Ocean’s Too Wide




I have to admit that I simply love SynthPop acts like Soft Cell, early Depeche Mode (before they went all preposterous and pompous), Human League ("Travelogue" and "Reproduction" are such brilliant albums), Yazoo or early OMD - and so I wrote "Ocean's Too Wide" as a kind of tribute to those heydays of Electronica. This track also contains a very fine pipes-solo by Näx as well as vocals by Ayuma and Frank plus an outtake of a spoken performance by Joolz.

All instruments (except uilleann pipes) and male lead vocals by Sid
Female vocals by Ayuma
Male backing vocals by Frank J. Hennig
Uilleann pipes by Näx
Music and lyrics by Sid

"Ocean's Too Wide" by Antichrisis is licensed under a
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The Fire Went Out




“The Fire Went Out” was originally written for Antichrisis’ lost album “The Legacy Remains”, but the original version sounded slightly different from the light pop ballad that this song has turned into now.

In the beginning, “The Fire Went Out” sounded like a big American road movie soundtrack: very epic, definitely massive and — not to put too fine a point on it — rather pompous. Jens, our producer in the days of the “The Legacy Remains” sessions, never liked the song as he considered it to be a bit on the cheesy side, but I always had a soft spot for these kind of sentimental love ballads dealing with broken hearts and all that stuff, hence I was rather glad when Ayuma asked me a few years later if she could give that song a try as she liked “The Fire Went Out” very much, too.

To cut a long story short: these vocals that Ayuma came up with sounded so gentle and smooth that the old arrangement somehow didn’t fit any longer — and so I worked out a completely new arrangement sounding much more suitable for a song that deals with getting abandoned and trying to find out if a love that fell to bits so easily maybe could have been an illusion right from the start.

All instruments by Sid
All vocals by Ayuma
Music and lyrics by Sid

"The Fire Went Out" by Antichrisis is licensed under a
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Understanding Everything




As previously mentioned Antichrisis always had a predisposition for dance music (Who said “EDM”?), and after a wonderful refreshing walk with Ayuma in the autumn rain this song floated around my head.

When listening to the rain, the wind and the trees, there suddenly comes a moment of understanding everything: what’s important and what’s not, how everything is linked together and what life is really about — and we tried to capture that irretrievable moment of awareness and consciousness in this song.

All instruments by Sid
All vocals by Ayuma
Music and lyrics by Sid

"Understanding Everything" by Antichrisis is licensed under a
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There Were Crows (Snowflakes Mix)




This song was originally written and composed for
At Sea Compilations’ “Snowflakes I” sampler in 2012, dealing with the subject that human kind seems to be the only species being mindless and ignorant enough to destroy its own natural environment.

By happenstance “There Were Crows” caught A. Forster’s attention, hence she asked us if we’d be interested in writing and performing the score to her forthcoming shortfilm “Baduhenna” — and this lead to an entire new Antichrisis album.

All instruments and male vocals by Sid
Female vocals by Ayuma
Music and lyrics by Sid

"There Were Crows" by Antichrisis is licensed under a
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Night Train




“Night Train” is a song that really went through different stages: originally it started out as a sombre piece of Gothic Rock (this primordial demo version with Katja Bartsch on vocals can still be listened to at
MySpace) which for some reasons never made it to its final version.

When I asked Ayuma if she would be interested in getting “Stone Rain” properly done, she started working on that track immediately but wasn’t too satisfied with the results — that song’s tenebrous atmosphere just didn’t fit with her dynamic vocal performance.

So we thought about doing a more lively version and on the spur of the moment the songs tempo changed from 97 to 125 beats per minute, so “Stone Rain” obviously didn’t work any longer as some kind of histrionic Gothic Metal track; instead it turned into a dashing pop song with a vintage Stax/Motown-feeling.

Now that “Stone Rain” started to sound just right to Ayuma and me, we were facing another problem: the sad and lovelorn lyrics of that song did no longer correspond to a now very powerful and uplifting track which meant that I had to rewrite those lyrics, too.

By that time it happened that I revisited the town where I lived during my teenage years: I always felt like an outcast there, and all through those teenage years I wanted to break away from that small town with its small minds and social restrictions — and all of a sudden I knew what kind of lyrics I would have to write for the new version of “Stone Rain” which from then on changed its title to “Night Train”: the story of my juvenile experience of running away to find a better life somewhere else.

So it finally seemed that everything was sorted out — until I started working on the brass parts. I have to confess that yours truly is not exactly a virtuoso when it comes to playing or arranging brass. And although I had some great ideas for hook lines for trumpets, horns and saxophones, they stubbornly kept sounding like James Last but definitely not like Memphis Horns as they were supposed to!

But fortunately there’s Tilo Rockstroh, former keyboarder with Antichrisis during the “A Legacy of Love”- and “Perfume”-era: he’s really an expert if it comes to brass arrangements, and when I asked him if he would be so kind as to contribute a proper brass arrangement to “Night Train”, he came up not only with a complete and wonderful sounding brass section but also with a terrific soul organ and a brilliant piano part. For this reason “Night Train” is in some ways a partial Antichrisis-reunion, as this is the first new track that Tilo is again involved in, and he really did a great job!

In a nutshell: that is the story of a complete metamorphosis from a gloomy piece of Gothic Rock to a rowdy bit of Soul Music — and I hope you’re going to like it, as it is a really something else for Antichrisis.

All instruments by Sid except
brass, saxophone, piano and organ by Tilo Rockstroh
All vocals by Ayuma
Music and lyrics by Sid

"Night Train" by Antichrisis is licensed under a
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Walking With Angels




“Walking With Angels” is a song about my wife Ayuma: her way of going through life never fails to impress me. Her strength, her warmheartedness, her creativity, her straightforwardness, her passion and her sensitivity are simply impeccable, therefore she will always be special to me — and in her own capricornous ways she has taught me a lot about the things in life that really matter.

The lyrics of “Walking With Angels” reflect the way that I see her: the little child she once was, the spirited woman she has become and also the potential of what might lie ahead of her — and furthermore I also tried to portrait her characteristic traits by writing a melody that is bright as well as intense but at the same time even slightly atrabilious.

All instruments by Sid
All vocals by Ayuma
Music and lyrics by Sid

"Walking With Angels" by Antichrisis is licensed under a
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Creatures of a Jade Lagoon




When growing older one hopefully gains experience — but with experience often comes suspiciousness: I’ve had my share of falling in and out of love, and broken relationships always left me soured and somehow shattered.

So when Ayuma and me met the first time I wondered if falling in love again would be the right thing to do, because for the very first time in my life I had reached the point of complete satisfaction with being on my own: loving someone else can turn into a cumbersome experience, and yours truly simply had enough of being enlisted in the Registered Society of the Broken Hearted.

But the more Ayuma and me got to know each other, the more I realized that Ayuma was well worth for to dare it one more time — and that what “Creatures of a Jade Lagoon” is all about: the wobbliness of realizing that you’ve started to fall in love again despite all doubts and qualms; the uncertainty of being afraid that it might just as well go wrong again but nevertheless longing for the other person and also hoping that unconditional love would not be just an illusion but might turn into something like the magical Jade Lagoon that those two creatures in this song finally found.

And as for Ayuma and me, we definitely have found our Jade Lagoon: “and we danced”.

All instruments and male vocals by Sid
Female vocals by Ayuma
Music and lyrics by Sid

"Creatures of a Jade Lagoon" by Antichrisis is licensed under a
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New Dawn Fades




Joy Division’s “Unknown Pleasures” is still one of my favourite albums of all times: from the opening drum beats of “Disorder” to the plaintive chords of “I Remember Nothing” this album is as close to perfection as an album can ever be -- and “New Dawn Fades” somehow seems to summarise everything that “Unknown Pleasures is all about: there’s desolation and vexation, a culminating outbreak of agony and anger… and all of a sudden there’s silence!

Joy Division made this kind of silence and emptiness that lies behind pain audible in the most fascinating and touching ways -- therefore we recorded “New Dawn Fades” as our tribute to this outstanding and unique band.

All instruments and Vocals by Sid
Music and lyrics by Joy Division



Adrenalin




“Adrenalin” is -- measured by Antichrisis-standards -- a quick and dirty track: I got the idea to that song when I was fiddling around on my electric guitar one evening, the riff that turned up sounded pretty good to me, and within half an hour the song was written (not the lyrics, though - they usually do take much longer as I’m not exactly a much of a poet).

Ayuma came up with her vocals almost as fast: I gave her a rough mix, asked her to go along and improvise, and after the third take everything was in the can. She also came up with a vocal line that I didn’t expect, as I originally thought a playing a solo guitar in the middle part of the song - but Ayuma’s line was so great and catchy that this guitar solo suddenly seemed somehow dispensable to me.

All instruments and male vocals by Sid
Female vocals by Ayuma
Music and lyrics by Sid

"Adrenalin" by Antichrisis is licensed under a
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The Point of No Return




“The Point Of No Return” is what one might call a mini-opera in Electronica: lots of different scenes and stages reflecting lyrics that deal with the end of a relationship (Yes, I know: not exactly a brand new topic for Antichrisis - but this song was kept in the vault for some years because it was actually waiting for Ayuma to perform it just the way it needed to be performed).

The funny thing is that this track is 9:13 minutes long - but each time I played it to one of my friends, no-one seemed to notice the time passing. Maybe it is because there’s so much happening in this track: though it is that long, it’s nevertheless never boring - and somehow perfectly suited for dancing.

All instruments and male vocals by Sid
Female vocals by Ayuma
Baritone vocals by Frank J. Hennig
Uilleann pipes by Näx
Music and lyrics by Sid

"The Point of No Return" by Antichrisis is licensed under a
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Here Comes The Night




This is the first track featuring my wife Ayuma as Antichrisis' new female vocalist. As it was her first performance for Antichrisis she was a bit nervous if everything would work out fine, but I think she has done an awesome and impressing job.

The song itself deals - just like "Crossing The Line" with some kind of apocalyptic vision of the last days of the earth, but there is one thing that is even stronger than death, that simply cannot be conquered by the forces of evil - and that is love: "You will meet me on the other side!"

The idea to that song came to me while I was exploring new sounds with Spectrasonics' brilliant new Omnisphere-plugin: Suddenly there was this strange buzzing sound being heard in the song's intro that started to built the foundation of "Here Comes The Night" - a happy little accident as Bob Ross would have said.

All instruments and male vocals by Sid
Female vocals by Ayuma
Music and lyrics by Sid

"Here Comes The Night" by Antichrisis is licensed under a
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Ride On




When I came to Nuremberg the very first time in 2003 I spent many evenings at the Irish Cottage in Fürth, were Paul Dempsey introduced me to this wonderful moody ballad by Jimmy MacCarthy that I hadn’t heard before. Soon this song became a favourite of mine and I often played it live with Paul and his friends — but in order to make that song work for Antichrisis I had to give it a certain treatment.

So I scraped off all that acoustic guitar-flavour that “Ride On” usually comes in and used quite a lot of sounds from Spectrasonics’ Omnisphere, Trilian and Stylus RMS as well as Camel Audio’s Alchemy instead. That new electronic arrangement along with Ayuma’s outstanding vocal performance gives Antichrisis’ version of “Ride On” a very intense, dreamlike and stirring quality that one wouldn’t necessarily expect from plain vanilla three chord Irish Folk ballad (no offense meant because many of Rock History’s greatest songs consist of just three of four chords).

Word & Music by Jimmy MacCarthy
Arranged and produced by Sid
All Instruments and male vocals by Sid
Female vocals by Ayuma



Ride On (Bob Moog Tribute Mix)




Though I like the ballad feel of "Ride On" very much, I nevertheless thought that it could be a nice idea to give that moody track some kind of "four to the floor"-touch without losing the song's emotional quality -- and I think it worked pretty well: Irish Folk meets New Romanticism Synthpop!

Word & Music by Jimmy MacCarthy
Arranged and produced by Sid
All Instruments and male vocals by Sid
Female vocals by Ayuma



Wasted Time




"Wasted Time" is a song specially produced for
Spectrasonics’ 2011 OMG-1 contest: I’m a big fan of Omnisphere, Trilian and Stylus RMX, and when they announced that contest I thought it could be some kind of challenge for me to create a song using primarily sounds of Omnisphere’s Bob Moog Tribute Library.

It all went quite fine so far: the song was written, its instrumental tracks were recorded as well as Frank’s vocals and mine, and still we had 4 weeks time until submission date for Ayuma’s vocal performance — when suddenly Ayuma caught a really bad cold and could not even think of singing.

With Spectrasonics’ closing date approximating and Ayuma’s cold not getting better we almost thought that we’d be running out of time so that we would not be able to enter the contest — but then Ayuma finally recovered just 3 days before deadline and so we got everything worked out and ready just a few hours before the official contest closing.

As I’ve mentioned before in this blog I really love some of the great Synth Pop bands of the Eighties: Human League, Soft Cell, Yazoo, OMD and Tubeway Army (just to name a few), and the sounds of the Bob Moog Tribute Library instantly brought back memories of these days, so “Wasted Time” — a song about falling out of love because the two protagonists didn’t take enough care for their love but took it for granted instead — sounds a lot like the legacy of the golden age of British Synth Pop, although I really can’t recall a song from these days featuring an opera singer (and also many thanks to Frank J. Hennig for his wonderful contribution).

All instruments and male vocals by Sid
Female vocals by Ayuma
Baritone vocals by Frank J. Hennig
Music and lyrics by Sid

"Wasted Time" by Antichrisis is licensed under a
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Crossing The Line




A very sinister song about some kind of Armageddon: Finally the fates decide that this planet is having it up to here with mankind and that creation could be bloody well better off without human race, hence they're calling the Angels of Doom to straighten things up. The middle-part of this track might have become a bit sanguinarily and violent, but then that's Angels of Doom for you (Maybe it's all because I've just recently re-read the highly recommendable novel "Good Omens" by Terry Pratchett and Neil Gaiman).

The funny thing about that song is that it originally started as a very heavy piece of Doom Metal much in the vein of early Sabbath, but then I layed my hands on the keyboards and couldn't stop until it transmuted bit by bit and much to my own surprise into a Tibetean Dancefloor track.

All instruments and vocals by Sid
Female vocals by Ayuma
Music and lyrics by Sid

"Crossing The Line" by Antichrisis is licensed under a
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Shine




I wrote this song for my wife Ayuma (you may check out her own stuff at
her website): We've met on New Year's night in 2005/2006, and from the very first time that I saw her I was simply attracted to her shining and beautiful energy - as if all of a sudden a warm summer breeze would have touched me on that cold and chilly winter night.

Since then my life has changed in many ways: Ayuma and me learned from each other, and she made me see the world and myself in a different light. We then got married in 2008, and it feels like our love is growing with every day (and also every argument, as we're both capricorn).

Seems like both of us have found what we were always looking for, and so "Shine" is my way of saying "Thank you" to Ayuma for the time and the love that we're sharing, and I do hope that this song somehow manages to capture all her beauty, her warmth, her energy, her empathy, her spirit and her soul.

All instruments and vocals by Sid
Music and lyrics by Sid

"Shine" by Antichrisis is licensed under a
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Lament for Kira




Sadly our cat Kira died on 19 April 2011. We got her from an animal shelter last autumn, and as soon as she came home to our place it felt like she had been with us all of our life.

We’ve never met a cat before that was so trusting and gentle: she really had a lust for life and enjoyed every single moment of the day. As Ayuma put it, “When she walked into the room it was always as if she brought a little bit of sun with her”, and of course it’s needless to say that it rather felt like she had adopted us than the other way round, and so this little cat completely enchanted us with her soulfulness, kindness and blind confidence in us.

Unfortunately we couldn’t be with her when she got run over by a car that tuesday— so her shining light went our much too soon and Ayuma and me are sadly missing her. Without her, the world has lost one wonderful little creature that had filled the hearts of everybody who met her with gladness and joy, and we do hope that this gentle and friendly soul will find a place in the otherworld where she gets all the love and kindness that she deserves.

The old apple tree in our garden is in full bloom now — but its blossoms will never feel as fair and beautiful again as when Kira climbed over its branches. We miss you so much, little one — but we are honoured and grateful that you shared your life in this world with us, and you will always keep your place in our hearts.

All instruments by Sid
Music by Sid

"Lament for Kira" by Antichrisis is licensed under a
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Starfish




This is a short instrumental that I've written long time ago as a score for an imaginary movie. Somehow this slightly melancholy tune stuck with me for several years, my wife loves it and so I thought I should record it to see what might happen.

All instruments by Sid
Music by Sid

"Starfish" by Antichrisis is licensed under a
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But Does Anyone Care? (Bahrain Uprise)




It’s hard to keep tracks with international events these days: the devastating earthquake in Japan followed by a terrible tsunami and the explosions at Fukushima Nuclear Power Plant, Libyan rebels fighting against Muammar “Mad as a March hare” Gaddafi, the uprisings in Syria and Ivory Coast - and also the protests in Bahrein, where demonstrators are suffering from ruthless attacks by mercenaries of the Gulf Cooperation Council.

To honour the Bahraini victims I’ve created this short piece of music; the voices on this track are taken from interviews of Bahraini citizens who are hopefully still alive.

All instruments by Sid
Music by Sid

"But Does Anyone Care?" by Antichrisis is licensed under a
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All tracks written (except "Ride On", written by Jimmy McCarthy), performed and produced by Sid