raid

Raid

Just as we opened the box in the beginning, it is now time to close it. This track does not mark the end, just rounds up the album and the period of my life when I made it. I've been a turntablist for over 15 years, but I've only been composing and playing the piano for a mere third of that period. With this, I close the beginner's phase of my musical creation. For years I've been collaborating with many musicians, composing music and recording scratches, and it gave me a sense of accomplishment. But it is now, with the completion of this album, that I feel well rounded and finally free to move on, not only musically, but also in life. We all need closure, we need a point in our lives where we face our mistakes, realize what we want from our future and turn a new page and go.

Closure

We live in a generic era. Food chains makes us eat the same stuff no matter where we are. Society makes us believe that we have to behave and dress in certain ways and try to achieve rather shallow goals to fit in and to be accepted. As life becomes more and more generic, the same happens with music. Copy paste chord progressions, song structures and lyrics that are suited for generic emotions. This becomes painfully obvious when the radio is on and same songs keep playing over again; radio stations with a rotation of maximum 400 songs. Songs with the same "hit pattern", made with the ambition of raking in vast amounts of cash, offering nothing in either artistic or aesthetic terms. Pure kitsch, music that will, in time, turn its consumers into people devoid of personality and will continue to engulf any remaining beauty to the point where it is no longer important whether we are playing a radio station or just radio static.

First track on the album and a symbolic opening of the box. I've chosen this track to open the album as, while making it, I've finally managed to let go of the worries and fears that have inhibited me until then. Anyone who is involved in a creative process is bound to be riddled with doubt, insecurity, even hatred towards one's own work. I am quite susceptible to all of it, at times to the extent that they deny me any enjoyment in the process of creation. I've realized that a song, from the very second it comes out, belongs to everyone. Everyone is free to love it, hate it, criticize it or ignore it. All I can do is accept that as a fact. Through my music, I open the door wide open for everyone to see what I feel as a person and what I know as a musician. Though intimidating at times, it still withdraws in the face of the overwhelming urge to create.

Opening

Marks the end of that horrible period of my life. It was not a happy end, but it was the end nonetheless. The end of someone's suffering and agony and the end of apprehension. The end one cannot change, only accept and move on. To this day I feel guilty and selfish for secretly feeling relieved; not because of how it ended, but because it eventually ended.

Salvation

I'm turning 30 a day after this album drops. And as most people reaching that milestone, I am slowly becoming aware of the passage of time, aware that a year does not last as long as it used to. It's shorter. Granted, the number of days in a year has not changed, but the days themselves seem to pass at a much quicker rate. Now, it's not a big deal, I do not feel old, I do not feel like I missed something or I have to make up for something. I did not get stuck in a rut, in a sterile "loop" type of life and I am happy because of it. I just want the day to be longer, so I'd have more time to play or listen to music, read a book, cook, spend time with friends and family, but since the hand on the clock does not care for our wishes, all we can do is make the most of what we're given.


Perception

The title is rather self-explanatory. Even if you don't know German, the meaning is three clicks away. If you're a person spending more time in your own mind thinking about the past, future, and imagined reality, then you can fully relate to this tune. Here, for example, Filip and I, we are not playing this tune, we are sitting in "Le Rotonde" in Paris, with a drunk Hemingway across the room going on and on about some hunting story.

Tagträumer (Little Box Edit)

Empathy is a good thing, though you may not always have it easy if you have too much of it. Say you adopt three stray cats, or spend half an hour chasing a spider around your flat just so you can let it out in the open, or you spend money, time and energy on people and their real or imagined problems. It may all be worth it in a long run, but it would certainly have been much easier to turn on the "ignore" mode at times and that's probably why  empathy is hard to find these days. Selfishness, greed, hatred and anger are tempting and hard to control, and they are without exception destructive. Yet there are people to whom I would not hesitate to direct all my hatred, anger, even violence. People who consciously spread pain, hurt, diseases and death for profit and personal gain. “Machine Men with machine hearts”, just as Charlie Chaplin brilliantly said it in his speech in "The Great Dictator".

No Empathy For The Machines

Human relationships can be very complicated. We love a person who lies to us, we hate someone who tells us the truth, just because the truth hurts. We tend to forgive people who've hurt us five times over, only if the sixth time they show some semblance of loyalty and some illusion of friendship, yet some people we begrudge the tiniest mistake. I'd always rather build bridges, than burn them, but in time we have to learn to tell who really is deserving of the effort and who is not. For some of my people I'd single-handedly build bridges many miles long, whereas others are not worth the push of the button to blow them up. I am very lucky to have people in my life who love and support me truly and unconditionally. This song is dedicated to them.

Bridges

Raid is a Composer and Turntablist/DJ based in Belgrade, Serbia. His unique musical style combines Dark and Melancholic Piano compositions with electronic and ambient sounds. Raid composed several soundtracks for theatre plays and instrumentals for Hip Hop Artists, but he is also known for his incredible Scratch skills which allowed him to collaborate with some of the world’s greatest DJs.

Bridges

Raid (official)