after making several attempts to sonically convey the history of the american west, a new subject became clear: a sonic exploration into the poisoning of the earth due to atomic testing and the heavy defense industries that surround it. the 'cobalt variations' trilogy attempts to make sense of this. the records can be listened to in sequence or taken individually.

the music program is designed to extract you from real time, and allow you to visit the american west and south pacific across various stages of destruction to the natural environment, as their resident populations are endangered through direct governmental actions.

cobalt variations three : mexicali

our journey concludes in the present day, situated along the united states southern border, where it’s no secret that weapons are flowing into mexico at an astonishing rate. no longer does the united states have to rain death from above with the impact of an atomic blast, we can now slowly poison another nation to death by simply supplying them with enough firepower to kill themselves off. with over thirty thousand murders in mexico in 2018 alone, and seventy percent of guns used in homicides being traced to an origin point in the united states, the program has clearly been very effective.

this recording explores the dusty, decimated landscape of the mexicali border, the violence and desperation still dominating the current moment, torn from the headlines of our undeclared border war.

the insidious drones of ‘camino del diablo’ paint a surprisingly grim picture of life in the shadow of the border, filled with an ominous foreboding of a cataclysmic event that never fully materializes. assume the sun is descending through a choking cloud of industrial pollutants across the western horizon.

field recordings taken in the mexican desert help set the stage for ‘imperial lands’, which uncoils slowly across nearly forty minutes of pure dread, describing the destructive arc of empire. shimmering processed guitars appear like a mirage amid the clangor of approaching industry. a cassette tape found by the side of the road, containing someone’s homemade sexual encounter, provides a literal and figurative climax to this piece, before winding down into a pool of slowly drying blood.