Spectrum, 14th Century Talk

[Thomas]

Post your thoughts on the ep.

I think the "Ballad Of No-Face" is simply fantastic. The piano part at the end just kills me in a good way.

[Scarychips]

The EP is fantastic. It does not sound like anything Owen ever did as Final Fantasy. If Heartland is anyything like that, we're in for a treat.

[neptune]

Do you think Cockatrice might be like He Poos Clouds (the song) but from the opposite point of view? Like... Link from Legend of Zelda looking up at the almighty player who controls him like a "marionette". The bit about freezing and burning made me think about the fire and ice dungeons from zelda... or am I just a hopeless nintendo nerd?

[neptune]

Just read the lyrics and found more evidence for that theory:

Compare:
"I'm guided by the slightest touch
With his fingertips"
With:
"I move him with my thumbs"

Or:
"I'm made to be a marionette"
With:
"You may have been made for love, but I'm just made"

Gosh I sure am obsessed with Zelda...

[Scarychips]

You're not the only who's obsessed neptune.

[funkage]

Oooh, is this released or just available at gigs???

Cant believe i havent heard it yet.

[Scarychips]

Only avaible at gigs, but it will be officially released September 30th.

[funkage]

Brilliant, is it a proper release or one of those silly limited release tickets that people in the North East of England cant get hold of?

[potem]

Aug 28, 2008 12:42:32 GMT -5 Thomas said:

Post your thoughts on the ep.

I think the "Ballad Of No-Face" is simply fantastic. The piano part at the end just kills me in a good way.

Yes, agreed.

If anyone can get or figure out some sheet music for that piano part at the end please post it.

[kiwiball]

i don't even know where to start. it's just so great! blue imelda is really different! i dig! it makes me wanna dance in my chair, but in a good way, as opposed to a really lame way. and the butcher is completely different live and recorded wow! he must've gotten creative, it's so exciting!

[JackAltman]

I think it's crazy that the EP was leaked yesterday and Google is already returning over 80 separate results when searching blogs only.

These Internets are a force to reckon with.

[Dave]

I wasn't entirely sure where to put this, but I thought it'd be best to put it here. The Stranger, Seattle's (better) local weekly, interviewed Owen about Spectrum for its issue about the Bumbershoot Music Festival.

Utopian Dream Boy
Final Fantasy vs. the World of Spectrum
by Sam Mickens

Toronto's Owen Pallett, the sole designer and proprietor of Final Fantasy, is a technically astonishing and vision-laden musician. In recent years, he's split his time between writing arrangements for and playing in esteemed ensembles such as Arcade Fire and the Hidden Cameras, and his own work as FF, including his last full-length, the excellent and widely lauded He Poos Clouds (winner of the 2006 Polaris Prize, Canada's most prestigious music award). He has two limited-edition EPs (Spectrum, 14th Century on Blocks Recording Club and Final Fantasy Plays to Please on Slender Means Society/States Rights Pregnancy Series) coming out this fall, and is working on his next full length, Heartland, in perpetuity.

You have two EPs coming out. The first one (Spectrum, 14th Century) is imaginary field recordings, is that right?

It's more like fake field recordings from a fictional country. The country is called Spectrum, and I'm the sole deity of it. The characters [in Spectrum] all worship me. Of the five songs on the EP, three are devotional songs from characters in the country.

How much supplementary writing work did you do in conceiving the country?

I'm embarrassed to say; there's quite a lot of stuff. But it's like asking, when you look at a beautiful house, what the foundations are like—it doesn't matter. I came up with the idea for the EP about two years ago. But other things have been going on; it's taken a lot longer to get things done. I keep getting caught up with arranging for other people and touring.

What are your ideas about the role of fantasy in your own art-making?

Well, there's some sort of visceral beauty in a lot of the fantasy that I read as a kid that reminds me of being a presexual entity. But it's very sexy in a really presexual way; I remember reading about owls and dragons doing it, and it was kind of boner material. As an adult, it's interesting to see that most of my favorite fantasy and science fiction from childhood was social commentary in some form.

Does your next full-length have any relationship to the fictional country?

Oh yeah, it takes place entirely in that country. And it has a plot that's secondary to its album-ness. To be honest, I think it's really far more legible than—I mean, the most legible concept album that I've ever heard is Dream Theater. They had a song and then an album that was part two of the song, kind of like a Phil Elverum thing, but in this super-American literal way. I don't remember what it was called; it had this big face on the cover. But yeah, I remember listening to that and, in between the triple rolls, I remember hearing a really, really overt story.

Like Trapped in the Closet?

Well, not quite as literal as that, but...

More literal than The Wall?

Well, I don't know, The Wall is pretty literal.

Do you feel like all of the characters in Spectrum are part of a very clear allegorical framework?

Yeah, it's more allegorical for sure. This Spectrum EP is really meant to illustrate the backgrounds and the tendencies of these people. But, how well can I do that? I mean, I'm not writing appendices, I'm writing a verse and a chorus and trying to inform you a bit about the people. But, really, they're all sort of really extroverted versions of my own feelings. Like: I hate me and they hate me, too. Or: I hate gays; they hate gays—stuff like that [preemptive note: Owen is homosexual]. So, I think people will kind of get it. There's a few sort of notes of colonialism and urban planning as well. This country Spectrum is based on a Canada that was never colonized—that is to say, it was colonized but there was never any genocide of any First Nation people.

So everyone built the society together?

Exactly. It was a colony that wasn't based on guilt, which had a culture that was not based on oppression and guilt and massacres, but rather was simply allowed to develop on its own. Kind of like Pitcairn Island, though I guess Pitcairn Island had its other sort of problems. But yeah, Spectrum is a much more pastoral, sort of Owen-worshipping kind of country. But, aside from this, I'm just trying to write some good songs.

[seaissa]

Thanks for posting that-- it was really interesting.

(I like both the Weekly and the Stranger... I like having choices...)

[ejusw]

downloading now, can't wait to purchase!

[Deleted]

The Butcher

Doomsday, the end of the the century
In accord with prophesy
Is all your fear, your fire, your family
Written within the book of butchery?

My appetite is endless
The people defenseless
The land is big, this land is bigger
But never as big as the mouth of a singer, oh

Every morning I listen to confessionals
I don't give a shit 'bout the bulk of it
Still I keep it professional
And as penance I tell them to prostletyze
Say the sun is red, say that i am right
Say that all the bases belong to us

What of doomsday the end of the century
In accord with prophesy
Put all your fears, your fire, your family
Into the mouth of Final Fantasy

And the bishops will kneel at their altars and sing
Remove their coats/cores, their rings, their jewels
Lay them all down in sacrifice
What of things, what things? What is this thing?
I've a temper as shiny as any bling
And all this attention will gain you no favour in paradise

And at doomsday the end of the century
In accord with prophesy
Throw all your fears, your fire, your family
Into the mouth of Final Fantasy

Oh crap, where is the crap?
Where did I crap?

Oh crap, where is the crap?
When/Wonder did I crap?

(repeats)

Well I stand alone on a planet still
Nothing left to remember with
I tried, I tried, I tried to prevent it,
I'll, I'll try but I'll never stop it, no

Muzzle me, muzzle, muzzle me
By my will and breaketh me
And you try, you try, you try to prevent
You'll try, you'll try but you'll never stop it


I can't get enough of this song. Its been stuck in my head since the Vicar Street gig and even more so since I recording of it. Its instantly familiar and the lyrics are so damn intricate and wity. The melodies, the melodies for gods sake! Is he saying "Oh crap, where is the crap?" or am I going potty?