### The Atlas Moth: An ache for the distance

#### 09/04/12 || SwornToTheBlack

Some months ago, I was walking home from the beef and liquor store when I tripped over a mouse and went tumbling into the street just in time for a horse-drawn carriage to collide with my spine. The first coma I lapsed into was rather pleasant. I spent most of my time talking with frog people in Victorian-era fashion. Eventually, I had to leave after an incident with some horseflies and an ancient, sacred toenail clipping. The Marquise was very upset.

I woke briefly, still in the street, to the sight and smell of fresh horse droppings.

The next coma was much more uncomfortable. I found myself in a thick fog, wading through the sands of what seemed to be an apparently moist desert, as if I were walking along the bottom of the ocean. As I trudged past coffins and roving bands of horse thieves, the earth gradually became more firm. I came upon calm waters where I was greeted by the brothers Gemini. They told me to seek the Atlas Moth. They said it came from Chicago. That was the only help they offered.

For what felt like perpetual generations I wandered, searching every hole in the desert. Then I understood. I traveled back to the brothers. Once I gathered the courage to speak, I said to them, “I have found the Atlas Moth. It is here! It is this place! It is all of us! It is everything that has come before and much of what is yet to be!” They smiled. I was free.

I never forgot what I experienced in the dark recesses of the mind. I struggled for the longest time whenever I attempted to communicate my adventure to another person. Inevitably I gave up and sought isolation. Then, one fortuitous day, I happened upon a record. Its glossy cover bore no name, though it spoke to me of a place I never forgot. The shopkeeper, a horrible, dismissive, gelatinous man told me the band was called The Atlas Moth. I was forced to sit down and let my eyes come back into focus.

Finally, here was my answer. The twisting melodies, all so loaded with their own silent anguish, momentarily converging in sorrowful unity; the soul-crushed voice, moaning, bellowing, screaming from the depths of human suffering; these were my greatest failures, my greatest fears emanating from this auditory tome of the human condition.

I know now what I sought in the dream and all those months since. I sought understanding. The Atlas Moth have given me that, and they have provided a voice where I could not. But the journey can never end. The voice confirms that understanding is not the desire — only a means. There will always be an ache for the distance.

- Information
- Released: 2011
- Label: Profound Lore Records
- Website: The Atlas Moth Bandcamp
- Band
- Stavros Giannopoulos: guitars, vocals
- David Kush: guitars, vocals
- Andrew Ragin: guitars, synths, vocals
- Alex Klein: bass, vocals
- Anthony Mainiero: drums

- Tracklist
- 01. Coffin varnish
- 02. Perpetual generations
- 03. Holes in the desert
- 04. Gemini
- 05. An ache for the distance
- 06. 25’s and the royal blues
- 07. Courage
- 08. Your Calm Waters
- 09. Horse Thieves