3.3k words across 21 entries.

The Nobles Listen on: Bandcamp, YouTube, YouTube (playlist), Spotify

The Paradox Music Team: (Bandcamp about blurb)

From the depths of the Medium to the edge of the Furthest Ring, The Nobles tackles it all in a 14 track album based on the setting of the Alpha Session! (Also includes Commentary PDF and one whole bonus track by Pascal van den Bos)

Rowyn Berlan: (booklet commentary)

Foreward

Hello whoever's reading this I'd like to personally thank you for taking the time to listen to my first solo endeavor The Nobles.

So yeah this album has been something I've been dreaming of doing even way before I started writing music a year and a half ago and I'm so relived to have finally made it a reality. THis was one hell of an ambitious project so much that I had to push back the release date a few times due to self doubt and a lack in creativity. In the end it was completed... right? you're reading this right now aren't you? Yeah craziness aside this project is simply about the medium of the alpha kids and any and all aspects relating to it, so expect themes for the best set of lands out there and more! Now lets thank those who helped made this possible.

First off I have to got to thank my main man Pascal for allowing me to do this and for originally accepting my pitch back in January. Also props to him for all the great feedback, a great job on the collab, and for being an amazing friend.

Next we have Animmania, the amazing artist who had to put my with my bullshit while I went through my ups and downs. Without their art I don't think this album would've been good, most of the songs were directly inspired by the track art and it's all perfect. (They also put together these commentary pages that you're seeing now)

Now I'd like to thank the members of the Paradox Music Team for all the support and feedback. In Particular Rainy and Beau did great jobs on our collabs and also gave great feedback. Wumby also helped me a lot when I was feeling low and finishing this album was something I promised her I'd do. Also shout out to Spad3s for mastering the whole album in such a short amount of time, I know I gave you help but thanks. Love you guys <3

The Paradox Music Team: (Bandcamp credits blurb)

Music by:
Rowyn Berlan

Featuring collaborations with:
Pascal van den Bos
Andrew "Rainy" Obeng
Beau Brian

Art by:
animmania
Maria Panaiotti

Album Mastering by: Spad3s

~~Side 1~~ Listen on: Bandcamp, YouTube, Spotify

Rowyn Berlan: (composer, booklet commentary)

So starting this whole thing off we have the introductory song to the first half of the album. Side 1 was well the result of me being tired as hell at 4am trying to write a song. It was originally a lot longer with a really weird intro bit but was cut down once I decided to use it for Side 1. In the end I like how this turned out and I plan to finish the original version one day to make it a full song.

Miasmic Resurrection Listen on: Bandcamp, YouTube, Spotify

Rowyn Berlan: (composer, booklet commentary)

So remember that shitty STLaP 2 song called Miasmic Decay? Remember how I said that I'd like to revisit it one day? Well here we have what Decay was supposed to be. Resurrection was the first song I made back when The Nobles was still a concept and initially it was gonna be a simple Lo-Fi esque remix of Decay. So it was presumably finished until waaaaay later when most of the album was done and I said "hey I wanna make that better". I went back and drastically changed the b section to be more melodic so the song didn't feel lacking when compared to everything else. This was also when I was obsessed with that custom bass I made for Those Who Tread so it's in here lol. In the end I feel like I made a pretty decent LoTaK song even though it was my second shot at it. I hope this song represents my favorite character Dirk and his kick ass land more than my previous attempt. Enjoy!

Dormant Wishes Listen on: Bandcamp, YouTube, Spotify

Rowyn Berlan: (composer, booklet commentary)

So this was originally made for the MTaHK Tribute album that UMSPAF was doing until I pussied out for whatever reason which is why it references Sburban Jungle. Now with that idea scrapped I looked at the song again and was like "yeah I can make this into a LoCaH song" so I did... The End. Ok but seriously I repurposed what I liked about the original draft which was the vaguely Sburban Jungle lead and built everything around it. With help from Spad3s I made the song very open to capture a feel of endless exploration and I think it works well especially with the panned synth. This is also where #I first experimented with the Cave Story Plus soundfont which shows up pretty much everywhere in the album in some shape or form kinda like how the ChronoTrigger soundfont was all over my BeforusBound stuff. In the end I think this quaint little song fits Janes land well even though in retrospect its a bit simplistic.

Perxenic Highlands Listen on: Bandcamp, YouTube, Spotify

Rowyn Berlan: (composer, booklet commentary)

Pascal you beautiful lad... He helped me out so much with this song and I couldn't be happier with the end result.

Pascal van den Bos: (composer, booklet commentary)

Uh yeah so Rowyn texted me at 3am asking if I wanted to help them on a song that they got stuck on for their solo album, clearly i dont sleep so i replied with a cheerful "HELL YEA". They sent me a pretty cool piano sketch that already had some of that signature "Timeless Sauce" on it, so I started having ideas for it pretty quickly. Prior to making this i had been listening to a lot of 16-bit fast paced stuff, specifically a lot of the Gadobadorrer soundtrack so i used a lot of SC-55 (labeled as the Gadobadorrer soundfont) in this. I also incorporated an old piano sketch called "Driven Factor" which was a Penumbra Phantasm ish remix of "Fate of the Heir" at the start of the song but in a more SotWW kinda style with the layered flutes, wind sound effect, strings, piano tuned to C6 etc (there will never be enough Fate of the Heir remixes, they will never stop). Then things start heating up with SC-55 drums, bass and an organ and Rowyn's signature usage of the ChronoTrigger soundfont. I also really wanted to add a bitcrush transition into chiptune breakdown since i had only recently gotten the magical8bitplug and dBlue Crusher (i really love dBlue Crusher holy shit) and i really love how they were used in Umbral Ultimatum. The tempo changes were inspired by me trying to recreate Eridan's theme lol, i just thought they were really cool so i wanted to incorporate that myself, and a kid from my class complimented me on it so CHECKMATE CRITICS B). Then some brass in the final section because Rowyn wanted some epic "Jake brass" in there followed up by a final chiptune solo thing with 3 magical8bitplugs playing at once and then to a slow section with the detuned EP and strings again, also a samplepack called "Angstrom Glockenspiel" cause i had also just gotten that and it just sounds perfect for the song imo (really good glockenspiel pack, would use again). In the end this is probably one of my favorite songs that i ever made and it was a lot of fun to work on with Rowyn, overall experience: 69 unannounced secret of mana drum soundfont swaps out of 10. Epic job on the album Rowyn B)

P.S. - To anyone reading this, don't open multiple instances of Edirol Orchestral at once in your DAW, i did do that and I also forced Rowyn to do it not knowing it would stab FL 3 times in the neck resulting in this project file crashing at least 12 times in total. Appreciate midi routing kids.

P.P.S - I just realized P.S. also stands for plasticSaturnia HA HA, how humorous

P.P.P.S - Perxenic Highlands sounds like a type of weed, lmao

Radiant Dunes Listen on: Bandcamp, YouTube, Spotify

Rowyn Berlan: (composer, booklet commentary)

So this was by far the hardest of the land themes to write in my opinion but I did it... I think? Radiant Dunes was quite the task to write mainly because I had gone through so many shitty drafts and was really cutting it so close on time but one night inspiration struck. I had listened to Cleopatra's Cocktail Party and Dominion from LoFaMs 4 and 3 respectively and had started transcribing the latter song which I think is pretty apparent. So the following morning I knocked out Radiant Dunes in one sitting, making one of my personal favorite songs. Now I started out the song by writing some chords as you do and built everything off of them at first. Then with the lead I really wanted to focus on harmony which I ended up doing later in the song with the double squares. I'm also a big fan of the appreggiation at the end that I added at the last minute. I think I did LoPaN and the Rox herself justice with the song and well if you want more Roxy tunes then stick around for Rainy's solo!

The Nobles Listen on: Bandcamp, YouTube, Spotify

Rowyn Berlan: (composer, booklet commentary)

The Nobles from The Nobles totally won't be confusing right? Let's hope not. Now The Nobles is supposed to serve as the main theme of sorts of the album and as kind of a culmination of all the land themes before it. I started writing this song when I had the Viridian Forest theme from Pokemon Gold and Silver stuck in my head and I think the chords and bass piano reflect that lol. Anyway I initially wanted to have the song just be full piano but I got feedback from Rainy and Pascal telling me to add more instruments so I did. Pascal in particular wanted me to make a more distinct b section so I did after struggling for a while. He also suggested that I add some strings and woodwind which I'm not too used to writing yet so the Radiant Dunes section of the song may be a bit off and I apologize for that. In the end I think this song does what it needs and if it's a bit lacking that's where the reprise comes in handy. Enjoy!

~~Side 2~~ Listen on: Bandcamp, YouTube, Spotify

Rowyn Berlan: (composer, booklet commentary)

This was a quick little song I made right after the original Miasmic Resurrection and it shows. I don't remember much about making this song but it was a fairly smooth process and I messed with panning a bit which is cool lol. In the end it does its job so let's hop into Side 2!!!

Voids Edge Listen on: Bandcamp, YouTube, Spotify

Rowyn Berlan: (composer, booklet commentary)

When I was initially coming up ideas for the Derse track I imagined it incorporating a bunch of derse related motif such as Derse Dreamers and Lust off of STLaP 2. I made at least 2 other versions of this song before that fated day basing them both on the two motifs I previously mentioned.

Then one day I sat down and wrote another shitty draft lol... but this one caught the eye of Rainy so he asked for a midi of it and eventually the FLP itself. In that moment I asked him if he wanted to collab and the rest is history. Now when writing the latest draft I like the idea of used motifs but the ones I had initially planned to use weren't working for me so I took to transcribing parts of Checkmate, Let's All Rock the Heist, and Time on My Side which Rainy then worked off of. So now we had like 3 or 4 motifs and the original melody and chords from the draft I wrote in the song. Rainy gave me the project to work on again after he started work on the ending but for whatever reason my computer couldn't handle it and FL repeatedly crashed so I left it up to him giving suggestions here and there. In the end I'm more then pleased with the direction Rainy helped me take this dumb idea I had and I hope you enjoy!

Rainy: (composer, booklet commentary)

Timeless originally wanted me to use my guitar sample library for the original version of this track. I'm not sure what happened but they decided to scrap that original version. I thought the original demo had promise so I asked them for a midi of the track. Eventually they offered to let me collab with them in order to finish the track. A lot of the elements from that original demo are still present in the finishing version albeit heavily modified and extended. I took the original melody and chords timeless wrote and messed around until I got this fun sounding progression and from there it all came together pretty naturally. Unfortunately, there came a point where timeless could no longer use the project file and so he wasn't able to have as much input as i would have liked. Despite that collabing on this was a pretty fun experience and I wouldn't mind doing it again.

Broken Dreams Listen on: Bandcamp, YouTube, Spotify

Rowyn Berlan: (composer, booklet commentary)

So this song was the result of by far one of the smoothest writing processes I've had and boy do I love how this turned out. I went into making Broken Dreams with a bassline in mind and had a little trouble getting it to sound good since it was originally in a different time signature than everything else. From there I wrote the right panned square and doubled it up for harmony cause I be like that. Then I wanted to add the Ruins bit from Skaian Shrapnel, so I carefully transcribed it into a different key while testing out like 100 different square sounds just because. Now writing the other half of this song was so fun especially since I found ways to fit in some more motifs and then messed around with manual delay which brings us to it's completion... oh yeah I should talk about the songs thematic purpose shouldn't I... So Broken Dreams is simply just a song about Alpha Jack wrecking shit up on Prospit and the name is pretty self explanatory.

Those Who Tread the Furthest Ring Listen on: Bandcamp, YouTube, Spotify

Rowyn Berlan: (composer, booklet commentary)

So I've always wanted to collab with young beau and I saw this song as the perfect opportunity. I started out by editing a few sytrus synths to better suit my tastes and added some noise buildup for atmosphere. I then passed the song to beau after writing a shitty piano sketch. Sooner than later Beau sent me back his WIP in which he added a lead piano and a bass break before his computer died. I had to finish the rest of the song myself but luckily the work Beau did gave me a clear direction to take the song. For the rest of the song I drew inspiration from songs like Land of Morytha and Yggdrasil from the Xenoblade 2 OST (good game btw) because I think the atmospheric tone of said songs was perfect for what I wanted. I decided to end the entire song with a combination of all previous motifs present throughout the earlier sections of the song and I think me and beau did well. In retrospect I believe that atmosphere was key when trying to represent Dirk's journey through the Furthest Ring in musical form and well I hope we achieved my goal.

Beau Brian: (composer, booklet commentary)

It vvas a really fun albeit rather shortli<ed experience helping Rowyn vvith this collab. Simply put, they said they didn't knovv vvhat to do vvith it past a certain point and vve discussed a collaboration. After a bit, they tossed o<er a copy of the project file and the things it used, and I did my best to go to tovvn on it. I only got the smallest bit added - A piano medley, a little bloopity part, a half a bass break - before I got p tired and hit the hay. I didn't ha<e time to vvork on it the next morning, so I sent it back to Rowyn knovving I'd be spending all my spare time the next fevv days at vvork. By the time I could get around to opening the file again, my computer had practically bricked itself..? I couldn't vvork on the project at all, but Rowyn did an amazing job completing. They'll probably say they vvere stuck, but in reality vvhen they vvas gi<en just the slightest push they jet right into it, and did a hell of a good job along the vvay.

Beau Brian: (composer, booklet commentary, quirk-free)

It was a really fun albeit rather shortlived experience helping Rowyn with this collab. Simply put, they said they didn't know what to do with it past a certain point and we discussed a collaboration. After a bit, they tossed over a copy of the project file and the things it used, and I did my best to go to town on it. I only got the smallest bit added - A piano medley, a little bloopity part, a half a bass break - before I got p tired and hit the hay. I didn't have time to work on it the next morning, so I sent it back to Rowyn knowing I'd be spending all my spare time the next few days at work. By the time I could get around to opening the file again, my computer had practically bricked itself..? I couldn't work on the project at all, but Rowyn did an amazing job completing. They'll probably say they were stuck, but in reality when they was given just the slightest push they jet right into it, and did a hell of a good job along the way.

Terminus Listen on: Bandcamp, YouTube, Spotify

Rowyn Berlan: (booklet commentary)

We're not done with young Beau just yet because forever ago he made a song called Death on a Dying Planet. While I did not directly reference that song, I did however base my composition off of it. Without Death on a Dying Planet I don't think Terminus would exist so thanks Beau. Now when writing the song I logically started with a rhodes and then wrote a bassline? with the cello. At the last minute I decided to add the ChronoTrigger soundfont to back up the main rhodes melody in the latter half of the song. I think I did an ok job at writing a Game Over theme and would consider this among my strongest compositions. I hope you're ready for some sad times and enjoy!

Stardust Glitches Listen on: Bandcamp, YouTube, Spotify

Rowyn Berlan: (composer, booklet commentary)

Stardust Glitches was made right after I made Fate of the Heir which is probably why it's a remix of it. Yeah I also don't remember much about the creation of this song... sorry. What I do know is that I also added a gold pilot reference cause of the stardust glitch edit in the comic which is cool. OH! and there's a lot of grossbeat and I have many regrets lol. In retrospect this song is probably the weakest on the album mainly because it's one of the older songs and it was mostly experimental. Anyway I hope you enjoy glitch hell!!!

All's Well Listen on: Bandcamp, YouTube, Spotify

Rowyn Berlan: (composer, booklet commentary)

You like slides? you like Earthbound? well boy oh boy do I have the song for you. So All's Well was made shortly after the Earthbound tribute album came out with a combination of the Earthbound and Cave Story Plus soundfonts. I started off by writing the opening arpeggio which I later went back and changed and the synth pad. From there I really wanted to focus on writing a good bassline and luckily for me the EB fingered bass is a heavenly instrument so let's just say mission accomplished.The lead on All's Well is one of my favorite melodies that I've ever written and yes I did cram in the ChronoTrigger soundfont for the second lead B). Now you might be asking yourself what's well? well all's well silly... for the alpha kids... at the end of homestuck... yeah lets go with that. Anyway I hope you feel well and enjoy All's Well!

The Nobles (Reprise) Listen on: Bandcamp, YouTube, Spotify

Rowyn Berlan: (composer, booklet commentary)

So we finally did it... we're at the end. To close out this passion project we have the reprise of the albums main theme. I decided that a somber take on the nobles would be a fitting end to our journey throughout the alpha session so I wrote just that. So lets keep this short... thanks so much for listening and giving my music a chance and for the last time I hope you enjoy!
(Alternate Title: Goodnight)