Metu Mortis, recorded 2019, released 2022, ©Apollonian Eye
In 2016, I became rather obsessed with the Latin language, having already learned German, which shares many features that seem bizarre to English-speakers. Latin is only taught to those who can afford it in Britain, with a few rare exceptions, and I saw immediatey upon exposure the relevance to English and other languages, to Culture and History, and to mental and thinking skills. Self-taught, I got myself through a GCSE (British High School level) and achieved an A-grade. For a bit of fun, and with german music like Rammstein having been a big help for me learning German, I wrote a couple of songs in Latin; these were Vae Victis, Regiscidium, Optimus Noctu and Cleopatra. Personal revision and practice, not much more.
Around the same time, after watching Rammstein at Download festival, my collaborators and I began thinking about the power of music to cross language barriers, as well as the power of language composition to enable easy learning of the lyrical and cultural content. Rammstein's "Du Hast", if you really understand it and the way it demonstrates german grammar, is an excellent learning resource as well as a memorable song.
Fast-forward two years to 2018. I was living in Royal Holloway University's Founder's Building, which is a large Victorian Chateau converted into student accomodation. The marble pillars and elaborate symbolic frescos enchanted me into a sustained hyper-imaginative state. Upon visiting Rome and especially Pompeii, this was further developed and a clear concept crystalised. I had tread the same footprints as the ghosts of that volcanic city whose phantom intensity was only comparable to a psychedelic experience. Now studying Latin and Greek at university, I began to walk the marble halls and imagine myself a time traveller from ancient Rome, mysteriously washed ashore in the 21st century and keen to tell, via the art forms of the new time, stories of glory and romance and savage war -- warnings and fables for modernity from the ancient mind.
Around the same time, after watching Rammstein at Download festival, my collaborators and I began thinking about the power of music to cross language barriers, as well as the power of language composition to enable easy learning of the lyrical and cultural content. Rammstein's "Du Hast", if you really understand it and the way it demonstrates german grammar, is an excellent learning resource as well as a memorable song.
Fast-forward two years to 2018. I was living in Royal Holloway University's Founder's Building, which is a large Victorian Chateau converted into student accomodation. The marble pillars and elaborate symbolic frescos enchanted me into a sustained hyper-imaginative state. Upon visiting Rome and especially Pompeii, this was further developed and a clear concept crystalised. I had tread the same footprints as the ghosts of that volcanic city whose phantom intensity was only comparable to a psychedelic experience. Now studying Latin and Greek at university, I began to walk the marble halls and imagine myself a time traveller from ancient Rome, mysteriously washed ashore in the 21st century and keen to tell, via the art forms of the new time, stories of glory and romance and savage war -- warnings and fables for modernity from the ancient mind.
The album METV MORTIS I was recorded in Spring and Summer 2019 in my Apollonian Eye studio then based in Egham, London.
METV MORTIS
The histerical call of a dying empire to live forever in immortal decadence.
DEVS VVLT
Welcome to the madness of war and the false courage of prophecy.
CLEOPATRA
You are the spellbound captive of an enchanting foreign land.
MEA CVLPA
Tides of emotions, waves come in stages; instrumental.
CALIGVLA
List of the mad deeds and words of Caligula.
REGISCIDIVM (et tv, brvte?)
Be aware of The Ides of March.
BACCHANALIA
Black Metal Wine Party.
OPTIMVS NOCTV
For nocturnal poets.
REDI IN S.P.Q.R.
The Beatles cover.
L'IMPOSSIBILE
Litfiba cover.