After the third 'Extinct' track that was dedicated to the St. Helena Giant Earwig, Cat told me she picked the Tasmanian tiger (Thylacinus cynocephalus) as the next one in the series. For this one, it was planned that it was her turn to start the work, send me the vocals and I would build the music around it.
A thylacine (Tasmanian tiger) at Beaumaris Zoo, Hobart TAS
It was clear to me that I would want to go with a techno style for this tiger track, nothing downtempo, dreamy or mellow, but rather a bit more aggressive, pushing forward. The tempo set by Cat on her vocals was a perfect fit.
Usually when building tracks I start with the backbone, the rhythm section and bass. But with building around Cats vocals I am looking for the melodic pattern first. Here this threw me off a bit, I had some ideas and put them on, but whatever I came up with I wasn't really satisfied with it and got stuck. I couldn't make it fit all along Cat's vocals she had sent me. So I did a restart and built the track from scratch, taking her vocals as core inspiration. She then did a second take of her vocals on what I built and in the end everything fitted together perfectly.
The beats are built on a percussion line as a backbone that you can hear starting together with a bass pattern around 0:28. It combines with the syncopic deep drumbeats that stand alone in the intro. Together with the percussion, bass and the basic 4/4 bass drum (coming in 0:42), it creates some kind of a galopping rhythm bouncing on the deep bass frequencies, when played on a good bass reflex sound system. I love that feature :-) You don't really get it on listening the track on headphones on your mobile phone or on the speakers of a desktop computer. Several synth elements are added throughout the track, that combine nicely with Cat's vocals. The track has basically two parts that are equal, with a restart at 3:48, but the second one is built out a bit more towards the end.
The track was completed beginning of february 2025, but the video work took some more time. The visuals follow the style of the Extinct tracks that came before, especially Years Of Wisdom and Tales Of St. Helena. Another proper THE WEB & CXXXVI audiovisual experience :-)
Click to listen to THE WEB & CXXXVI - Demons And Cannibals on SC
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