“The Sleeping Giant”
My piece is called “The Sleeping Giant” and it was inspired a lot by the show Adventure Time and the Studio Ghibli Movie Nausicaä of the Valley of the Wind; Both of which are brightly colored animated pieces that are set in post post-apocalyptic worlds.
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After rediscovering Darlingside‘s “Singularity”, I began to wonder about the many meanings of the term. Our class defined singularity as the “transition to post humanity”, but what lies ahead after humanity can be very different futures. A technological singularity describes a point when technology, particularly artificial intelligence, becomes so advanced that humans are unable to control it. At this point, AI may take over society, thus, ending the era of human dominance. However, the end of human kind depends on the benevolence of the AI; we may fall under the care of these machines– such as in Ilya Varshavsky’s Perpetual Motion (1965)– or we may perish if they mean us harm.
In J.G. Ballard’s The Cage of Sand (1962), the three central characters—Bridgman, Travis, and Louise—are trapped in a post-apocalyptic beach town of Cape Canaveral while they are being hunted by the seemingly nefarious “wardens”. However, as the story unfolds, the readers realize that the dystopia does not encompass the rest of the world, but rather is localized to Cape Canaveral. Furthermore, the wardens are not a legitimate threat; they only want to quarantine the characters temporarily to prevent dangerous viruses found in the beach sand from spreading. Thus, the characters’ fear of the wardens is deluded and their entrapment at the beach is self-imposed. Instead of exploring apocalypse on a global scale, Ballard examines the idea of a personal apocalypse, which is when a crisis in an individual’s life mentally entraps them in the past.
In response to the songs about Utopias we heard in class today, I decided to post three songs from two of my favorite artists that focuses on post-apocalyptic imagery. However, rather than singing about the horror and devastation that arises from the end of the world, the artists romanticizes the idea of a cataclysm. This also reminds me of how the protagonist in “Take Your Choice” by Sakyo Komatsu chooses the apocalyptic future rather than the harmonious one because at least that choice promises certainty. Thus, it makes me think of how in a world of anxiety and uncertainty, the idea of apocalypse becomes appealing because it promises certainty and perhaps even a fresh start for humanity. One of the artists, Darlingside, describes a similar sentiment:
“One of the questions that came up as a consistent theme on the album was that of agency, or how much one can do in the face of seemingly insurmountable odds. That a song of ours might inspire someone to feel less powerless is lovely to hear…we do enjoy juxtaposing dark and light imagery. There’s something heartbreaking about finding bits of beauty in difficult places.” (from interview with Darlingside; see here: https://coloradosound.org/soundcheck/darlingside-qanda/)
The three songs with their lyrics are listed below. The first one is Wasteland, Baby by Hozier. The second and third ones are Singularity and Eschaton by Darlingside.