[NEW SONGS]

Berserker
On your guard as you lurk along the sand. A paper face won't mask your fear. Unrelenting consequences for this inquisition. Venture forth and give yourself away with the scent of unfamiliarity. For razor teeth love their human silk, they long to savor unexpecting flesh. To drink a carcass dry is to taste the Sunderban. Mighty one, never forget, never forget why your skin is thick. Die defending that which your heart keeps closest. The taste of vengeance is so much sweeter on the blackest of lips. The wind whispers trespass, a call for an end. Take up your arms set your sights. Never fear there's always more blood. Retaliate! At ease mighty one this war is not one of your own. The king returns to claim his throne. A humble crown adorns his noble brow.As the killing season comes to a close, take what's left and start again. As you strive to regain all aspects of your grief ridden life, living each day with strength found in your heart.
Rareform
A thousand times, too many times, I've fallen back out of place from a dream. The bright sunlight a rude awakening, like I'm seeing the colors leave the brush for the wall. That's when, into: I reach into memories, I long to re-live those times, those younger days. If only time would stop, stand still, maybe I could see myself. What I've become, it's sickening, this isn't me. No turning around, no turning back now. I'm disappearing into my dreams, I'm vanishing into the air. Liberation, I'm free from all of this. Now I must go, dissipate into the light.
Drifts Of Winter
Oh, so fucking cold. The winds, the drifts of winter, bone chilling nightfall. Early evening sun-downs make nights seem more like Borealis dreams. My roots runs deep through veins, my ancestry. Everything I know, in body and soul, Lakeland (this is all I know). Look to the river rushing, unparalleled in it's power. It carves away at the land, eroding the banks, consuming the sands and washes away to her majesty. They say there's no other place like home, and they said it best. I've realized what this place means to me, Lakeland. I can see my reflection in the land, I see my form, and I know the land reflects in my Self. It reflects in my Self.

[FORGING A FUTURE SELF]

Forging a Future Self
Please cut this noose. Untie these hands for me. They will insurrect my former self. Hide behind your failed design. Perfect its imperfections. I..ll carry out the plans of old. I..ll dig through the remains of my ruins. Unearthing something truly remarkable once hidden by your opaque heart. I..ll carry out plans of old. Digging through the remains of my ruins. From this day forth, your love will poison no longer. A strange suffocation, enticing existence. It..s comforting, the artificial life. A ghostly bliss without your kiss. Never grasping what you..ve hoped for. Your translucent hands pass through the sunlight. You..ll never feel that loving glow. Damned to be deprived of the blissful warmth of heaven. As you dissipate into the shadows.

Warm Thoughts of Warfare
The waking hour of scarlet warfare, I will fight for you. Our blood will wash away. Their skin will crack and peel in a thousand fires. We will break every bone, we will crush them all to dust. An attempt so frivolous to save your life. Watch you hit the sanguine ground like autumn leaves. With each nail driven you drift away. This somber burial is a calamity. Rise from your casket and kiss new breath from me. To those who can't behold your fading moonlight beauty radiating from your precious eyes, a tender gaze. Never witnessing an instance when you held time still forever in your matron hands. Rise from your casket revive this effigy. New life will feed your starving lungs. New blood will surge through collapsed arteries, and I'll hold you through it all.

Isolation Theory
So this is loneliness. I..ve grown too fond of this. Now i thirst for loveliness, to drink its beauty. i..ll never fill my cup if i can..t seem to free my frozen heart. Torturous veins tangle this body. A scream of anguish, silenced by the distancing to anyone. So this is loneliness. I know this all to well. Wrap me in your wings of amity. Torturous veins tangle this body. A scream of anguish, silenced by the distancing to anyone. Isolation is a four letter word. Through my bloody hands i see my heart reach the ground. No one is there to pick it up from the floor.

The Forfeit
Every time your lips spill their poisonous words, they infect the ones you claimed to have cared for. We are gored by your serrated ways. We shed our faith, we..ve bled oceans for your cause. We shed our faith in your atrocity. We..ve come to claim a thousand lives to live. Open hands will shape what little time we have. We exude our servitude to a lifetime of deceptive worship. Righteous hands will rise, if only to redeem the city of the gods. And in ourselves we trust. A thousand fists will rain. This mighty downpour will wash away. There is new hope in every open eye. Promise to ourselves that these words will never die. We exude our servant hood to a lifetime of immoral worship. Righteous hands will rise, if only to redeem the souls of the meek. Burn your spores so your plague will not manifest in the hearts of the innocent. And when the blackest day becomes forever grey, the ash will scatter of what has not remained. The ashes have buried you.

Fingers like Daggers
Your feminine fingers are like daggers. Tearing me apart, with each caressing stroke. My scars unravel cruel history. Our love was stab wounds and lusty kisses. In your eyes I see wasted tears for wasted years, and heartache, heartfelt for granted. You left me with nothing but the desire to overcome. This gaping wound from where you stole my vital organ. But keep it with you, a trophy for yourself. Still you linger for another gaze. Die away from me. I won..t stand by while you plague the air with your lies and deception. My shirt stained crimson, from long nights of anguish. These scars are forever, but this won..t be eternity. You wash away guilt in the oceans of my tears. I will drown you.

Engulfed
The sweltering heat sweeps through the blood, raising internal rage. The escalation of annoyance converts fingers to fists. Ready to smash the moral wall retaining the release, restraining the release. Wash over placid with flooding waves of hate. Diverge the silence with cathartic piercing screams. Unleash on your enemies a sweeping firestorm. Laying devastation upon those who haze you. Forever they curse you. Forever loathing the day they unraveled the fabric of your innocence. Gnawing at every tame fray, leaving only vengeance. A sheltered source of inspiration for your master plan to lay everything to waste. With no aggressor, without a foot to stamp out every garden of hope. Plant a row of remorse, and a crop of forgiveness. Raise yourself in a better world.

Redeeming The Wretched
When the bite of the steel catches your face, give it all your flesh to strip away. Revealing all the scars you hide inside. Your inner quarrels, your struggle to survive. A crimson hand to choke your throat. I..ll stop your breath as long as it takes. To end this torture, clearing a forest of oppression. Can you taste the soil as it fills your lungs? To extinguish the fire, the fire burning in your eyes. You cannot stop the scorching. We..ll lay you down on your eternal bed. The soothing touch of a wrathful hand. You leave the sky, encased in the earth. Can you feel the roots as they seep inside your heart? A crimson hand to do the will of god. We..ll wipe you out to clear the land for angels. With the turning of the tide.

A Steady Decline
The secret..s out this is the last time. Cast overboard, dragged out to sea. All premonitions drowned today in the murky waters flowing from wounds. But we emerged soaked in grace, dripping with the truth. You've fired upon a target so clear, but we..ve shattered our own glass hearts. We..ve fought with sweat and blood, this life is all we have. Today has taken a bloody toll, but the nightfall will claim your life. Claim your life tonight. Her majesty will swallow you, she..ll devour you. And now we stand at this eulogy dripping with the truth. You fired upon a target and we fired back. We fired back on your stronghold. We devastated all defenses. Regret consumes you. Regret becomes us all.

Pi was written and recorded only a few days before the completion of the Master copy, at around 10 am, with a couple of serious hangovers. Justin and I had talked about having a classical guitar intro into some sort of heavier riffage, but we weren't quite sure what that was exactly going to be.

We remembered back to a few weeks prior, when we were throwing around an idea of using the mathematical constant Pi, and incorporating it into some sort of complex breakdown pattern where the kick drum corresponded to each number as the figure progressed. Kinda creating the ultimate mind boggler of a riff. The complexity of the intro is often overheard, because it's hard to discern what is actually going on within the track, UNTIL NOW!!!

Here's a breakdown of the....um, breakdown, in the intro to our album, "Pi: The Mercury God Of Infinity"

The actual tempo is 120 beats per minute (bpm). You can hear this by listening for the closed hi-hat that is panned left: it is playing constant eighth-notes.

The snare is on beat three in 4/4 time at 120 bpm.

A crash cymbal accents beat one of the first measure in 4/4. It is repeated every four measures.

Now this is where it gets tricky: the china cymbal.

It's hard to feel the breakdown in Pi at 120 bpm, and this is mostly due to the china cymbal, which is playing a 4 over 3 (4/3) dotted-eighth note ostinato that begins on the "E" of one.



Confused?



Check it out: A quarter note is equal to one beat in 4/4 time, but so are two eighth notes, or 4 sixteenth notes. It's all about subdividing note values.

When you count a measure of 4/4 in quarter notes, it's: 1, 2, 3, 4.

When counting in eighth notes, it's: 1 + 2 + 3 + 4 +. (a plus sign refers to the spoken count "and" ex. "One and two and three and four and")

When counting in sixteenths, it's: 1 E + A 2 E + A 3 E + A 4 E + A. (Spoken: "One e and a two e and a three e and a four e and a)

So when I say the china starts on the "E" of one, I'm referring to the spoken counting value assigned to the second 16th note in a quarter note duration.

A dotted eighth note is a duration of three 16th notes, an ostinato is a persistently repeated pattern. Basically, the china plays on the bold-capitalized letters:

one E and a TWO e and A three e AND a four E and a ONE e and A etc.



Starting to get it? Cool.



At last, the reason Pi is what it is: the Double-bass pattern.

The formula of Pi for the kick drum was pretty far fetched at first, but seemed to work well once the track was finished. The numbers and rests in the formula translate to 16th notes on the kick drum, and 16th note rests. There is no kick drum beats where there are snare drums. Sooo, here it is:

With the decimal point BEFORE the number, and starting with the first number, move that many decimal points to the right and insert that many 16th note rests. Use one 16th note rest to divide the numbers you passed (when applicable). Continue on throughout the rest of the figure. No repeats.

So basically for the first step, you'd place the point (pt) before the first number, three: (pt)3.14159265

Next you jump the decimal three points to the right: 3.14(pt)159265

That's where you insert three 16th rests, and insert one 16th note rest between the other numbers you passed: 3(16th rest)1(16th rest)4(dotted-eighth)159265

Now, your decimal lies in between the 4 and the 1. So, following the formula, you move one point to the right of the 1 and insert one 16th note rest. There are no numbers to separate with single 16th rests, so you move onto the next number, which is 5, and follow the same instructions.






That's all there is to it! The formula extends out to 71 decimal points.

There's another secret to the actual track on the album, but we'll leave that for the people who try to figure out the riff and play it! Good luck, all you super intelligent motherfuckers!!


-Trent | ATB