The Crystal Caves is a symbol of submission, revelation, and the enigmatic boundary between knowledge and madness. It depicts vast, gleaming caverns deep beneath the earth’s crust, where immense quartz crystals grow like frozen lightning. These radiant formations are not merely geological wonders — they are conduits of consciousness, forming the neural lattice of an ancient, mythological intelligence.

In the lore of this card, humanity’s collective fears and desires are imprinted upon the crystals, forming an unfathomable archive of thoughts and memories. Faced with an existential crisis — be it environmental collapse, war, or spiritual disillusionment — a select few are chosen to hear the ringing. This sound, like a chorus of distant bells reverberating inside their minds, is a calling from the depths. Those who submit to the summons venture into the Crystal Caves, seeking understanding. Others resist, unwilling to face the knowledge that awaits — and in doing so, are consumed by the madness of dissonance.

This card challenges us to confront our inner callings. It asks whether we are willing to descend into the recesses of our own minds, face the uncomfortable truths that lie within, and emerge transformed. Alternatively, it warns of the destructive consequences of rejecting growth when the time has come to evolve.

Drums, piano, vibes: R Thomas
Guitars, Bass, Vocals, PS Perkins
Recorded, mixed and mastered by Mystic Tape Deck
Tascam DP24SD + StudioOne 7 + a bunch of cheap mics

LYRICS
---------------------------
In the ways of the world from the crib to the grave
Everybody’s a slave
Ain't nobody gonna save us

Save your bellyachin for another day
Baby they got ways
Of making you behave

When you hear those bells ringing in your brain
Before they drive ya insane
Get on a boat or a plane

Take the golden taxi to the crystal caves
It’s a little like doomsday
You’re gonna have to be brave

Come join your friends in the crystal caves
Meet the underground conclave
At the standing wave

Gonna put the computer right into your vein
Connect the aqueous membrane
To the mineral mainframe

Gonna jump and jive when they play that jazz
Sprinkle on the pizazz
And just a little bit of zip zap biddly bap foo bar baz

Come and disappear in the crystal cave
Everybody’s a slave
Ain't nobody gonna save us

Now that you’ve arrived, won't you come on in?
We’re all about to begin
To start shedding our skin

Make like a snake, and gobble up that tail
It’s a hwale of a fairy tale
On the shell of a snail

In the mystery maze deep under the ground
A little magic we found
A way a watch can be unwound

To begin again inside the cave alone
A place we’re gonna call home
Amidst the shimmering stone

In the ways of the world from the crib to the grave
Everybody’s a slave
Ain't nobody gonna save us

The Crystal Caves

Have a listen to my album "Curiosities Of Outsider Art" (Sept 2025). Quirky and interesting tunes.
Thank you for listening!

I try to write with rich lyrical details and self-deprecating humor about the human condition. Plus, that unique Shade Structure sound!  It sounds best with headphones. Thanks for any comments, reposts or likes.

Discography: Available under Album tag on my Soundcloud main page. 
* Curiosities Of Outsider Art (Sept 2025)
*All this Useless Beauty (2025)
*Rockers (2024) 
*Arrhythmia & Blues (2024)
* The Curse Of A Good Looking Ghost (2024)
* Low Profile (2024)
* Smilers (EP 2023)
•Short Songs For Tall Minds"  (2022)
•Friends, They're Gonna Get Your Story Wrong (2021)
•A Suburban Dadaist With Some Store Bought Beats (2021)
•All Feel and No Technique (2020)
•This Is How I Spend My Nights (2019)
•California Songs (2018-2019)

All sounds contained within are home-made/DIY recordings. Most songs are short stories, as I am influenced by Musicians & Writers like Raymond Carver, Warren Zevon, Mountain Goats, Tom Waits, Mark Eitzel,  Randy Newman, Destroyer, Steely Dan, Captain Beefheart, Loudon Wainwright III, Leonard Cohen & The National. Most songs have the lyrics on the song page. Thank you for listening!

AVANT GARDE | GUTTER PROG | GARAGE JAZZ

Some of our art is made on computers, some of it is made by hand. We are particularly interested in that gray area in between where you cant really tell. All of what we create here is one work laid out in segments, all connected. The Mystic Tape Deck universe is vast and explores all manner of adding meaning to our lives, while pondering meaninglessness.

Please consider supporting our project and helping us complete the work. We make books and cds that go with them. We also have a graphic novel and a custom oracle deck in the works. All part of the story.

A Multimedia Puzzle-Story Of An Immortal Being's Struggle To Define And Exert Their Will Upon A Wholly Deterministic And Ambivalent Multiverse, And The Strange Cult Who Loves Them.

--------

Greetings to you: readers, beaders, seekers, wanderers, wonderers, outsiders, rebels, fantasy gamers, freaks, mythologists, philosophers, appreciators, creators, perpetuators of beauty, coveters of mysterious objects, collectors of counter culture, the curious, the questioners, the unusual, the unique, the star children, the light workers, shadow integrators, diviners, alchemists, hermits, monks and popes, the saviors and prophets, the builders and destroyers of worlds, the old ones, the young ones, the rollers of boulders, the sun orbiters, the morning star dewdrops and twinkle toed dreamers of dreams, you mystic shining beacons, you crossers and denizens of the void, reality shapers, universe makers and underworld freaks.

"A prominent feature of avant-garde music is to break through various rules and regulations of traditional culture, in order to transcend established creative principles and appreciation habits. Avant-garde music pursues novelty in musical form and style, insisting that art is above everything else; thus, it creates a transcendental and mysterious sound world. Hint, metaphor, symbol, association, imagery, synesthesia and perception are widely used in avant-garde music techniques to excavate the mystery of human heart and the flow of consciousness, so that many seemingly unrelated but essentially very important events interweave into multi-level structures and forms."

"Magic is what we do. Music is how we do it." -- Jerry Garcia

Welcome to my page, my peers, associates, friends, and musical family. I'm a lifelong, multi-instrumentalist musician who records prolifically and joyfully. You'll hear me play guitar, bass (regular four string, and four and five string fretless), mandolin, banjo, keys (piano, organ, synth), lap slide, sitar, and sing on my recordings here. I've been in a few dozen bands in my life, playing everything from bluegrass, jazz, rock, jam band, reggae, funk, afrobeat, Middle Eastern, traditional Irish, singer/songwriter, pop/covers, to experimental/avant garde. 
  Since I found SoundCloud a couple years ago, I've found many talented, creative people with whom to create music. However, in the summer of '23 I formed a band called The Eclectic Collective with some of my favorite musicians I've met through here. It started as a loose collective of musicians and coalesced into a core group of musicians who find other musicians with whom we'd like to make music, then run their songs through our process, and in effect add a full band. That core of The Eclectic Collective includes Tez (Llanpsych), J.J. Terrel, Ken (K2 and the Three), Stephen (Texmex Shaman), Chris (cgmaness), and Mark (mistermark). A couple of other musicians are frequent collaborators, as well, including Artur of Surfers Like Us, and Steve Vervaet of Steve's World. More recently, we've been joined by Carl of The Beautiful Dark fame. 
  The magic of music is amplified exponentially by each person adding to it. So, we really try to add our sorcery all kinds of music from all kinds of artists. Sometimes, we keep it within the group, but a lot of what we do is collaboration with other artists. Therefore these days, 100% of what I do is collaboration, within the group or with other artists on the side.
  I, and we, are also available for hire if you have a song or lyrics and you really want to add bigger instrumentation or a band and good production to it. 
  A small sampling of the artists whom I consider primary influences, and whom you will hear coming through my fingers include Phish, The Flaming Lips, The Grateful Dead, Radiohead, Rye Cooder, Steve Earle, Miles Davis, Fela Kuti, Arcade Fire, Mikey Dread, Yellowman, Purpleman, The Meditations, Michigan and Smiley, Lee Perry, Dillinger, Django Reinhardt, Impossible Recording Machine, The Allman Bros Band, Pink Floyd, Led Zeppelin, Cream, Bela Fleck, Les Claypool, Sam Bush, David Grissman, John Prine, Talking Heads, Beastie Boys, MMW, Moe., Morphine, Ween, Steve Lukather, Michael McDonald, John Abercrombie, Dave Holland, John Scofield, Victor Wooten,  Cannonball Adderly, Thelonious Monk, Flea, Parliament Funkadelic,  Frank Zappa, Prince Paul, Pete Rock, Thievery Corporation, Amon Tobin, Chet Baker, Joao Gilberto, Stan Getz, Astrud Gilberto, Carol Kaye, Tame Impala, Mumford and Sons, Japanese Breakfast, LCD Soundsystem, Beach House, Sean Lennon, and Billy Strings, but of course there are many more. I also really like and am influenced by traditional Iranian, Palestinian, Indian, Sri Lankan, Sudanese, Mauritian, Somalian, Egyptian, West African, and Syrian music. I welcome anyone who plays non-western music to contact me for a collaboration, too.
 I'm overjoyed to have found my community on SoundCloud. This is a truly unique forum where everyone is sincerely trying to build each other up. The profoundly supportive and positive SoundCloud community has really opened up an exciting new world of collaboration for me. That is the main reason I'm in the Cloud, actually, to connect with other musicians and make music that I enjoy listening to, and hopefully others do, as well. I am ALWAYS looking to collaborate with interesting musicians, mostly though BandLab, which is where I record almost exclusively. It's a solid, free digital audio workstation hub where you can share recording projects, even if it's not where you make your recordings.
  Everything I do is live instrumental, not programmed, and using no computer beyond my phone. That's not to say that I would be opposed to using that kind of tool, it's just not my preferred medium with which to paint. If you like my music, please share it. If you want to collaborate, my BandLab handle is @bingo_pajama. Feel free to contact me at cornbreadband@hotmail.com, as well, even if you aren't on BandLab.
  If your music is primarily AI, please don't come around my page, as I'm not at all interested in complimenting a machine.
  Here's a link to music I've recorded live with a group of musicians here in Pittsburgh called The Northumberland Street Ramblers.
Check out The Northumberland Street Ramblers on #SoundCloud
https://soundcloud.app.goo.gl/fU4Me

#hardstyle #hardcore #trance #techno #electronic #ambient

Songs with a twinge of humor (and some a bit more serious).  
I do not use AI to create my songs. 
Recently I have had the urge to pick up my guitars (Taylor 114ce and Fender Squire) and I have been trying to use more guitar in my songs.  
My go to .vst plug ins are  EZkeys 2, EZ Bass and  EZ drummer 3) and my DAW is Logic Pro 11. 
I welcome your comments and enjoy listening to all the great music on SoundCloud. 
All songs are originals and copyrighted.

My new album "Dreams of the Byzantines" is streaming June 13th, 2025. Please check out my new website darrencsullivan.com for videos and albums to purchase.

Thanks for the kindness and support.

Having fun making tunes, enjoy! All original here

In the distant Subert Humlin, Gory Rallagher, Sank Frinatra, and Dats Fomino Galaxies, Her Majesty's Royal Intergalactic Empire is under siege by the sinister Khazargonians and their elite squads of shock troopers- the Jearl Pamians and Goundsardenians. Her Majesty has commissioned an elite force led by her three of Her Majesty's Space Navy's finest officers with several primary objectives, chief among them was the following directive: to combine the great tones of surf and fifties rock... with disco!
These elite officers are:  Admiral Krank of the SS Belgrade (Guitar, bass, beats, intergalactic espionage and assassination by exploding cigars); and Captain Mirth of the SS Zagreb- (Guitar, piano, synth, beats, and advanced thermal detonation). And our very own clockwork man on the drums, Mo Sheen (https://soundcloud.com/user-424452711).  Unfortunately, despite bravely serving Her Majesty's Space Navy, Vice Commandant Dubois has been court martialed and convicted for conduct not befitting an officer and counterfeiting baseball cards, stripped of his command of the SS Budapest, and dishonorably discharged from Her Majesty's Space Navy, though certain recordings of his guitar, synth, bass, beats, and forward deployable laser blasters remain here memorialized for posterity. Let it be known that though he has sunk to the very depths of ignominy, we wish him well in his new venture, the Spandex Spanktroverse.

🎶 DJ Turbo | Spinning Beats & Vibes 🚀  
Unleashing electrifying sounds and unforgettable nights! 🌟 From underground parties to epic festivals, I mix genres and create experiences that keep you dancing all night long. 💃🕺 Join me on this sonic journey and let the rhythm take control! 🎧✨ #Mixmaster #PartyStarter #FeelTheBeat   https://www.mixcloud.com/turbodj75/    https://www.instagram.com/turbo_dj_75?igsh=MXIxZzZ0bDdtM20yYw%3D%3D&utm_source=qr https://linktr.ee/turbodj

Genocide, June 2025:
Israel is only the executioner, every nation which has armed that country in the past year is an accessory to that genocide, an accomplice, a facilitator.  We cannot talk about war crimes because when you target unarmed civilians, mostly women and children, we are talking about a massacre, like terrorists do, not a war. The people who orchestrated that massacre, in the US, the most duplicitous, followed by those of the UK, Germany, France, and probably a few lesser ones should be tried for crimes against humanity just as well as Netanyahu and his cabinet, because it has been going on for two years, generously reported by media of all kinds, so the enablers knew exactly how the arms were to be used, as a tool for revenge, domination, and humiliation of the Palestinian people.  The conflict has ceased to be about the defense of anything for months.

The parties responsible have made a mockery of decency, morals, fairness, proportion, or justice, not to mention empathy.  Of what little there was, these concepts will be a lot longer to come back than they were to be struck down.  

Is it 1984 already?!?!
 ...

I have not been able to recover access to my other account [https://soundcloud.com/ha-kekong] for a couple of years.  I have tried a few times to get back into it but SoundCloud doesn't trust me.  Same phone number, same email addresses, and they still claim that they can't verify my identity.  I created that account about three years ago as a substitute to my regular account which SoundCloud temporarily closed.  They closed it as part of some upgrade procedure in their system, the result of a bug that affected many accounts, about two years ago.  Since SC did not inform its users I didn't know if that was permanent or not, so I created that other account which I can't access.  Don't be mad if I have not replied to your message in the past two years, that's because I never got them ; ) ... You can always reach me here though.
...

This one here (957729823) is for regular folks.

I love you, both.

...

You can't see it because of the angle with which I took the shot, aiming down, but beyond those blocks is the sea.  To the left is the Mediterranean, to the right is the Atlantic Ocean.  No it's not Gibraltar, but a little bit further West. ... Actually I checked recently and it is further North more than West, I thought I was facing South when in fact I probably was facing the Atlantic ocean, which is why I suppose the waves were of a decent size where we were.
...

My face and the bike are a courtesy of Joël Vaudreuil
[https://vimeo.com/user8897093]  ... Merci Joe!
I then went ahead and butchered his work with a borrowed helmet.
... Sorry Joe. =(
...

I'm trying to promote what I think is good music, so if you want to help out a bit I'd rather you [like] or [repost] my *playlists* rather than my field recordings, if you don't mind, unless you are a die hard fan of those things. Thank you ; )

I speak French, so if you send me a private message, and that you are a francophone, please write in French, thank you.  ... I mean, you don't absolutely have to, but I would prefer it. 

All my field recordings (except for when I record a person) are public, freely downloadable by anyone who is able to click on the button.  I encourage anyone interested to use them in any way whatsoever, on purpose or accidentally. No need for permissions or credits or any other kind  of administrative maneuvers.
...

Anarchists give me hope.

I'm a big fan of EFF.  Love ya EFF.  (no connection with the above line)
... and of course Richard Stallman and Linux and all the others.  Bless yous.

Now don't be lazy, go find out what it is this "EFF" that I'm talking about.  I'll give you a hint: it has to do with computers.

You have a nice day now.  Hugs & Kisses.

Hello, Welcome to TBD.
All these creations are made by hard work and years upon years upon years of practice and trying to explain this world and the human condition to myself in the process through poems & songs. Thanks for all of your wonderful support.
Peace and Love to Everyone,
Carl Culliton


PS: The world needs good art and new ideas from the mindsets of artists living authentic lifestyles. In a world where we are poisoned by labels I think it's more honourable for humanity to show your true colours at the hard issues and lay them bare for a better future and in my opinion this should be more important then the success of whatever brand you are trying to create as a musician or artist. That's why I am The Beautiful Dark. My name is unlikely to help me become affluent and successful but it lays bare that this world has many dark inhumane ideas and mindsets to transcend and get on top of to move our existence on a path to a greater good for all life. So I'll do that for my children and I won't apologise for not trying to please people with any shallow so called truthful status quo. I'll share my actual truth from my whole being and you can use your own discernment to process that if you decide to embrace it. Cheers