(previously: Mixtape of the Found Decade)
It is an alternate 1981. A young New Wave musician and a corporate security agent have become trapped inside an advanced military simulation.
This story takes place one year after Novas 5.3 and one year before Novas 1.
Novas 5.4: In The Land Of Angels
Act 1: Control
01 Exit Visa – Never On A Good Day (1983, England) SUSAN
Some other time, some other place
Hey don't bother me now
I just wanna feel the wind in my face
So hey don't bother me now
Will she get happy? I bet she will
Will she get sad? I bet she will
Will she get laughs? I bet she will
Will she get bad? I bet she will
Out of my way, you're cramping my style
So hey don't bother me now
I'm going good, and I'm on trial
So hey don't bother me now
Will she get happy? I bet she will
Will she get sad? I bet she will
Will she get laughs? I bet she will
Will she get bad? I bet she will
But never never never never never never never on a good day
No never never never never never never never on a good day
Cause O - L - D, I'm looking for the same
As you
Looking for love
Looking for a reason
Looking for a place
Looking for a name
Some other time, some other place
Hey don't bother me now
I just wanna feel the wind in my face
So hey don't bother me now
Will she get happy? I bet she will
Will she get sad? I bet she will
Will she get laughs? I bet she will
Will she get bad? I bet she will
But never never never never never never never on a good day
No never never never never never never never on a good day
Cause O - L - D, I'm looking for the same
O - L - D, I'm looking in vain
O - L - D, I'm looking for the same
As you
Susan has settled into the Simulation and forgotten her former identity. She’s working on her music career.
A wonderful little song that I’m sure I heard sometime in the early 90s. No trace so far of who Exit Visa were, other than their Discogs entry.
02 Stu Phillips – Knight Rider Main Title (1982, USA) SKYWATCH
Knight Rider
A shadowy flight into the dangerous world
of a man who does not exist
Michael Knight
A young loner on a crusade to champion the cause
of the innocent, the helpless, the powerless
in a world of criminals who operate above the law
Jack has entered the Simulation.
I’ve always thought of Knight Rider as deeply dystopian. Driverless cars, a privatised police force, artificial intelligences infiltrating defense corporations… and much more so in retrospect. Perhaps think of it as being the System’s view of itself. As a variant of the Bond theme, it works as a motif for Jack.
The Knight Rider title plays much the same role musically here as Space Invaders does for Novas 5.3.
03 Zoo – Land Of Broken Dreams (1982, New Zealand) JACK
Have you ever noticed, my oh my
Heaven isn't open to you or I
Unless you got a ticket it's a one-way affair
In the land of angels I'll see you there
This is the land of broken dreams
This is the land of broken dreams
This is the land of broken dreams
Broken dreams
Here come the Indians, one two three
This is no Israel, white Mercedes
Now I always feel like crying but I don't know why
Such a stupid question but such an obvious reply
This is the land of broken dreams
This is the land of broken dreams
This is the land of broken dreams
Broken dreams
I got myself together inside my coat
I got a million dollars worth of hope
And I always feel like crying and I don't know why
Such a stupid question but such an obvious reply
This is the land of broken dreams
This is the land of broken dreams
This is the land of broken dreams
Broken dreams
The Simulation has erased most of Jack’s identity, but he still remembers that something is wrong with reality and that he’s angry.
Zoo, also Pop Mechanix and NZPop, were a Christchurch band! I never knew them back in the 80s but I do remember encountering the album ‘Cowboys and Engines’, with its delightfully cyberpunk cover art, sometime in the early 1990s.
04 Peking Man – Room That Echoes (1985, New Zealand) SUSAN
(echo, echo)
You hear all the words that I tell you
You judge upon the things that I feel
Every movement I make tells a secret
I have promised I will never reveal
It's not that I'm trying to mislead you
It's just that I'm misleading myself
And now that the wall is completed
I'm taking time to build a house
I'm gonna build a room that echoes
Around and around and around with its own sound
Around and around, I won't need to be there
Around and around and around with its own sound
A sound that no-one has to hear
I'm painting my face with numbers
A message that you won't understand
I look at myself in the mirror
I give myself a helping hand
I will listen to the sound that surrounds me
Even though I won't be there at all
So next time you need some stairs to fall down
Give my room of sound a very loud call
I'm gonna build a room that echoes
Around and around and around with its own sound
Around and around, I won't need to be there
Around and around and around with its own sound
A sound that no-one has to hear
A sound
A sound that
A sound that tells
A sound that tells you
A sound that tells you what you've got
A sound that tells you what you're not
A sound that tells you what you need
A sound that tells you
Susan feels a sense of isolation but can’t put a finger on it.
A perennial Kiwi pop classic (and why ‘Land of Broken Dreams’ isn’t I’ll never understand, as both songs are similarly bleak), it’s the music video with its Commodore 64 computer art that always grabbed me. But I’m glad to have found a setting for it here.
05 The Actor – Lights (1982, Netherlands) SYSTEM
Flashlights shine across my room
Seeing all that's going on out there
Feeling rays of burning light
I want to see you
I'm afraid
Afraid that the lights fall out
And it would be night again
It would be night again
Watch out for my neon tubes
They'll be covering the world
So watch the steps that you are taking
I can see you
And you haven't changed a bit since last time
Well maybe I was blind
Maybe I was blind
Or maybe the lights covered my eyes
How are you?
Well I'm not right
(always daylight, never see your face)
Shining houses, blooming streetlights
I dislike the night
So put on the lights
You will be seen
In all your colours, true and honest
Well they flicker in the gleaming light
Shine on as you go
They shine on as you go
As you go
SYSTEM dreams of a more perfect world.
‘The Actor’ was a song from Donovan’s 1981 ‘Love Is Only Feeling’, during the period when he was really big in Germany. That may or may not be relevant as to why a Netherlands band in 1982 might have picked ‘The Actor’ as their name. Or maybe it was just the general New Wave obsession with film, fashion, acting, and simulated reality.
06 Out Of Order – Creatures In The Speakers (1981, UK) SUSAN as JACK
It was dark in the hallway
He was practicing late
Trying to get the runs on his guitar
It was a crazy time to do it
But he was flying to his fate
Dreaming of the day he'd be a star
There was scuffling in the corner
He didn't heed the warning
Something in his playing was deranged
Major chords were ended
An icy chill descending
The air inside the room was feeling strange
Too late, don't sing
It's they who are pulling the string
Creatures in the speakers
They're the ones who decide
Too late, don't play
They're waiting to blow you away
Creatures in the speakers
Taking you for a ride
A crowd is like an ocean
A storm was in the air
Something had been summoned to attack
He couldn't see the faces
Beyond the ring of cold light
Staring at a place behind his back
But then inside a heartbeat
He hit the combination
Slowly stirring in its cage
Well he was halfway though a solo
When he seemed to feel his mind go
There was suddenly no exit from the stage
Too late, don't sing
It's they who are pulling the string
Creatures in the speakers
They're the ones who decide
Too late, don't play
They're waiting to blow you away
Creatures in the speakers
Taking you for a ride
Jack has also been programmed for a music career. Accidentally (or perhaps not), he stumbles on a back door to the Simulation.
Another wonderful song I found, somehow, in the early 1990s. Scared the heck out of me at the time. In the spirit of cyberpunk I have repurposed it for my own uses.
07 Talking Heads – And She Was (1985, USA) JACK as SUSAN
Hey!
And she was lying in the grass
And she could hear the highway breathing
She could see a nearby factory
She's making sure she is not dreaming
See the lights of the neighbour's house
Now she's starting to rise
Take a minute to concentrate
Then she opens up her eyes
The world was moving
She was right there with it
And she was
The world was moving
She was floating above it
And she was
And she was
And she was drifting through the backyard
And she was taking off her dress
She was moving very slowly
Rising up above the earth
Moving into the universe
And she's drifting this way and that
Not touching the ground at all
And she's up above the yard
The world was moving
She was right there with it
And she was
The world was moving
She was floating above it
And she was
And she was
She was glad about it
No doubt about it
She isn't sure about what she's done
No time to think about what to tell him
No time to think about what she's done
And she was
And she was looking at herself
And things were looking like a movie
She had a pleasant elevation
She's moving out in all directions
Oooh, hey hey hey, hey hey
Hey hey hey hey hey hey
The world was moving
She was right there with it
And she was
The world was moving
She was floating above it
And she was
And she was
Joining the world of missing persons
And she was
Missing enough to feel all right
And she was
Susan also finds a back door to the Simulation.
Oh dear, Talking Heads is a bit too mainstream. But I don’t mind, this is still a great song. That tension-release siren pattern in the chords just aligns very nicely with both Bond and Knight Rider themes.
08 G. G. Tonet – Dedicated To Norbert Wiener (1980, Italy) SYSTEM
Now the destiny of Man
Lifts the burden from his hand
For he, for he
Looks to the future and builds an immortal machine
We will do as you ask
And handle all tasks which you somehow learned how to hate
We will do as you wish
And never know why you needed to speculate
We will take it all on
And never know why you needed another you
No more can anything change
can anything age or ever be known as new
Everyone will now be free
Being just the way he wants to be
Happy
Thank you
We will change eternally
Changing everything for dull tranquillity
Eliminate human nature the fee for our tranquillity
We will remember all things
And never know love and never know how to hate
We will remember all things
And never know love and simply impersonate
We shall continue with time
And never know why the reason we came to be
We shall continue our line
And thank you for your gift, eternity
Thank you Norbert Wiener
Thank you for everything
Thank you Norbert Wiener
Thank you for your believing
Thank you Norbert Wiener
Thank you for everything
Thank you Norbert Wiener
Thank you for believing
SYSTEM wants only to make everything perfect for everyone.
I want to say that I knew this one in the 1980s? I think. The cover art for the album ‘Why?’ definitely strikes a chord. The lyrics are my best attempt at transcription; some words are almost certainly wrong.
Another demonstration, if we needed it, that Norbert Wiener’s Cybernetics – and its implications for media as a construct of social control – was a hot idea on everyone’s mind in the New Wave and Italo Disco scenes in 1980, well before Neuromancer. (For another, see Ann Steel, ‘Find Your Way‘, 1979), Cyberpunk, before that name existed, just was part of the zeitgeist that Punk was born in.
End of Act 1