Before I prattle on about the background behind the last record on the list, Dark Moons, let me offer sincere thanks for taking the time to read, listen, and maybe laugh along with me during these ten days of darkness. Your time, virtual camaraderie, and support are truly appreciated, so thanks again…. Perhaps I’ll make this an annual thing… my Purge… we’ll see.
Dark Moons had pieces of itself laying all over my Audio Sanctum, scattered like body parts from a date with Jason Vorhees. Some bits were from unresolved ideas, some were snippets originally intended for other compositions, and others were sound beds made for this work in particular. The shit was making me crazy…. er…. Each of these disparate pieces was like an independent entity, all orbiting the idea, all saying slightly different things to me, and all of them seemed to obfuscate their meanings. The one bit they all shared in common was their shrouded natures. Dark moons…..
A new moon, a dark moon, is still up there in the cold vacuum of space, it’s just not generally visible to the naked eye. Whether or not a dark moon can be seen, it’s influence is still felt, tides still rise and fall, it still helps protect the Earth from space rocks, it still affects the Earth’s crust and the magma beneath, and it still drags on the Earth’s rotation. Thus, even unseen our dark moon exerts its effects on our world.
Dark matter could’ve been chosen to serve as my example, for it too exerts its influence without us being able to see or observe it in any fashion save by the most abstract methodology. Nevertheless, in this instance I think a dark moon provides for reflection on things we can sometimes see and other times we cannot. The moon also has a more deeply rooted place in our mythology, at present, than does dark matter. When you interpret information about the moon it is often colorized by its place in your mythology, and here I use the term, mythology, as metaphor for whatever you believe, whether or not that has any connection to actual facts. You mythology might support the opinion that the Moon is green cheese or Chang’e, Hecate or torn out chunk from an impact in Earth’s distant past, a wandering satellite captured by Earth’s gravitational field or Sin, and so on… in the words of the master philosopher, Bob Ross, “you decide.”
The moon is also an example of the cyclic nature of so many things. Days and nights, seasons, a night path that is sometimes illuminated, sometimes not. It is generally easier to navigate a path when it is illuminated, one can more easily see pitfalls and objects that might trip us up. Yet, when the moon is dark, when its illumination isn’t present, we actually see the stars far better. It can be very similar with the navigation of own essence. We more easily navigate immediate hazards when we can fully see them, yet sometimes the fainter things, the things farther away from where we are, are easier to see if we don’t rely on our illumination, but rather seek enlightenment from the unknown, the obscure, and the incredibly distant. When your mind cannot grasp, observe the obscured with your heart, with your essence… this is the place and time of the Dark Moons….