The Obelisk Questionnaire is a series of open questions intended to give the answerer an opportunity to explore these ideas and stories from their life as deeply as they choose. Answers can be short or long, and that reveals something in itself, but the most important factor is honesty.

Based on the Proust Questionnaire, the goal over time is to show a diverse range of perspectives as those who take part bring their own points of view to answering the same questions. To see all The Obelisk Questionnaire posts, click here.

Thank you for reading and thanks to all who participate.

The Obelisk Questionnaire: Duncan Park of Return to Worm Mountain, Rise Up Dead Man & More

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How do you define what you do and how did you come to do it?

At the core, I play guitar and write songs. I started playing when I was ten years old, largely because my dad played guitar and my parents played loads of great guitar music in the house as I was growing up. At that age I also started listening to my “own” music, which at that point in time was pretty average pop “punk” like the Offspring and Blink-182 and then nü-metal bands like System of a Down, which was also generally guitar-oriented music.

From there I quickly realized that I love making new sounds on the guitar and started writing my own licks and riffs. At a very young age I knew that I preferred creating my own music to playing covers. I suppose it all just snowballed from there, especially as my tastes in music expanded and my artistic horizons broadened, which opened my eyes to the almost infinite possibilities of musical creation.

Describe your first musical memory.

I was lying on a couch which had been prepared as my bed for the night. I assume we were on a family holiday, or at the very least, we were travelling somewhere and staying in an unfamiliar house. I am not sure how young I was, but I remember feeling excited, and my dad was playing some songs to me on guitar in an attempt to get me to fall asleep. Appropriately, he was playing the song “I’m Only Sleeping” by the Beatles. I remember the song making me feel hopeful, and almost hypnotized. It was a feeling of pure emotive euphoria, which to this day only music can make me feel. It was incredible.

Growing up, my father often played my sister and I songs to get us to fall asleep. He would play his own renditions of the usual Disney songs that kids our age would have liked, but he was a massive Beatles and John Lennon fan, so to this day when I hear the original versions of “I’m Looking Through You,” “Beautiful Boy” or “I’m Only Sleeping,” it always makes me think of him, and more specifically, how much I preferred his versions of those songs (even though the originals are all stone cold classics). I’d love to get a recording of him playing those songs. Next time he comes to stay at my house I think I may force him into it.

Describe your best musical memory to date.

This is an incredibly difficult question. There are so many moments when writing music which give one an unbridled feeling of euphoria which is immensely satisfying, and I suppose these moments are my best musical memories. One moment in particular would be when Cameron and I wrote the song Umdhlebi Tree for the second Return to Worm Mountain album. We only had a handful of songs and whilst we were jamming and recording some live take’s in his garage to get things started on making the album he said to me we needed to write another song for the record, and kind of put me on the spot to come up with a riff there and then. I felt this immediate pressure and just started to let my fingers wander up and down the fretboard trying to find a riff. He kept saying “nah, I don’t like that” to everything I was coming up with, until I fell upon that serpentine arpeggio that makes up the main riff of the song. At that point we both knew we had something that was special to the two of us, and to this day that remains my favourite riff I have written, and Umdhlebi Tree is one of the songs that I am most proud of out of everything I have ever recorded.

When was a time when a firmly held belief was tested?

In my day job, my firmly held beliefs are tested all the time. But in music, one firmly held belief of mine that is often tested in an incredibly positive way is my belief that when it really comes down to it, the only person you can rely on is yourself. Time and again my friends and musical peers have proved me wrong on this. The musical community has supported me through a great many experiences where I thought I was alone. Music tests me in ways which make me realise that people are generally kinder and more supportive than I believe them to be. And that is a wonderful way to be tested.

Where do you feel artistic progression leads?

Within my own personal experience and understanding of what “artistic progression” is, it leads to an increased satisfaction in one’s own ability to articulate, express, and emote artistically. Something like becoming more fluent in the ability to communicate musically and express feelings and emotions which cannot be expressed through the limitations of conventional language. As you progress artistically, the wider and more powerful your emotive range becomes. With this ability, the more your own satisfaction in the art you create grows.

However, I don’t necessarily believe that I (or anyone) is constantly “progressing” artistically. I often feel more like I have “regressed” in certain aspects of the art I create, which can be incredibly frustrating.

How do you define success?

For me, success is almost synonymous with satisfaction or contentment. Some people are satisfied just being able to write a song which they will only ever play in their living room, and to them that is an accomplishment and a success in itself. Other people may only be satisfied if their album gets five-star reviews and they sell out a headlining tour of Europe or something like that. So it’s not the same for everyone, and I don’t believe anyone’s own criteria for success is more or less valid than the next person’s.

I also don’t believe that success is something that is static. Everything’s relative. When a band starts out, getting that first gig is a success worth celebrating. As they progress over time their own perception or threshold for success may change and evolve. These days, I often see the number of social media followers an artist has being used as a metric for success. Twenty years ago, social media didn’t even exist, so what is generally perceived or accepted as a measure for success by the public changes over time.

For me, playing music is an extremely personal, cathartic experience, so when I play music, whether it be live or recording and experimenting in my home, if I feel like I have achieved that satisfying release of catharsis, then it has been a success. If I walk away feeling elated, euphoric, or even “cleansed”, like I have purged my frustrations, then it has been a success. If I walk away feeling frustrated or disappointed, then it certainly was not a success at all. I guess that’s my metric for measuring success.

What is something you have seen that you wish you hadn’t?

There are undoubtedly a couple of gigs I wish I hadn’t seen. Conversely, there are a few audiences I wish I hadn’t seen either. However, I suppose these were all learning experiences. Master classes in what not to do on either side of the stage. Not that I’ve come close to mastering the art of performing live.

Describe something you haven’t created yet that you’d like to create.

I would really like to create an immersive, meditative drone recording that is over an hour long. I dabble in drone music in my solo stuff and with Rise Up, Dead Man, but I am always nervous to go for that overblown expanse of songs which last for 20+ minutes. It’s ironic, because many of my favourite songs and albums are crazy long, but I suppose I’m building up the confidence to pull something like that off myself. I also don’t want to go into writing a song or an album with the intention of just “making it really long” as an unwarranted tickbox criteria. I feel like it has to happen naturally, so I’m just waiting for the right piece of music or inspiration to come along so that I can ride that wave in a way that is organic rather than forced. Perhaps a stupid goal, but I guess I just want to make the kind of album or piece of music that I really love getting lost in myself. But if it never ends up happening, I am perfectly comfortable with that too.

What do you believe is the most essential function of art?

In the immortal words of Shia LaBeouf, “Anything that moves you is art,” and much to my own amazement, I agree with the guy on this point. Whether it makes you reconsider the fabric of reality or just makes you feel happy and want to dance, if it moves you, it is art. Art’s most essential function is to move the audience. I’m sure there are artists who create their art with the intention to communicate something specific (even I have created art with this intention), but once it’s out in the world people will experience and interpret it in their own ways which you cannot, and should not be able to control. So regardless of the specific intention of the artwork, so long as it moves people, it is art.

I suppose this could also fall under the above question regarding how success is defined – art is ultimately successful if it moves the audience.

Something non-musical that you’re looking forward to?

So many things… Summer vacation (I’m in South Africa in the Southern Hemisphere, so it’s currently the middle of summer), my wife’s birthday, going hiking again, taking my dogs for a walk in the Durban botanic gardens, seeing my mother for the first time in two years (thanks Covid)… There are many things I am excited for.

https://www.facebook.com/duncanparkmusic/
https://www.instagram.com/duncanparkmusic/
https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCKSrVDS0Yedbsnxv9ApN5GA
https://duncanpark.bandcamp.com/
https://ramblerecords.bandcamp.com/

Duncan Park, Invoking the Flood (2022)

Last day. I guess we made it. There was never any doubt it would happen, but I wouldn’t call this the smoothest Quarterly Review ever by any stretch. Weather, canceled school, missed bus, The Patient Mrs. about to start a new semester at work, plus that day that had three noise rock records right in a row — who slots these things? (me) — it hasn’t all been easy. But, if you’ve ever read the QR you might know I’ve developed a tendency to load a bunch of killer stuff into the last day to kind of give myself a break, and here we are. No regrets.

Thanks for reading this week (and any other week if you’ve ever been on this site before). Here’s how we finish.

Quarterly Review #41-50:

Dream Unending, Tide Turns Eternal

Beautiful and sad, this first collaboration between drummer/vocalist Justin DeTore (Solemn Lament, ex-Magic Circle, many more) and guitarist/bassist Derrick Vella (Tomb Mold, Outer Heaven) under the moniker of Dream Unending harnesses a classic early ’90s death-doom melancholy, but it’s not as raw as the image of My Dying Bride circa ’92 that might bring to mind. If you want to do mashups, think Novembers Doom meets Alternative 4-era Anathema. Tide Turns Eternal brings together seven songs in 46 minutes and is memorable in stretches like the guitar progression of “In Cipher I Weep” and the crushing chug of the title-track as the Massachusetts/Toronto duo harness the a true sense of classic death metal just ahead of the two-minute weepy guitar interlude “Forgotten Farewell” and the 10-minute closing title-track. Perhaps there’s some inspiration from Bell Witch in the making, but Dream Unending‘s atmosphere and patience are their own.

Dream Unending on Instagram

20 Buck Spin website

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Mud Spencer, Fuzz Soup

The title don’t lie. French expat Sergio Garcia, living in Indonesia, concocts 11 instrumental tracks of fuzzy flood, and if he wants to call that soup, then yeah, that’s as good as anything I’ve got. “Razana” opens with two minutes of garage-style strut, while “Back to Origin” crunches and “Fuzz Soup” feels a bit more of a psych freakout with its lead guitar and drums that remind of Witch, all performed by Garcia, who adds organ to boot. “Quest for Fire” is probably more in homage to the movie than band, which is a little sad, but the song brings in some minor scales and droning atmospherics, and “Ride the Mammoth” pushes more straightforward into the languid wah whatnottery of “Argapura” at the presumed start of side B, which feels rawer in “The Shelter” and more chaotic in the buzz of “Surfin’ the Dune” before “The Cheating Mole” turns to nighttime darkjazz, “Tumulous” turns its acoustic start into a hairy march punctuated and grounded by the pop of snare, and closer “Narcolepsy” finishes with a duly zombified, organ-laced take on tape-trader doom. These experiments work well together throughout Fuzz Soup, united by weird and unpredictable as they are.

Mud Spencer on Facebook

Argonauta Records website

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Farfisa, Gänger

Gänger is third in a purported series of four EPs by Manchester, UK, four-piece Farfisa, and its four songs solidify some of the more let-go aspects of 2020’s Bravado, taking the folkish shine of a cut like “My Oh My” and turning it into the dug-in garage prog rock of “Honey Badger” and riffing out dirty and fuzzed on “River Rash.” Frankly, I don’t know why, having once conjured tones like those of the penultimate “Clinton” here, which sound like something that would make Ty Segall start a new band, one would ever not do that again, but I won’t claim to know what the fourth EP in the series might bring. One can only hope that, when the series is wrapped, they compile it into some sort of offering — a double-tape or some such — and release the whole thing together. As it stands though, Gänger is my first exposure to the band, and they smash through “Limitator” with due prejudice. I can think of five record labels off the top of my head who’d be lucky to have these guys, but nobody asks me these things.

Farfisa on Facebook

Farfisa on Bandcamp

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Volcanova, Cosmic Bullshit

Fucking a, rock and roll. Reykjavik’s Volcanova aren’t through “Salem,” the lead cut from their righteously titled Cosmic Bullshit EP, before they’ve cadenced Uncle Acid in the verse and broken out the cowbell, so yes, it’s that kind of party. That cowbell comes back almost immediately for “Gold Coast,” which tramps out big riffs like Def Leppard used to make, and “Desolation” brings the bass forward effectively in its hook, the band having already built fervent momentum that will carry through the rest of the 26-minute mini-album. Not to pick favorites, but “End of Time” feels purposefully placed near the middle, and “No Wheels” — yup, more cowbell — splits that and closer “Lost Spot” well, giving a grounded stretch of pure shove before the finale hard-boogies and big-drifts its way to a surprising wash of an ending, organ included. You don’t call your release Cosmic Bullshit if you’re not looking to get attention, and Volcanova certainly earn that with these tracks.

Volcanova on Facebook

The Sign Records website

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Aiwass & Astral Contruct, Solis in Stellis

The premier collaboration between Arizona’s Aiwass and Colorado’s Astral Construct — the latter also stylized as ASTRAL COnstruct — is a seven-minute single called “Solis in Stellis” that bridges terrestrial and ethereal heavy psychedelias. At a bit under eight minutes, its melodic flourish and weighted underpinning of low end, drifting guitar and fluid rhythmic progression sound like nothing so much as the beginning of an album that should be made if it’s not currently in the works between Drew Patricks (Astral Construct) and Blake Carrera (Aiwass), who both function as solo artists in their respective projects but come together here to show the complementary potential of each for the other. Lush in atmosphere, patient in its delivery and spacious without being overwrought, “Solis in Stellis” is hopefully the beginning of more to come from these two, who might just end up having to call themselves the Aiwass Construct if they keep going the way they are.

Aiwass on Facebook

Astral Construct on Instagram

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Doctor Smoke, Dreamers and the Dead

Seven years after 2014’s The Witching Hour, Ohio’s Doctor Smoke return with Dreamers and the Dead, a solid 10-song/42-minute run that makes up for lost time by reimagining ’90s-era Megadeth sneer as dark and catchy heavy rock and roll. The four-piece led by founding guitarist/vocalist Matt Tluchowski may have let a few years get by them — that’ll happen — but if the intervening time was spent hammering out these songs, the effort shows itself in the efficiency with which each cut makes its point and gets out, a song like “These Horrid Things” casting its mood in the verses before opening to the chorus, winding fretwork building tension into and subsequently through the solo. This is a revamp of the idea of a classic metal influence, the first instance of a generational shift I can think of that’s bringing this particular vibe to a heavy rock context — the pounding and sprinting of the title-track might’ve been thrash in the ’80s, but a decade later it was thicker and so it is here as well — and Doctor Smoke make it theirs, no question. One wonders what the next seven years will bring.

Doctor Smoke on Facebook

Ripple Music website

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Willowater, Loyal

Rebranded from their moniker of Sierra, Ontario progressive heavy rockers Willowater bring the four-track/14-minute EP as a quick hello to listeners new and old. Guitarist/vocalist Jason Taylor and bassist/drummer/vocalist Robbie Carvalho (also synth) chug out in early-Tool fashion on the opener “Ultimatum,” and the subsequent title-track answers back in kind with shared vocals and a bit of twisting, pulled squeals of guitar, and so on, while “Fly High” calls to mind Dio-style riffing with a bassline to bolster the classic metal vibe, and “Winter Now” builds a tension in its keyboard-laced 3:26 that, somewhat maddeningly, never pays itself off. Perhaps the message there is of more to come. Hope so, anyhow. Sierra were a quality band, and undervalued. Willowater seem to be taking another shot at catching as many ears as possible. A fresh start. Not so crazy different from what they were doing before, but sometimes a name can make all the difference.

Willowater on Facebook

Willowater on Bandcamp

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All Are to Return, II

This second EP from the anonymous Dutch outfit All Are to Return reignites the brutality of their 2020 self-titled debut short release (review here), while expanding the stylistic reach. Opener “Carceri” tips into industrial black metal before resolving itself in harsh screams and drones, while “Surveiller et Punir” feels even more experimental/art rock with tortured screams far back under noisy guitar. “Classified” is shorter and more beat-oriented, but the distorted wash of “Postscript on the Societies of Control” (bit of positive thinking there, almost in spite of itself) is abrasive as fuck, such that the quiet, minimal synth that starts “De Profundis” accompanied by more obscured screams seems almost like a relief before it builds to its own post-Godflesh industrialized crush. They finish atmospheric on “Desiring Machines,” blowing out conceptions of extreme music in about the time it takes for you to put on your shoes and jacket so you can go out, wander into the wilderness, and never be heard from again.

All Are to Return on Bandcamp

Tartarus Records website

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Mountain Sides, Mountain Sides

Members of Mirror Queen, the just-signed-to-Tee–Pee-proper Limousine Beach (really, I haven’t even had the chance to post the news yet), Zombi, Ruby the Hatchet and Osees coming together for three Mountain covers. Mountain Sides do “You Better Believe It,” “Dreams of Milk and Honey” and “Travelin’ in the Dark,” and they knock it out of the park accordingly. I don’t know that this would ever get to become a real band between the commitments of Morgan McDaniel, David Wheeler and Steve Moore, let alone Owen Stewart (Ruby the Hatchet‘s drummer) or Paul Quattrone from Osees and a geographic spread between New York, Philly, Pittsburgh and Los Angeles, but as a quick outing to test the waters, these three songs want nothing for vibe. Of course, being Mountain songs helps, but it almost inevitably would. Still, I’d take a record of tunes they wrote themselves, even if it doesn’t happen for another decade because everyone’s busy.

Mountain Sides on Bandcamp

Tee Pee Records Digital Annex

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Duncan Park, Invoking the Flood

Serenity in experimentalist drone and psychedelia, marked by the interplay of organic folk and otherworldly elements of fluid aural adventures. The backward, swelling repetitions of “The Alluring Pool” answer the watery worldmaking of leadoff “Rivers are a Place of Power,” the backing chimes reminding of water moving the air, the acoustic guitar on centerpiece “Riverbank” furthering the theme in sweetly plucked notes while Duncan Park (who also collaborates with Seven Rivers of Fire) picks up the journey again on “The Winding Stream” with a current of melody playing beneath the main acoustic lines of the song, instrumental in its entirety. Invoking the Flood, apart perhaps from some warning that might be read into the opener, grows more peaceful as it goes, though Park‘s inclusion of vocals on closer “Over the River” speaks perhaps of other tributaries waiting to be explored. Still, it is a sweet and encompassing, if short, trip downstream with Park here, and if the flood comes, at least we had a good time.

Duncan Park on Facebook

Ramble Records on Bandcamp

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