New Release: Simulation (Dark Minimal House)

I am happy to present a new dark minimal house single, Simulation, along with an instrumental mix and a bonus track! Simulation is available now as an independent release on BandCamp.

The Tracks

Simulacra is a sparse, heavily understated track build around emptiness within a groove. That emptiness is punctuated by sharp stabs extending out from percussive loops.

Simulation is a dark minimal track built around haunting pad swells, undulating sub bass, and a poignant dialogue sample. The Instrumental Mix is the song in full, minus the spoken words.

The Inspiration

Simulation, and it’s companion track, Simulacra, came together after Straylight EP dropped on Microgarden Lab. It’s my continued exploration of sparse, dark, minimal grooves.

The tracks are named for Jean Baudrillard’s book, which explores how the modern world is built upon signs and symbols derived from other signs and symbols – copies of copies – many of which lost their originals long ago. The upshot being that modern humans live in a simulated reality composed of signs and symbols – not the actual real world.

Simulation features a clip from a famously poignant scene in the 1995 classic, Ghost in the Shell, in which a man comes to realize that his memories are false. They were symbols which referenced no original. How close are we, who live a modern existence composed of signs and symbols, to this man? Is the only difference that someone was there to point out his fallacy? If everyone bought in to his false memories and reinforced them, would his fallacy ever come have to light, or would those false memories have been accepted as true? I wonder how many times such a thing has happened before – both on a small, personal scale, and on a large, historical scale.

How much more often will that happen going forward, in this world that exists more and more in simulation? And more frighteningly, how easy would it be for people with agendas to control that process?

Thanks for coming to my TED talk. Enjoy the tracks, and see you on the underground stream!

-AudioMunk