Unto Thine Darkness, Death Doth Deliver

Track List		Length
1 - The Epoch in which his Evil Reigns		9:58
2 - Courante - Cello Suite No 2 in Dm (Bach)		0.45
3 - His Gaze shall wipe away their smiles		3:00
4 - With Justice is His Judgment Administered		1:31
5 - Emblazoned with a Z		5:54
6 - The Destiny of your Fate		3:02
7 - Unholiest Judge, What Woeful Wrath hadst thou		4:23
8 - Upon the Astral Plane (Uematsu)		4:22
9 -Worship and Exaltation is Due only to the Dark Lord and Master of all things Metal		12:12

Commentary: About this album

    As one would expect from most recording artists, the latest Disciples of Zoldon album takes a significant turn from previous work.  Also, in order not to be a completely different project, much remains in common with its predecessors.  There is the same inconsistent genre skipping between songs, and no strict focus for lyrics overall, though the purpose is still apparent - the praise of fictional deity Zoldon, exploration of his character, and recount of his deeds. 

In 2005 the Swedish metal band Meshuggah put out an album that became very influential on my own - Catch 33.  There are a number of remarkable things about this album, two of which are the exclusive use of computer programmed drums, and the seamless continuation of music from the start of the album to the end - indeed the CD is more like a single song with almost arbitrary track divisions than anything.  I had already been using programmed drums for DOZ, but this idea of working all the tracks together as a continuous piece is something that I decided to use in Unto thine Darkness, Death Doth Deliver.

A lot of metal albums typically display their fastest, most intense songs at the beginning of the album, and their slowest, moodiest or most experimental material at the end.  My original intention when I started writing the album was to mess with this a little bit and start off with a very long doom piece, followed by a very fast grind track.  This concept didn't turn out to be as weird as I had anticipated, but still works well.  'The Epoch in which his Evil Reigns' is definitely the track I worked on the hardest, and would have to be the only song I have ever written that turned out exactly as planned after recording it.  I like it's consistency and power, and the mix did it justice.

The decision to include a Bach piece at random was one I nearly changed my mind on while in the studio.  I only left it in there because it makes me feel good to do bizarre and 'unjustified' things with my music.  By this I mean that it doesn't improve the album in any typical way, but it makes the album more unique and unusual, which is an improvement in a different way.

'His Gaze shall wipe away their smiles' is the most ridiculous song I have written by far, and so far it has turned out to be one of the most popular.  I think I am happy I did it, but don't expect anything like that in future!  It is also the most poorly performed and required a lot of 'cheating' in the studio to get right.  I certainly didn't play any of the guitar tracks start to finish in one take.  More like 6-8 bits stuck together per guitar track.

This song and the next two make up the core of the album, carrying it from the beginning to the moodier, more atmospheric stages of the album.  Emblazoned with a Z feels like one of the centerpiece songs, and uses a lot of material that I had floating around with me for some time.  Definitely one of the most progressive pieces that I've done.

My love of final fantasy music and utmost respect for Nobuo Uematsu is the motivation behind the inclusion of this second to last track.  The original name of this piece is simply 'plane', although I have heard it referred to as 'forgotten city' from another source.  The music is the theme of the Final Fantasy VII characters making their way to an unknown destination, exploring a strange structure, unaware of the doom that awaits them...

The final song on this album was written completely in the spirit of the moment, I had all of the rest planned out and once they were in place I simply continued on a roll of inspiration and churned it out.  As such it contains a lot of material that I regret.  The payoff is that it also contains the some of the most valuable moments of the whole album.  In true DOZ tradition it is loveably inconsistent.

Unto thine Darkness, Death Doth Deliver  marks a drastic change for DOZ in that it is a completed, mixed, produced piece of work.  It has a full hard copy CD package, and comes across as a much more serious effort.  In many ways it is, although the project will never be serious in the same way that bands such as Meshuggah are, for example.  Putting real effort into a joke project allows me to do things that I otherwise wouldn't be able to, and enjoy the music in a certain unique way.  It is possible to be amused by something and have a lot of respect for it at the same time.  Having said that, the majority of people that find out about the project without someone to explain it for them, go ahead and assume that it is entirely serious anyway.

-Luke, 22 July 2006.