Behind The Tracks: CKRAFT - Epic Discordant Vision (Single) (2023)

Let's talk about the album's title track, Epic Discordant Vision, 5th track of the album (video: https://youtube.com/watch?v=95hdZBMjouQ)

Charles (CKRAFT bandleader): This composition came to me after listening to these two songs in a row:

- Meshuggah’s "Dancers to a Discordant System” (https://youtu.be/uq2HNLTxaZc)

- and the Middle-Ages’ Gregorian chant “Visionem Quam Vidistis”, sung by some monks in the most traditional way! (https://youtu.be/lOevSluzwtQ)

“Visionem Quam Vidistis” is about a vision, something that you witness, and that you should keep for yourself "until the son of Men comes back from the dead”. Religions are full of these little scenes, described in these chants. They’re supposed to fuel people's reverence, contemplation, and celebration towards their gods, but I always found that there’s something more to it, something deeper, sometimes epic, dark, and ominous, if you know what I mean. These melodies are hundreds of years old, they were at the very origins of Western culture and music and they crossed all those centuries and still survive nowadays!

The first minute of the song is about setting up the intricate, discordant, but crushing Meshuggah-influenced rhythmical idea, and after 00:59 you can clearly hear the melody, like an epic vision coming straight from Middle-Ages, played by sax and synthesiser-accordion.

Then the calm and harmonious interlude in the middle of the track is clearly influenced by what Opted was doing in the late 1990s / early 2000s, “Still Life” and "Ghost Reveries” are two of my favorite records in the history of Metal (I basically grew up listening to them!)

And of course, after all the development in which we play the Medieval melody again and add slow and epic, nearly-classical textures, the discordant riff suddenly comes back to destroy every bit of hope created earlier in the song. Classic! Who doesn't like to crush stuff at the end of a tune?

Thanks a lot Breathing The Core for having us today, I just love to talk about the behind-the-scenes details of this music, each of them has its little story mostly inspired by Medieval references, and it's always a great pleasure to reveal all those Easter eggs to the fans!