PELE'S BELLY
An exotic tale of music, mysticism, mushrooms and madness on the big island of Hawaii.
It’s November 2017 and I’m gathered on the big island of Hawaii with a group of eager producer/DJ’s from around the world. We have travelled here to learn the mystical arts of Audio Alchemy from our venerable masters Steve Young (aka Hedflux) and Yaegon Lamagaia (aka Kalya Scintilla/Merkaba) each of us are aiming to create a track that will boost musical minds to the next level.
Like many budding Producer/DJ’s, I fancy myself as some kind of Techno Shaman. And so I decide to invoke the power of the local deity to assist me in making my track the fully sickest of the sick. Squinting my 3rd eye hard I begin my prayer. ‘Oh Pele, volcano goddess of hawaii, grant me mad inspiration and unprecedented fatness of bass and I will pay homage to you in song. I will craft a sonic tapestry telling the tale of you rising from the sea. My synthesizers will paint a vista of jungles and birds growing on your sides until finally, your lava filled splendour will erupt in the sickest drop ever’.
It occurs to me that there is something kinda Robert Johnson at the crossroads about this but I figure it can’t hurt my chances so why not.
I wander off into the jungle and meditate in a sort of grotto. There’s an interesting piece of lava rock on the ground. I take it with to keep by my laptop as a sort of inspirational totem.
3 days into the Retreat and the course is going great. Our venerable masters Steve and Andy wow us with their production prowess. Yaegon, despite his incredibly new age name, turns out to be the most down to earth Aussie bloke ever. I feel nationalistic pride for the first time in my life. ‘’Aussie Psy represent!, Go Yaegon you little ripper!’
The only thing not going so well is my track. My new skills have produced little more than a torrid mess of bleeps, swooshes and groans. It sounds like a stale slice of PsyDub cheese. At 10pm I call it quits and despondently pack up my gear. A few of my diehard companions are still beavering away at their laptops, headphones firmly in place.
As I trudge to the dormitory there is singing coming from the across the paddock. A traveller who stays at the retreat is strumming a guitar around the firepit. Welcoming the sounds of real instruments after too much synth wrangling I head over there and beg a go on the guitar. We pluck and sing away with the piercing sounds of Cochi Frogs chirping around us. Hey this is sounding pretty good. I rush back to the dorm, grab my portable recorder and capture the jam, frogs and all. We pack up the guitar and I say ‘Hey, I don’t suppose you’re the incarnation of a goddess by any chance?
’ ‘Maybe’, she replies coyly.
Man, I am really buzzing on this jam. Forgetting the concept of bed I rush back to the lab and reopen my laptop. I reorganise the track around the vocals and put in another couple of hours work before bed.
It’s the last day of the retreat and the beat is sounding good. The bleeps are now birdcalls, the swooshes are volcanic vents and the bass is producing some serious seismic action.
Tonight is the Alchemy Festival, with half the island invited to the retreat. We all get to play a DJ set and show off to the hippiest of the hip Hawaiians. The dance floor is pumping as I set up for my set. Someone has put two rather large mushrooms on the DJ table as some sort of offering. Apparently the volcanic soil makes everything grow massive including the local fungus. They can only be one type of mushroom though.. As my set finishes I play my not quite finished track to a solid response. ‘Cool tune bro’ says Yaegon who is setting up to play next. I nearly die of a fan boy heart attack. Not only did I just open for Kalya Scintilla but he thinks my beats are dope.
I’m in a celebratory mood as Yaegon launches the dance floor into a tribal bass frenzy. Those mushrooms are still there and they are looking at me kind of funny.. They can’t be too much more potent than Australia mushrooms despite the size difference. Oh well, down the hatch. Andy and Steve who are grooving close by give a synchronised guffaw.
I feel like a psychedelic don juan as I swagger off to dancefloor. As Hedflux winds the music up to a Breakbeat climax I’m really starting to feel that fungus. Stepping out into the night I’m on a mushroom inspired mission for higher meaning
I reach out with my fungus infested mind and speak to the universe ‘what’s next? ’ In my mind’s ear a voice echo’s back from the jungle.‘Give back what was taken’
Oh right.. Pele wants her piece of lava rock back. Where did I leave that again?
I head over to the lab and look around but my psychedelic pebble is nowhere to be found. My fellow Audio Alchemists, many who are as Gizacked as me haven’t seen it and strangely enough I am not very capable of explaining the significance of this particular piece of black gravel.
Paranoia sets in hard. I have lost the goddesses’ sacred icon and must now pay the cost. I curl up in my sleeping bag to wrestle in agony with the psychodrama as the mushrooms burns away at my mind. Finally, exhausted I pass out.
I wake the next day feeling surprisingly clear and fresh. I figure that Pele must have exacted her tribute by using her lava powered mushrooms to eat away some of my brain cells.
I don’t do drugs or consort with strange Island Goddesses anymore.
But I did get a pretty decent tune out of it.
For the tune follow the free download link below.
(My first label release as Harlequin Chameleon)
https://soundcloud.com/harlequinchameleon/peles-belly-free-dl
