time. They will destroy you in a beautiful blaze of glory.

11. Better Off Dead:

This one is about revenge. Locked up in an emotional battle waiting to break free and take back what is yours. There is no mercy in this rage.

If you've ever been manipulated or held hostage by someone emotionally or physically, this one is for you.

12. Live Forever:

We are back to our voyage through time and space with this one. We enter at the end of your life, you thank the vessel that has carried you this far and disembark into a new realm.

You rejoin all you have lost and see the universe expand before you. Time no longer exists and you see the Earth and the empire constructed by its inhabitants fall. In this infinite state, you achieve atonement for yourself and understand where everything went wrong.

13. Echo:

We end the album with a song about the battle between capitalism and identity. I started thinking this song would be a generational song about the "echo" generation. A lot of the shit that the world is riddled with today was crap that was made to sell to my generation. We witnessed the change in technology from analog to digital, we witnessed the most intense surge in consumerism and essentially the world becoming a plastic shit hole. A generation without any breaks, always consuming, always being fed more and more stuff, upgrades, upgrades, upgrades, planned obselences. It's relentless. I feel like I was so distracted my entire life I have almost forgotten most of it. I thought maybe the "Echo" is a never-ending, a consumption loop, "We are the Echo, We are the endless tide." The loop of consumption is then created. It cannot stop itself unless we recognize the threat and put an end to it. Realize the truth of the world and spread it back to us all the same way we were used. Stopover- consuming, you're not alone, we can change the course even though they don't want us to. So buy our new album.... right? hahaha. Fuck.