Gateway.radio

[gatewayradio]

No Mercy DeathbyRomy - 2022

DeathbyRomy - No Mercy

Listen to No Mercy on TIDAL

Was walking around an empty hotel lobby where I work last night, randomly shouting out NO. MERCY. I SHOW NO. MERCY. And could not for the life of me remember where I had heard the song. After much googling and fervent searching inside my own head I found it. And god it was better than I remember. For some reason that discordant and violent guitar just feels like a wave of tranquility washing over me. Just hook that shit straight into my veins and watch me sink through the floor. My inner peace is wave of distortion and bass coming to fuck up my insides with sonic brutality. 

For staccato distortion sledge hammer blows of guitars instantly into her singing my boy hates everybody but me. Oh this journey is gonna be fun. He’s my fully loaded gun, brief silence, bullet casing falls to the ground and bounces a couple of times. You pussies better run. A livewire volatile partner. A Mallory to her Mickey. The wild, dangerous and reckless love of uncontrolled youth left off the chain. Laws, norms and social cues are not even guidelines in this world. They are monuments of oppression to be destroyed at all costs to prove complete and utter devotion. 

Nananana. In love with a monster in a nursery rhyme mocking tone. You know I don’t even wanna vivisect it too much. I just wanna get lost in the violent soundscape with staccato screams peppering the chorus of NO. MERCY. I SHOW NO. MERCY. My boy’s a bullet in your brain. In love with a man on the edge of sanity and believing she’s in control of a completely unhinged indiscriminate killer which she can unleash at any moment on any perceived enemy. And revelling in that. Watch out cause he do what I say. I really wouldn’t get in my way. NO MERCY. I SHOW NO. MERCY. The iron heavy zen has arrived to quiet down the inner noise if just for a few minutes. Peace. At last.

[gatewayradio]

The Angels Don’t Hate Me Ghost Stories By Beth - 2026

Ghost Stories by Beth - The Angels Don't Hate Me

Listen to The Angels Don't Hate Me on TIDAL

Sometimes a song just lands in your lap and you just don’t know what to do with it. Where did you come from? How did you contain so much emotion that caused tears to spring from my eyes? Why are you out here making such soul bearing music to an audience of none? Why was this track hidden behind the first track I heard of a woman who can growl-sing behind a wall of noise? And then this acoustic breakdown of a desperate cry for salvation while standing before the Pearly Gates. Finally feeling at peace with a life once lived only to see the angels looking away in shame as rain comes pouring down in the background. I thought here I could be understood. But no. There was more to this story all along. I just didn’t know. I couldn’t have known. So many mistakes and memories are exposed and I wish they could be gone. I thought I had to break the world before it broke me. 

And her voice just raises and fills all the space as she comes so close to breaking trying to explain and justify her actions. This is who I had to be to survive, you get that right? I had to be this hard to survive. And turned away from the Pearly Gates just to fall back down in the dirt again, where the only choice left is to face yourself. Open every scar and redo the past. Could I have been more kind? The worst part of it is knowing that it was true. Blamed the world, blamed everyone else and never looked in the mirror. Knowing that by hurting first I could never be hurt myself, but at what cost? What did I give up to reach this place? 

And self realisation hits in a rage induced growl. Every sin was a choice, every scar has a voice. I don’t want this darkness, I don’t wanna be trapped in my mistakes. What part of myself do I have to kill to fucking get back on my feet and get my fucking wings back? All that anger at the world turned inwards to just get to know the person underneath. The angels though. They don’t hate me. They just know me. I think I am just too far gone for saving. Rain keeps falling. The desperation of wanting to leave a life well led just slips and fades away as if the calls were never even heard at all.

[gatewayradio]

Baby’s On Fire Die Antwoord - 2012

Die Antwoord - Baby's On Fire

Listen to Baby's On Fire on TIDAL

The first time I met a woman from South Africa my knees went weak and my stomach started doing backflips. Something about that accent just sent me to pieces. Maybe it’s the old colonizer blood in me from the old days of the British Empire that got woken up inside of me. This is my favourite track by Die Antwoord. Which always raises the next question, how do you deal with artists that become “problematic”. For Die Antwoord’s sake, I am too addicted to their music to stop. Others I have just stopped listening to. Just ok dude, you were fucked up and it wasn’t act. Your catalogue is dead to me. And with Die Antwoord, there is always gonna be that accent that turns me into a human pile of mush filled with adoration. So kinda trapped by my own body's reactions to the way the English language is spoken here.    

And what can I say about the video? I love white trash. I love seeing how we are all trash whether we started on the council estates of England, the hollers on the poorest sides of the  Appalachian mountains, or the white slums of Cape Town. Baby’s On Fire as a track though. It is brutally heavy techno with beats so phat you can’t stop your head from bouncing along. When Yolander sings, her accent is thick; it adds an extra musical rhythm to her singing. I find so many times I am not listening to a word she is singing and just treating her lyrical spitting as another instrument to find a rhythm to bounce along to. 

And that chorus? Fuck that is heavy. Like I swear they just took baseballs bats to steel dustbins, beat the fuck out of them in an abandoned warehouse and said yeah, that’s the beat for the chorus. Nailed it. During the breakdown Yolander belts out, No need to get so deep, Nothing quite like motherfuckin’ techno beat. And right there, I feel, you capture the whole essence of Die Antwoord. It’s not deep, it’s not for deep dive analysis (lol), it’s just techno noise to make your body move and feel fucking alive.

[gatewayradio]

MadnessMuse - 2012

Muse - Madness

Listen to Madness on TIDAL

A man kicked down my wall today. Stood in the rubble of my broken living room looking at me vaping on the sofa in just my boxers trying desperately not to melt away in the heat of this cursed summer. And he said why did you stop writing? What caused you to walk away from all of this that was bringing you so much joy? And as I continued to melt into an ever increasing puddle of my own sweat I said “Iunno. Stuff.” Puff of the vape and staring at this man going, I may need to put pen to paper to get rid of this guy. And remove the friction of sitting down at the screen and typing nonsense to the weird that soothes the soul.  

So with a gentle stammered introduction of mm-ma-mum-ma-madness before the vocals come in and suddenly that voice just eases all tensions past and present. This is home. This is where I belong. Being transported to a heart wrenching tale of loss, learned hopelessness and despair at the madness of trying to keep a relationship going despite there being more red flags than a carnival. Or am I hearing one side of the story and one guy has a bigger platform to tell his side? I guess we can never know for sure. But I love being here. I love this journey he has invited me on. Where madness and musical composition play with each other to say you can never know the whole truth. But dig the vibes huh? 

But these memories in my mind? As he said, I can’t get them out of there. And they stay there to fester into some kind of madness. I have forgotten more than I could ever learn today but still we the pen hits the paper. Heart slowing down from the beat and body gently rocking to the melody. Have I finally found the light inside a song about the madness of discovering other people have needs? Or are the guitar solos just there to make me pull silly faces and go uuhhh? As the crescendo builds and chorus comes in, lifting the whole piece with the angelic quality of a full on symphony choir. Can you appreciate this song without the need to vivisect it? Rescue me. And maybe I can move on. It’s still all madness.

[gatewayradio]

Rozalla - Everybody’s Free- 1992

Rozalla - Everybody's Free (Single Version)

Listen to Everybody's Free (Single Version) on TIDAL

This came out in the 90’s and I don’t know if I remember this track coming out or if it is memory I have created later on to suit my own needs. I like to think I got to experience to the 90’s but truth is I didn’t hit my teenage years and start developing an interest for music until 1996. So music before then what was it? Background noise? Did I really get to experience the 90s at all? The idea of experiencing their 20s during the 90s is I am sure an idea that many people like to idolise, pedestalise and fantasise about. A decade without smart phones, music that is still played in the clubs today and a sense of hope that I myself felt vanish after 9/11. Just a moment of saying to myself, well, fuck. Things ain’t gonna be the same and probably not for the better either. And well, broadly gesturing at everything, you see my train of thought in action.

But what if I had gotten the 90s? I would not have gotten the 00s. The awkward decade that no one really knows what to call. The Noughties? Sounds ridiculous. But got it was some good music. Or was it really? Is it rose tinted glasses saying, the music that existed in my 20s was the best ever written and everything since has been garbage, soulless trash. And if I had had the 90s now I would be in my 50s now. Looking at retirement getting ever closer as retirement funds disappear into the ether of whatever the fuck is going on out there. From trusting what my own eyes to see, to AI slop being everywhere and not having been trained at a young enough age to distinguish between reality and slop. What a nightmare. The world I loved, replaced by a constant online bombardment of entities fighting for my attention inside a black mirrored rectangle of ever worsening daily doomscrolling post 1990s world in the worse possible way.

So. Everybody’s Free. Absolute banger of a track that cause a spiral of thoughts to suddenly grab me by the throat and say, commit this to paper. Now. You can enjoy the song later. A collage of memories awoken, questioned and possible pasts and futures contemplated. And some of those memories may be false agents planted to make me believe I have actual memories from this time period. Who can tell. Everybody’s free to feel good. I approve of this measured response to the world at the time that just said, get along, work together, enjoy the freedom that you can create inside your own mind to just, well, feel good.

[gatewayradio]

Santa Monica Everclear- 1995

Everclear - Santa Monica

Listen to Santa Monica on TIDAL

Weaponised apathy finally finding a release with a track that was a little before my time yet remains timeless. Just an anthem of hope wrapped in cynicism. The person who listened to this when it mattered most still had hope for the future and believed that the world was a conquerable place just waiting for him to step up to the plate. The man listening today is going where did that hope go? What happened? When did it all fade, crumble and turn to dust? Why did time get so fast? Why are the memories here over 20 years old?

With a raw and vulnerable guitar welcoming us in. Come. Listen. I am still living with your ghost. Which meant nothing to me as a care free teenager. Is crippling to me as an adult with bills to pay and a life that keeps putting up new roadblocks every time we try to change direction. We can live beside the ocean, leave it far behind. Swim out past the breakers, watch the world die. You and me vs the world. In a different life where every single thing was completely different. Perhaps. I am still dreaming of your face snarled out into existence as the guitar riff gets heavier and drums more poundy. We really thought it could be more than this at some point? Right?

I left this place. Of writing. And expression. I thought there was nothing left to say. Maybe there isn’t. Maybe it is all nonsense. But I got sucked back in today. Cause for some reason, people are still finding this collage of buffoonery and going yeah, it’s alright. And I thought I would write about Santa Monica. And nothing came but a vomiting of half truths about a time that is long past and a present that feels nothing. So how do I weaponise this apathy and make it work for me?

[gatewayradio]

You Stole the Sun from My Heart

Manic Street Preachers - 1998

Manic Street Preachers - You Stole the Sun from My Heart

Listen to You Stole the Sun from My Heart on TIDAL

I woke up this morning from a dream where If You Tolerate This Your Children Will Be Next had been playing on a radio in a sunlit room in a dream. So naturally, I sat down with my morning coffee and just had to listen to the track on the album This Is My Truth Tell Me Yours. Which said it had the release date August 01, 1994. Which confused me. Cause I remembered listening to this album in school with my mates and no way was I 11 at the time. I was in upper school. So a quick trip to Wikipedia told me this album 14 September, 1998. That’s more like it yeah. I was 15 at the time this came out. A quick chat with the AI bot on the support page of Tidal let them know the correct information and the bot told me it would put the album under review. Spent a few seconds there thinking all my memories were false.

You Stole the Sun from My Heart is the next track on the album after If You Tolerate This Then Your Children Will Be Next. A stark warning about the need to start shooting fascists pretty fucking soon and acceptance of their place in this world is all downhill from here onward. If You Tolerate This Then Your Children Will Be Next. Huh. But then You Stole the Sun from My Heart came on and I just remembered what a glorious track this. From it’s staccato drums to it’s huge, era defined, Brit Rock guitars. This song doesn’t as much take me back as it reminds me that love is just fucking weird and I still don’t get it now. You have broken through my armour and I don’t have an answer. I love you all the same. I’m lost among the undergrowth, so much so I woke up. I love you all the same. You stole the sun from my heart.

Even now I don’t get it. Is he in love? Is he on the defensive. Is he on the offensive? Nothing makes sense. But my god it is an absolute banging tune with a verse that races towards a sing along chorus with giant buzz distortion filled guitars. And then as we reach the finality, I have, I gotta stop smiling. It gives the wrong impression, I. I love you all the same. As the composition slows down and fades into nothing. What was the point? Did it even need one? Why did it pluck at heartstrings and make eyes feel moist? Who knows. But waking up remembering that shooting fascists is always the right move and being whisked immediately into a generation defining anthem before finishing the morning coffee. Great start to the day.

[gatewayradio]

La Curandera ((Notes From the Trial of)) Clutch - 2004

Clutch - La Curandera ((Notes From the Trial of))

Listen to La Curandera ((Notes From the Trial of)) on TIDAL

What’s your comfort food? When everything is weighing you down and you just need a pick me up? For me it’s to go through the Clutch back catalogue. Guitars that just smash your face off, an easy to nod along to blues rhythm and a singer who spouts tales of wonders. In the shadow of Cerebus her spirit will reside. She dances on black sand in the night, In a linen dress. It doesn’t have to mean anything. It means everything to me. Just larger than life riffs being pounded into my skull at breakneck speed while a Hammond organ screeches in the background adding more layers to the cacophony of the trial of La curandera. It’s a small dose of ridiculous dressed in seriousness but with a wink in its eye and jaunt in its step.

And then that eyes closed, head swinging from side to side bridge comes in. Shed not a tear for humanity. God fetch my stars. This is where guitar riffs live breed and grow into monstrosities while being voiced by a man who see the song as a vehicle for maniacal ranting. Guitars getting somehow even heavier as that Hammond organ is taking a beating. And suddenly nothing. Just feedback. Echoing. On and on. Slowly fading to black. As the beast steps away from the mic and the instruments are just dropped to the floor. An uncomfortable amount of looping feedback. The trial is over. No one won. But a raucous was made.

[gatewayradio]

A Drowning

How To Destroy Angels- 2010

How To Destroy Angels - A Drowning

Listen to A Drowning on TIDAL

Two years had passed since the final farewell album from Nine Inch Nails had been released for free on their website as a thank you to the fans. Two years and me wondering, well, now what do I do? And then A Drowning got released. The first track I heard from the upcoming album How To Destroy Angels by, How To Destroy Angels. And everything felt right with the world again. Trent was making music and his wife was singing some of the most haunting vocals wrapped in that distinctive multi-layered textured sound I had had around me since my first days of dipping my toes into music loving serious. We were back. And with a track to make us feel that there never could be a purpose to anything again, but please. Just help. If you can.

Please, anyone. I don’t think I can save myself. Is her desperate plea inside this desecrated cathedral of sound where only despair can exist. A monotonous beat setting the tempo and layers of percussive distortion stacked on top as synths and a desperately lonely piano try to make themselves known. I’m drowning here, please, anyone. I don’t think I can save myself. This spirit crushing cry of reaching the edge of the last straw and just still having the strength to say please. Help me. I love this moment. As the crushing loneliness of the last ditch desperation is whispered to the void, I feel tranquility. There is a peace in knowing this is the edge. And I can stand here. Surrounded by all the regrets of a life that could have been led a thousand different ways, drowning in a memoir that still isn’t finished. Waves of sounds crashing into me and just say please, one more time. Anyone. Save me. I’m drowning here.

[gatewayradio]

Suicidal

Dead Sara - 2015

Dead Sara - Suicidal

Listen to Suicidal on TIDAL

Muffled like I’m listening underwater. Thoughts that shouldn’t take root but sit there anyway. Just doing our best to drown them but they scream back from underwater. Do you ever feel like dyin’, she screams at you. I remember talking to a therapist once and them asking if there are suicidal thoughts and I said oh just the usual amount you know. 3 or 4 times a week. She said no. The correct amount is zero. What? That doesn’t seem right. So some people go through their whole lives without that. Do what we gotta do to make it through is the last line screamed from underwater before the music moves into the room with us. A brief moment where we just stand tall and say, it is what it is, but we keep on going.

For such a taboo subject, erased by algorithms so we can no longer have a public discourse on the subject matter, the music is incredibly upbeat once it is allowed to breathe and is acknowledged. As with most dark and anti-marketing subjects, once the light is shone on them they become less taboo. So when the stadium chorus comes around you found yourself scream singing along with the chorus yelling at the top of your lungs, We’re suicidal! And finding the entire thing so cathartic.

But this feeling, too will pass as will this post disappear. It will get auto-flagged and de-listed for daring to utter one of the algorithms forbidden words. To find such an upbeat song about the absolute end of the road looks like for many people with nowhere to turn and finding relief in the ability to just look at it and go huh. Pretty banging tune. Found a way to make it through. Found something that made it worth it for one more. Wake up to another day. Run and blow my life away. 50/50 everyday ain’t it really?

[gatewayradio]

One Warren Haynes- 2004

Warren Haynes - One

Listen to One on TIDAL

Upon hearing this cover, I knew this would forever be the definitive version. An old friend up in Norrland showed me this and it was love at first sight. There could never, ever be another version and the original will always feel half-assed in comparison to this. Just Haynes up there on that stage. A single acoustic guitar carrying the weight of all the regrets felt and still to come. And a voice that has just had too much pain for one lifetime.

One for me will always be that dark night of the soul between two lovers. That talk. The one you been putting off and delaying for so long. But now it has to come to a head. This has to get out in the open. Those feelings you had for so long weighing down your guts and making everything so heavy. But how do you express them? The only emotion you ever really understood is anger. And in turn became the only way you ever knew how to express emotion. And this person in front of you is asking you to express yourself with a vocabulary you never learned.

But here. Inside this song. In the depths of Haynes wounded voice, there is a template that makes sense. A way to express what you could never find words for yourself. In such a poetic way, there is a way to say everything you have inside you. It’s with a heavy heart I admit, I could never express myself as raw as this. But I am so thankful for Bono for writing this and Warren Haynes for singing it in the way it deserves.

[gatewayradio]

Wear It Like A Crown

Rebekka Karijord- 2009

Rebekka Karijord - Wear it Like A Crown

Listen to Wear it Like A Crown on TIDAL

A haunting piano to lull us in, and before we can even find our footing she starts singing. She sings with an exhaustion that can only come from losing patience with yourself. Every single day. I don’t know where this fear came from. This fear of failing, fear of letting myself and everyone down. It’s like knives straight through the ego and the heart just sinks inside my chest hearing this. A heart wrenching call for help where the only problem is the noise inside your own head and the fear that holds you still. Just forcing you to listen to every single part of you that wants you to fail and made manifest in song.

This fear is growing deep into my soul. Make me all paralyzed and cold she sings and I just feel my head hang even heavier. When did this fear start dictating all my decisions? Why did she have to put into words the weight that’s been holding me down for longer than I can remember? Cause if I don’t follow my heart this time, I’m gonna forget what this life is all about. What does the heart even want when it’s crushed daily inside a machine that demands time for survival? Where does the heart turn when it is too heavy? There is sadness so deep inside this song that even the resolution feels too monolithic to contemplate.

Cause courage and belief are redeems. No one else can rescue me it seems. There is no one out there to offer a hand and say stand tall and proud. You’re alone and The Fear is all you have to keep you company. Can you wear it like a crown or does the weight of it all crushing down on you feel heavier for every passing day?

[gatewayradio]

Silence (DJ Tiësto’s In Search Of Sunrise Remix) Delerium, Tiësto, Sarah McLachlan- 2004

Delerium, Tiësto & Sarah McLachlan - Silence (DJ Tiësto's In Search Of Sunrise Remix)

Listen to Silence (DJ Tiësto's In Search Of Sunrise Remix) on TIDAL

Nothing hits. All the words are fake extensions of an ego that can’t rest. Time to exorcise all that noise with Silence. And it has to be just the mix. All other mixes are wrong. This is my home. This is where I stood and reached for the lasers. This is comfort in a bass line that rearranges the insides to say stay in this moment. Right here. Right now. With me. This is the only place you need to be. Feel it flow through you. Let the music build, let it take you places beyond where the ego can reach. Just close your eyes. Oh. My. God. That voice. I just need to close my eyes, listen and nothing else can exist right now. The song gets busy but I can always hold onto that rumbling rolling bass and Sarah’s voice A guide during this moment of silence inside my head where I can just listen.

And I wanted to believe that I’d get caught up, when the rage in me subsides. The drums fade, the synth of the angels builds up and Sarah just unleashes a powerful and gentle pummeling of how much the silence means when all the anger subsides. There is a freedom that comes from standing in the silence and just letting it crash over. In this white wave of serenity, I am free. I have seen you. Inside this white wave and you are silent. You are with me. And the silence has to end to make way for the thumping tempo of clarity given and of journeys beginning from this place of peace.

This is my church. This is my faith. This is where the healing happens. Deep inside the rhythm of thumping track there is a silence I can find and stand inside.

[gatewayradio]

Night or Day LOOK MUM NO COMPUTER - 2024

LOOK MUM NO COMPUTER - Night or Day

Listen to Night or Day on TIDAL

In celebration of the UK’s last place in the Eurovision we gonna look at some other music by LOOK MUM NO COMPUTER, cause in all honesty this guy is fantastic. Be it making the nightmare fuel that is a Furby organ to producing absolute bangers like this track to constructing his own weird and whacky instruments. Cause what else is a bonkers sound engineer to do? Night or Day starts with guitars harking back to the height of Brit pop before a fat filthy synth comes with backing vocals created by himself on a reverb loop. I know I getting too technical here and just splooging over the guy but my god this mans creativity is without borders and I am in awe just to sit in the shade of what he makes. Marvel at the construction of it all and giggle with excitement of a schoolboy putting mentos into a coca-cola bottle for the first time.

The song is a declaration of rapture. I have built all my machines, taken all of my pills and now there is nothing left to do. I need to run away from here, tasting absolutely no fear. Just keep running until there ain’t no night or day. No say, no space, no shame. Just a blending of all the hours so neither night or day exists. The demons that come at nighttime are now creative muses. The lethargy of sunlight and days spent waiting for the night to roll around to get back to the real work. I’ve seen the fractures, call them what you will. There’s nothing to redeem. A journey beyond the accepted walls we put around ourselves just to be drowned in the rapture of the synth gods.

Take me away. Till there ain’t no night or day.

[gatewayradio]

The Great Below Nine Inch Nails - 1999

Nine Inch Nails - The Great Below

Listen to The Great Below on TIDAL

Happy birthday Trent. How do you pick a favourite from such a vast catalogue where brilliance is facing you at every turn? How about the double album I brought on release day, skipped working to stay at home and listen to all day long and only really grew to fall for this track just a year ago? Starting in a deep dark synth hole of claustrophobic where sorrow highlights the oppression. Just surrounded by the depths of every mistake ever made and being told, listen. This is what every regret you ever made sounds like. Is there hope for me? All the spoils of a wasted life. All of this for you. Can it ever mean a thing? Whispers so distant just telling you repeatedly, you made all the wrong choices. She is gone. You are gone. It’s all gone. Forever. There is no coming back from this. The currents are pulling you away from every ambition you ever held. 

And a sudden violent outburst. And I descend from grace. In arms of undertow. I will take my place. In the Great Below. This is my home now. Sucked away and dragged out into a vast expanse of nothing but void. There is nothing here. It is the Great Below. Where nothing can exist and nothing can hurt me anymore. But I can still feel you. Even so far away. You never left entirely. You still live under this skin. And no matter how far the current pulls me into the void. You will always be there. Buried underneath everything I have created and abandoned and destroyed. An echo of a memory of a time when it all meant something. 

Just the sad realisation that all the ghosts are still there. Always there. And can never leave. Despite a descent from grace years ago and too much time spent wallowing in the Great Below. I can still feel it all. Even so far away.

[gatewayradio]

I Alone Live - 1994

Live - I Alone

Listen to I Alone on TIDAL

A huge part of me is convinced that 1994 was the greatest year for music. Both Blur and Oasis debuted here. Nirvana had just given us In Utero and Courtney Love’s desperate plea in the album Live Through This, was haunting. I feel such a desperate stay-with-me-sadness echoing throughout that whole album. And then there is Live - Throwing Copper. Right at the tail end of grunge but still walking their own path completely. I Alone is where we land today to glimpse back at this era. A song that starts so gentle and caring and fills me with a dread that lives on today. 

Promises of companionship and caring in the start of a relationship. I will be there for you, I will care for you, I will offer the world according to where I am standing and you will be grateful to receive it. But then the stadium sized chorus kicks in with cries of I alone love you, I alone tempt you, I alone love you. I am the only one you can turn to for love. There is no one else but me, myself and I. And I am pretty certain that is not the message being portrayed in the world of 1994. But in a way, surely he knows? He knows this is the repetitive sonic battery into submission and isolation. It’s all I can hear myself and I am pretty certain just by saying this, I have ruined this song for someone. 

Oh, now, we took it back too far, only love can save us now. All these riddles that you burn, all come running back to you. We regressed so far in a desperate attempt to cling to a child-like grasp of love that we lost our way entirely. A destructive attempt to experience puppy love one more time and now it is beyond broken. Only love can save us now. But you know what love is? I alone love you. I alone love you. I alone tempt you. I alone love you.

[gatewayradio]

The Test The Chemical Brothers - 2002

The Chemical Brothers - The Test

Listen to The Test on TIDAL

Just longing for a chemically induced revelation to come from somewhere. To stand on top of the engines of my own mind and say look. I understand it. I can feel what it means to be alive and a part of this weird and wonderful shared hallucination where pain and suffering go hand in hand with pleasure and ecstasy. Just pour a heroic dose inside my body. Let me dream of a future that doesn’t exist inside of any known reality. Let the beat of the music take me to a place where I can hear you and you can hear me. You know I almost lost my mind. I couldn’t explain. What I have seen. See waves breaking form to my horizon. I’m shining.

The beat is solid and body moving. This needs movement to exist and I have to move to feel the music. It’s only natural. The beat. From where we all began. Boom boom. Boom boom. A constant beat inside our developing heads as we waited without even knowing. Soon we would see the world and the beat would fade. Alone surrounded by ones who love and intimacy of the beat torn away from us. Are you feeling me? Like I am feeling you? My heart and soul they long to be free. But the doorway is forever out of reach. The acid test. Never taken. Always wanted to. 

Lord, did I pass the acid test? I never stepped into that liberating abyss of complete detachment from the reality I have to see and endure everyday. Will I pass the acid test? Lord. You better go to bed now. Long for the day when your heart and soul are free. Maybe I will almost lose my mind. But I will be home. And I will be free.