Fata Morgana: Dusk

Summer Nights

"SCAM CALL"
Junior Horror Division 
USC Student Film Showcase
Directed by Nate Barclovis
------
When the phone rings, you already know the right answer is don’t pick up—but our unlucky protagonist does it anyway. What starts out as an ordinary spam interruption turns into a deliriously unhinged descent as a voice on the other end, a man who calls himself Sergio, demands payment with increasing urgency. Fragmented phrases, scrambled threats, and the endlessly repeated command—“Make check payable to Sergio!"—burrow into their brain like a glitchy 90s slasher villain who has learned telemarketing.

Is Sergio real? Is he a debt collector from beyond the dead? Or is it just the world’s most persistent scammer? Does it really matter? ... because once the call connects, reality unravels and paranoia blooms.

---------------------------



SCAM CALL | USC Student Short Film | Junior Horror Showcase

Step into the breathtaking world of DE LOS MUERTOS, Cirque du Soleil’s daring new spectacle where gravity bends and the impossible becomes reality. 

In a mesmerizing blend of future-metal energy and hauntingly beautiful choreography, aerialists soar and plunge from crimson ribbons that seem to drip like living blood, performing death-defying feats above a world suspended between life and legend. Every moment pulses with tension and wonder, every note of the score striking like a heartbeat echoing through the void. 

DE LOS MUERTOS is a celebration of risk, of beauty born from darkness, and of the fearless human spirit rising above the edge of the unknown.

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CIRQUE DU SOLEIL | DE LOS MUERTOS

LYRICS:
"something is rotten-
in the village of toys"

You better watch out, you better not cry
Better not pout, I'm telling you why:
Satan Claus is comin' to town

​He's making a list
Checkin' it twice
Gonna find out who's naughty and nice
Satan Claus is comin' to town

​He sees you when you're sleepin'
He knows when you're awake
He knows if you've been bad or good
So be good for god damn sake!

​Oh! You better watch out
You better not cry
Better not pout, I'm telling you why:
Satan Claus is comin' to town

​With little tin horns 
And little toy drum
Rootie ass toots 
And rummy-toot Tums
Satan Claus is comin' to town

​He sees you when you're sleepin'
He knows when you're awake
He knows if you've been bad or good
So be good or you won't wake!

​Oh! You better watch out
You better not cry
Better not pout
I'm telling you why:
Satan Claus is comin'

...To your town

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SATAN CLAUS

'Fungus' is about enabling toxic behaviour to the point it changes you and others, then holding on to bitterness and resentment that has grown as a result. 
'Fungus' will be one of five songs in an EP I intend to release in 2026 called 'Octopoda'. The project's focal point is holding on. Sometimes it is good to hold on and sometimes it is not. Sometimes you change yourself so that you can continue to hold on, but it comes at an expense. You might hold on to bad memories that make you feel bitter or sick, but you can't help it. Other times you hold on because it brings you happiness, for example a fond memory of somebody who is no longer with us.
I've called the EP  'Octopoda' because octopuses  are known for resilience, the ability to adapt, deceive, change shape and camouflage. To add to this, the obvious would be their tentacles and strong grip, which goes with the theme of holding on.

Fungus

a storm of thought and tension unfolds in this hybrid metal fusion track, where the mind - once awoken - races through pieces of memory, half formed sentences, and relentless internal pressure in an exhausting battle for existence.
------
LYRICS:
------
Waking still drifting from the night
Quiet settling right
A weightless mind without defense
No story yet to fight

Breath moving slowly 
Through the thoughts
A gentle vacancy
The world waits 
Somewhere past the sheets
But it can wait to be

Soft as it starts
A tremor through the chest
A whisper that warns
This calm won't rest

Feel it crawling in
A pulse too sharp to tame
Every sound beneath the skin
Turns comfort into strain
Trying hard to hold the line
But something starts to slip
Gravity redesigns
The fuse along the grip

Midday bends the frame off course
Leaning hard against the noise
Too many faces
Rushed and raw
Too many careless toys

Talking the mind into a grip
But nothing seems to stay
Every thought is contradicting
What was meant to say

Telling it steady
But steady doesn't come
Logic meant to guide
Has started 
Coming undone

Feel it breaking loose
Sense unspooled again
Everything once used to ground
Gets twisted
Overruled
Trying not to feed the fire
But sparks refuse to fade
Losing sight of boundaries
Memory itself made

counting backwards
tracking fractures 
through the day
every vow made quietly
keeps peeling away

pacing in the mind
like a figure trapped in glass
begging for a moment
but the moment doesn't pass

pressure coding patterns
no one living could predict
and the harder that it's named
the more tightly it constricts
words collide at crooked angles
won't align or stay in place
architect of chaos
in a self designed maze

slow it down if only
mute the sound, but how?

everything accelerating
none of it allowed...

the mind keeps pacing without feet
dragging whole hours behind it 
like metal drums on concrete
no permission asked
no rhythm chosen

everything repeats in the wrong order
a hallway of thoughts turning inward
each door opening into the same room
with the same question
that never waits for an answer

voices that aren't voices
nudging the spine
saying move
but not saying where...

just move
move-
move before the next thought 
catches up
and rewrites 
the last one

feeling the memory of a memory
trying to speak through the cracks
but the mouth is somewhere else
and the meaning 
keeps falling through

half-formed sentences
that dissolve before landing
the self keeps splitting 
Into smaller versions
arguing directions

one calm
one trembling
one counting backward 
from numbers that don't exist

one insisting that nothing is wrong
while everything tilts
just slightly enough-
to make gravity 
feel personal
and the center
whatever the center used to be
is now a moving target
dragged across the mind
by invisible hands
that won't say why

Feel, the senses pulling back
From the roar beneath the bone
Not a villain to attack
Just a mind left overgrown
Reaching through the overload
Grabbing anything to hold
Falling from the edge again
Stories still untold

One faint breath beneath the weight
A promise still to keep

Tomorrow may recalibrate
Tonight -

Return to sleep

-------------------

RETURN TO SLEEP

BLINDED BY YOUR LIGHT transforms The Weeknd's 'Blinding Lights' into a moody confession from someone slipping into obsession. The cold, mid-80s darkwave synths frame a narrator wandering through an empty city, convinced that only one person can quiet the noise inside his head. 

What once felt euphoric now lands like a midnight voicemail you weren’t meant to hear — breathy, insistent, creepy, and far too possessive. 
------
LYRICS:
------
Yeah

I've been trying to call
I've been on my own 
For long enough

Maybe you can show me how to love... 
Maybe

I'm going through withdrawals
You don't even have to do too much
You can turn me on with just a touch
Baby

I look around and-
Sin City's cold and empty, oh
No one's around to judge me, oh
I can't see clearly when you're gone

I said, ooh, I'm blinded by your light
No, I can't sleep until I feel your touch
I said, ooh, I'm drowning in the night
Oh, when I'm like this
You're the one I trust

I'm running out of time
Cause I can see the sun light up the sky
So I hit the road in overdrive
Baby

The city's cold and empty, oh
No one's around to judge me, oh
I can't see clearly when you're gone

I said, ooh, I'm blinded by your light
No, I can't sleep until I feel your touch
I said, ooh, I'm drowning in the night
Oh, when I'm like this
You're the one I trust

I'm just walking by to let you know 
(walking by to let you know)
I could never say it on the phone 
(never say it on the phone)
Will never let you go this time

I said, ooh, 
I'm blinded by your light
No, I can't sleep until I feel your touch

Hey, hey, hey
Hey, hey, hey

I said, ooh, I'm blinded by your light
No, I can't sleep until I feel your touch

I said...
Ohh, blinded by your light
I can't sleep until I feel your touch
Could never say it on the phone 

I can't sleep until I feel your touch 
And I'll never let you go this time 

Because you're mine 
You are mine 
-All mine 

I am blinded by your light

Blinded by your light

---------------

BLINDED BY YOUR LIGHT | DARKWAVE EDITION

“Chaos is the first language of the universe. We spend our lives learning to translate it.”
------
LYRICS:
------
Born to chaos  
Born to chance  
Born to balance  
Delicate dance  

Said world begin in fire  
Big explosion loud as God  

Universe stumble forward  
Still… it learn to walk  

Born from warm dark water  
Pushed into cold sharp noise  
First breath breaking silence  
Still… we find our voice

Order is a cage we like  
Chaos is the thing we are  
Tiny motion shift the world  
One wingbeat becomes a scar

Born to chaos  
Born to chance  
Born to balance  
Delicate dance  

From shaking sky  
To storms we bleed  
Chaos takes root  
To crack open the seed

Watched cities fall to ashes  
Windows cry and break apart  
Chaos rude and brutal teacher  
Still… it shape the art  

Draw maps inside the rubble  
Trace the danger
Trace the dream  
Butterfly with fragile power  
Moves the whole regime

Order is a cage we like  
Chaos is the thing we are  
Tiny motion shift the world  
One wingbeat becomes a scar

Born to chaos  
Born to chance  
Born to balance  
Delicate dance  

From shaking sky  
To storms we bleed  
Chaos takes root  
To crack open the seed

I walk in broken patterns  
Streets like twisted wire veins  

Chaos speak in quiet language  
Pulse inside my shaking brain  

Every step is revolution  
Small beginning
Giant wave  

Make disorder into meaning  
Turn destruction into brave  

Chaos spark is breathing furnace  
Burning through the rules we keep  
Order heavy like concrete block  
Chaos make the stone leap  

Balance always shifting under  
Feet that dance on cracking ground  
Lose the silence
Find the thunder  
In the noise-
The truth is found

Chaos spark is breathing furnace  
Burning through the rules we keep

Chaos spark is breathing furnace  
Burning through the rules we keep

Too much order — nothing grows  
Too much chaos — no one stays  
Balance is the blade we walk  
We walk it… 
Always

Born to chaos  

Born to chaos

Born 2 Chaos

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bORN2CHAOs

In this emotive indie-electronic version of Soundgarden's "Black Hole Sun", an apocalypse becomes an intimate moment where the melody floats like a final confession into the abyss.
------
LYRICS:
------
In my eyes
Indisposed
In disguises 
No one knows
Hides the face
Lies the snake
And the sun 
In my disgrace

Boiling heat
Summer stench
Neath the black
The sky looks dead

Call my name
Through the cream
And I'll hear you scream again

Black hole sun
Won't you come
And wash away the rain?
Black hole sun
Won't you come
Won't you come

Won't you come?

Stuttering
Cold and damp
Steal the warm wind
Tired friend
Times are gone
For honest men
Sometimes far too long for snakes

In my shoes
Walking sleep
In my youth
I pray to keep

Heaven send
Hell away
No one sings 
Like you anymore

Black hole sun
Won't you come
And wash away the rain?
Black hole sun
Won't you come
Won't you come

Black hole sun
Won't you come
And wash away the rain?
Black hole sun
Won't you come
Won't you come 

Black hole sun, black hole sun
Won't you come 

Black hole sun, black hole sun
Won't you come

Black hole sun, black hole sun
Won't you come

Won't you come?

Hang my head
Drown my fear
Till you all just disappear

Black hole sun
Won't you come
And wash away the rain?
Black hole sun
Won't you come
Won't you come

Black hole sun
Won't you come
And wash away the rain?
Black hole sun
Won't you come
Won't you come 

Black hole sun, black hole sun
Won't you come...

Black hole sun, black hole sun
Won't you come...

Won't you come?

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BLACK HOLE SUN

LYRICS:
-a voice in the system

-a jagged cut in the sky

-two zero two six

-the warning begins

Steel lines crossing the morning light
Air torn open by machine flight
Footsteps vanish into powdered ground 
I speak the first sign-

War rises without disguise
And the horizon takes it in

Streetlines tremble 
Under fevered crowds
Sirens drift through 
The overcharged clouds
Structures falter in patterns 
No one commands 

I deliver the second sign-
Instability takes control
And the city absorbs it

World comes crashing

The world comes crashing

World comes crashing
The world comes crashing
The world comes crashing 
Down, down, down, down

down - down - down
Crashing down

Crashing down

Iron hands barter justice for gold
Documents burn as the stories unfold
The air grows thick 
With the weight of crime 
I name the third sign-

Corruption binds the frame of power
And the chambers carry it

burn inside
cold measure
break signal
rise error
fallen memory
silent remedy
crimson catalyst
outer frequency

Voices collide in a storm without form
Lines divide through 
The center of the swarm

Hands reach upward 
With nothing returned 
I reveal the fourth sign-

Inequality becomes the rule
And the people feel its weight

Streets mapped out by empty shelves
Families counting hours 
Like debts to themselves
Cold statistics 
Pressed into abandoned homes
This is the pattern 
Beneath the noise

Law tilts toward the tallest tower
The powerless 
Measured in fractions of power

I recite the final sign-
Injustice seals the fall
And the stillness after
World converging
The world comes crashing

The world comes crashin'

World comes crashin'

The world comes crashin'

World comes crashin'
Comes crashin'
The world 
Comes crash shin' down...

Crashing down 

Down, down, down, down

Down - Down 
Crashing down

Two
Zero
Two
SIX

it does not end —
it sinks.

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TWO ZERO TWO SIX  (CRASHING DOWN)

SINCERE IMPOSTER is an intimate collection of artists exploring a curious mixture of New Wave, Dance, EDM, Folk Rock, Metal, Art Pop, Electro, Dreamwave, and Experimental World Pop. Collectively, this is known as QUIRKPOP — music that pushes the creative limits of traditional pop.

Expect an unpredictable journey through sound, emotion, and humor, where genres collide and pop bends in strange new ways. Each song is conceived, composed, and performed with total sincerity, whether it’s built from voices, instruments, software, or hybrid experimentation. The focus is on the music itself: if it resonates, it resonates. No explanation required.

SINCERE IMPOSTER is curated by two musicians, both living within the same body, sharing a singular existence. They identify as Danielle & Dave. They are both psychologically and musically confused, yet extremely and unapologetically sincere.

Influences range from Weird Al and Nathan Fielder to David Lynch, Rosalia, Monatik, Atarashii Gakko!, Rammstein, T-Pain, and T-Swift. 

Danielle & Dave’s favorite inventions include the vacuum and the peach pitter. Their father is simply known as Vessel… who may be an entity or a god.


TWO ZERO TWO SIX (CRASHING DOWN)

Sincere Imposter

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