The image that started it all. PCMania Magazine, issue 48, October 1996.

Aldeus was born after a titanic effort to finish my previous work: a very long production, full of difficulties and long working hours. I needed to stop and do something completely different.

I had recently discovered the albums by Mountain Realm, which had a great impact on my daily life, and I decided it could be fun and enriching to try to do something similar, but with my own style and identity: dark aesthetics, with musical ideas very spaced out over time and with a reflective, imaginative, and fantastic atmosphere.

One of my dreams as a musician was always to have a creative space with many sound sources at my disposal: a cave full of synthesizers, perfectly wired and ready to create. I say "cave," but it could well be a dungeon, or a spaceship. Over time, that dream became a mental archetype that I had to reproduce in the real world.

That dream started with an image. A photo published in PCMania Magazine (issue 48, October 1996), which a friend lent me. It showed several keyboards with an overlay of a sheet music editor screen. I don't know exactly what happened, but it clicked in my brain. Was it to compensate for some deficiency, as they say happened to Kevin Moore with Space Dye Vest?

At that time, I was a teenager with no resources. I had a Casio keyboard to learn on and a PS1 (IBM) where I listened to MODs through the PC Speaker. Music and computing were two worlds separated by a line I couldn't cross. It was frustrating, but I felt a lot of excitement inside.

Everything changed when I got a PC with a sound card. I started using Scream Tracker and the MIDI sequencer Voyetra Orchestrator Plus. I spent hours and hours on it, studying MIDI files I got from magazine CDs and in the dawn of the internet. I remember that time as golden.

Over time, I was able to acquire some equipment: Korg N5, Roland Fantom X, Roland Juno 106, etc. It's not a "vintage collection," but rather a set of instruments built around my love for the sound of the eighties and nineties. I adore my instruments and have a personal relationship with each one.

Some rack synths I use.

Glow Over Basalt Ruins is a journey through an inhospitable land where all my synthesizers have their moment of prominence. They are strange electronic bards who sing different parts of a heroic poem in harmony. The solo in Through the Shrine with fourth harmonic intervals is the Modal Argon8, the mysterious melody at the beginning of Blood Brook is a mix of JV2080 and TR-Rack, the bass in The Rider in the Distance combines sounds from Korg N5 and Doepfer Dark Energy, etc. I've tried to give each one their moment to shine.

The album was produced in a few sessions over two weeks. From the beginning, I wanted it to have a "journey" structure: all the tracks have continuity and are meant to be listened to in a single session. Is it a concept album? I think we can consider it as such. I'd like to share the story it tells in more detail here soon. Stay tuned to this blog!