By Rachel Rose Mitchell rachelrosemitchell Bandcamp YouTube YouTube.
Cover art by Elanor Pam elanorpam Twitter fanelorn.net fanelorn.net.
Released 12/25/2012.
Duration: 4:29.

Listen on Bandcamp or YouTube.

Read artist commentary.

Artist commentary:

Rachel Rose Mitchell: (composer, booklet commentary)

When I made Blood Knight, I was still pretty exhausted from putting Mechani% - now known as Indigo Archer - together. I'd never made anything as complex as Indigo Archer before and on top of that I had massive anxieties about getting into the competition. I was stressed out! So Blood Knight nearly never happened.

About a week before the music contest ended, I was talking to my best friend and he said he thought I could make a kickass song for Karkat. I didn't really believe him at first. Karkat is one of my favourite characters and I didn't feel confident about capturing him at all. But my friend persisted and threw a few ideas at me. Eventually I found myself in Cubase making music again with my best friend to thank for it.

Immediately, I knew it needed electric guitars. That was problematic for me as I'd never, ever gotten synthesised guitars to sound halfway decent before. Heck, I'm still not entirely sure how I managed it, but I'm super happy with how it turned out. The feel of it matches what I was going for; not quite metal, not quite a ballad, kind of melancholy but also kind of in your face. Sort of. You might be able to tell that I had an easier time making it than describing it, heh. Pretty darn proud of this piece.