Name: Out of Focus by Heliopolis 5
Duration: 4 min 15 s
Description: This track ended up reminding quite a bit of the Dutch rock band Focus from the early 70's ( mainly from the vaguely operatic voices I used ) hence the title! I only made this connection when I'd finished it believe-it-or-not. Once again it was made in GarageBand.

Such a masterful composition. Super impressive and enjoyable!

Wonderful sounds in this piece! 😃👏👏

@user-936947521 Thank you so much, Frans. It really means a lot!

this one has a lot of great moments. the intro and this section are prob my faves. Love!

Psychedelic haze meets operatic drama in a track that wanders through memory like an old film reel, scratched, surreal, and strangely captivating. That choir element floats ghostlike above the mix, echoing back to Focus era theatrics with a wink and a swirl. Guitars shimmer, drums pulse just out of frame, and everything feels like it’s moving through a dream you half remember from your dad’s record collection. It doesn’t ask for clarity, it dares you to lose yourself. 💨 The kettle hissed, “This was steaming with mystery, like prog rock brewed in a teapot” 🧄 The garlic press muttered, “I didn’t understand it, but I felt it, and now I smell like nostalgia” 🧊 The ice dispenser clinked, “Operatic, trippy, and weirdly beautiful, I froze mid vibe” GarageBand sorcery at its finest, like falling backward through time into a vintage jam session with ghosts and glitter.

Very progressive rock sounding... I like that.. :-)

THE HARBOUR from Echoes from a distant Past

A collab with https://soundcloud.com/bigpapashonan on violin and keys/sounddesign and https://soundcloud.com/holgerengel on bass guitar, Big Thank You to my wonderful collaborators. Please take a listen to the remix of KBS:  https://soundcloud.com/bigpapashonan/brochen?si=a3d0ddc3cdb9475f9601e6fdea3e64bc&utm_source=clipboard&utm_medium=text&utm_campaign=social_sharing
 
At 1142 metres above sea level, the ‘Brocken’ (also known as the ‘Blocksberg’) is the highest mountain in the ‘Harz’, a mid-range mountain group in Central Germany. Put simply, it is a large block of granite, a plutonic rock. It is shrouded in legends and mystery. My father grew up in this area as a child and of course knew the old stories and myths, including some about the so-called "Brocken Ghost"...

The cropped, filtered and edited photography shows the „Brocken Spectre“ (original by Walter Richter)
					
„When the observer's shadow falls on a layer of fog or clouds, the shadow is not represented by a solid surface, but by each drop of water in the haze individually. As a result, the brain cannot see the shadow stereoscopically and significantly overestimates the size. Air movements cause the shadow to move, even when the observer is standing still. This seemingly separate entity can also float and hover without having any visible contact with the ground. The other physical conditions on the mountain, cool and damp air, silence, as well as the lack of orientation due to a lack of foresight and neighbouring mountains, reinforce the subjective impression of the apparent existence of a ghost."

					Johan Esaias Silberschlag, 1780


Brocken Ghost

1
The shadow falls (4)
On layers of fog 
The shadow falls
Unto each single drop
The shadow falls
On layers of fog
The shadow falls (2)
  
A different story
On each single drop  
A different story
From the bottom to the top
A different story…

2
The shadow floats
On layers of fog
The shadow  is hovering
Over the ground
The shadow is growing
Waving without sound
The shadow floats
With a glory

A different story
On each single drop  
A different story
From the bottom to the top
A different story
On each single drop
On each single drop

Brocken Ghost (wt KBS and Holger Engel, raw edit)

This track ended up reminding quite a bit of the Dutch rock band Focus from the early 70's ( mainly from the vaguely operatic voices I used ) hence the title! I only made this connection when I'd finished it believe-it-or-not. Once again it was made in GarageBand.

Out of Focus

The axolotl named Julio Cortázar watches Julio Cortázar observing the axolotls swimming in the aquarium.
The sister tracks here: https://soundcloud.com/michele-ansani/this-is-them-last-version and https://soundcloud.com/michele-ansani/this-is-us

Here the short background story:https://ambystoma.uky.edu/teachers_materials/axolitbook/AxolotlByJulioCortazar.html
Picture is from Pietro Corrao.

------

Composed by Michele Ansani (2025)
Posted on SoundCloud: 2025, May 1

Is this you? *

En hommage à mes deux amis de SC: Damga et HyLGZ22 @user-618736932😉qui m’ont permis de ”poser ma voix” sur leurs excellentes pistes!
Instrumental: Damga 
Lyrics: DelhyA, Damga, HyLGZ22 et leurs collaborateurs
Vocals: DelhyA

Je vais oser être vraie
Je vais oser comme Joséphine et me la jouer façon bad gurl
(Je vais oser) et te proposer une romance erratique au son de mes mélodies nocturnes
Même s’il n est que 16h ce dimanche et que le soleil revient
Laisse moi t inviter dans la cathédrale de mes sons ecstatiques
Où je te jouerai la sweet polyphony de mes désirs
Te prenant ainsi dans les phares de mon clair de lune artificiel.

Welcome to my subspace
Où je ne te propose rien d autre que du love dans un magnetic cloud.
J’y ferai l éloge de ta rousseur en attendant que le rouge te monte aux joues
Bien sûr je ne te dirai pas lesquelles, ici je te l avoue…
Au gré de cette méditation guidée, nous allons jouer et nous élever
jusqu’à ce que la dernière goutte soit tombée,
Jusqu’à ce que la dernière goutte soit tombée….

Laisse moi te séduire au son de mes black keys et mes harmonies
Laisse-moi t’envoûter avec my dark smooth melody
Sous la douceur lunaire, je serai ta hiérophante adorée
Sous les étoiles endormies, tu seras bien vite piégé(e)
Au sein des vagues sublimes du storm de nos phéromones
Où tu n auras plus qu’à succomber aux sons de notre attraction musicale….

Ce soir my love soyons fantasques et frivoles
Ce soir my love ce sera juste: « relax and let me take control »

——————————————————
TRANSLATION:

I'm going to dare to be true
I'm going to dare like Josephine and play the bad girl
And offer you an erratic romance to the sound of my nocturnal melodies
Even if it's only 4 p.m. this Sunday and the sun is back
Let me invite you into the cathedral of my ecstatic sounds
Where I'll play you the sweet polyphony of my desires
Taking you in the headlights of my artificial moonlight.

Welcome to my subspace
Where I offer you nothing but love in a magnetic cloud.
I'll praise your red hair while waiting for the red to rise to your cheeks
Of course, I won't tell you which ones, but I confess here...
Through this guided meditation, we will play and rise until the last drop has fallen, Until the last drop has fallen...

Let me seduce you with the sound of my black keys and my harmonies
Let me enchant you with my dark, smooth melody
Under the lunar sweetness I will be your beloved hierophant
Under the sleeping stars you will quickly be trapped
Within the sublime waves of the storm of our pheromones
Where you will only have to succumb to the sounds of our musical attraction…

Tonight, my love, let's be whimsical and frivolous
Tonight, my love, it will be just: "Relax and let me take control"

Electro Goddess (with Damga)

Cover Art: Wilhelm Grimm (left) and Jacob Grimm (right), portrayed by Elisabeth Jerichau-Baumann (1855) PD-US
Music and Lyrics Copyright 2025 Joe Stroffolino

Hansel and Gretel were abandoned by their parents in the forest all alone.
They stumbled across a delicious looking candy-coated home.  A cannibalistic witch captured them and put them in a cage. Those were the kind of stories they used to tell children at a young age.

The brothers Grim told stories that were a reflection of their time
There was disease famine and poverty and things were not going fine 
We had to sanitize the stories because our modern stomachs are weak
And you’ll get in trouble if you read a book to kids, and it makes them shriek

Three little pigs were in a brick house trying really hard to survive 
The big bad wolf came down the chimney, fell in a pot of water and was boiled alive.
Cinderella’s stepsisters wanted to marry the prince, but they couldn’t fit into her shoes so they chopped off their heels and toes because they had so much to lose 

The brothers Grim told stories that were a reflection of their time
There was disease famine and poverty, and things were not going fine 
Little Red Riding Hood in the bedroom with a wolf dressed in human clothes.
Wondering why her grandmother had sharp teeth and a snout instead of a nose. Jack climbed the beanstalk, there was a giant who wanted to grind up his bones and make some bread. He stole the magic harp and the hen that laid golden eggs and the giant ended up dead

There’s days when you want to take a sheet of tin foil and stick it in your baseball cap
To keep all those negative thoughts from getting in your head and making you a miserable chap
Did it all start when you were a child, and your mother read you that bed time story that perhaps in retrospect may have been a bit too dark and gory

The brothers Grim told stories that were a reflection of their time
There was disease famine and poverty and things were not going fine 
Now we environmental devastation, nuclear weapons and milk that might have bird flu
Just turn on the news you don’t need a fairy tale to put the fear of God in you
But if you take away all the parts that are dark, sick twisted and gory. 
Do you have anything left that actually resembles a good story.
***
Vocals and backing vocals -  Joe Stroffolino 
Guitars - Joe Stroffolino ( 2 Strumming tracks: Taylor 114ce and Fender Squire and I picking track:Taylor114ce)
Bass, Saxophone, Horns: PG Music Real tracks
Piano andi Strings: PG Music and Native Instruments
Drums: EZ drummer 3
Recorded, mixed and mastered with Logic Pro 11

The Brothers Grim

I Drove My Car At 150MPH

Lyrics : Snow Man Dave
Music, instruments, vocal & mix : PJ Project

Her Music Comforts Me

Written by Mark.H.F and Heliopolis 5
Guitars by Mark.H.F.
Keyboards, arranging and mastering by Heliopolis 5

This song is a collaboration with my good friend Mark who supplied the files to his super guitar-based rock song Bad Orange. I have remixed his track, taking his guitar riffs and tried to make something which retains the rock feel of the original but is pretty different as well. We are both happy with the result. You can check out Mark’s original Bad Orange track by going to @mfishman71 ( as well as his other great guitar driven tracks, of course ).

Juiced

Original by David Bowie 1977

Bass, drums, vocal and mix : Little Man
All other instruments : PdB Orchestra

Heroes

Entanglement

I enjoy producing upbeat tracks spanning a range of pop styles. I really hope you have fun listening to them. I write my tracks using GarageBand and hopefully I am improving my writing, arranging and production skills. I do not use AI in any of my compositions.

Out of Focus

Heliopolis 5

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😏 Krazy Krissie 🧦

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