The CPU is the plane of the divine to which all are educated to aspire towards and simulate. It is an abstract, mythic plane said to be the source, the “centre,” of all things. To know it requires a journey of transcendence, renunciation, faith and discipline. In return, its promises are manifold and godly: immortality; omnipotency; benevolence; harmony with everything. In the mechalopolis of New Hope City, citizens gather at nodes round the city everyday, performing rituals and baptisms—children are brought in, a surgical incision is made on the napes of their necks and a brain stem interface is transplanted, connecting them to what they are told is greater than them and what they were born to serve. A dystopia by any means. One in which people sever and enter simulated realms to experience simulated enlightenments. One in which robots will come to long for humanity—“I’m scared that I am nothing but equations,” she calculates. One in which to not compute is not an option. One in which those who refuse are exiled and become sub-human cave artists and subjects of scientific research. One in which, when all the augmented reality (of billboards, street signs, dietary plans, streaming services and social media) is turned off becomes bleak and dark.
For our brief character, known by his handle Mohawk_Baboon, this bleak, dark city is his preferred choice. He whistles a tune that none can hear. He passes the bodies that are mute, talking with each other, and smell of new cars. They are hypnotised by the sound of their own voices. They call out, “Is there anybody there?” Hearing only themselves and thinking, oh, good, we’re all here. His footsteps find puddles, his socks soak. Breath fogs. A thought cannot form in his head without becoming transposed by some CPU slogan he’d heard countless times throughout his young life. But for Mohawk_Baboon this is the pinnacle of peace: a dripping, sterile fuzz. He refuses the enlightenments of the CPU. But also, he refuses to feel alive. His pride is to be alone, even among these billions of bodies.
He is venturing down, away from the bodies now, into an alleyway and into a small, plain door. This is the House of People, or so it is known among them who are aware of it. A small club of self-proclaimed radicals. He sits and listens to a conversation:
A: Forget Truth. It is a currency of past civilisations. And likewise forget Reality too. Our future is in an economics of other falsehoods, ones which are undeniable. The currency today is Space. Space to fill is what everyone wants, needs; data, development, construction, expansion. And the CPU promises primarily space. Space for Truth and Space for falsehoods, either is the same purchase of this currency. They promise infinite universe’s for each of us. That’ why They are in power, because They are Space and They offer its emptiness for all to fill. The argument against the CPU needs to end, for such arguments only resist an unstoppable force. We need to enrich ourselves in this world, we need to endeavour to enter it deeper than any others, to find enterprise in its early construction and thus empower ourselves to really shape the future. Our ideas, which we gather to share here, about Art and its significance, needs to not be lost, that should be our decisive cause. Ego is what obstructs us. If we submit ourselves to ideas which seek to possess us then we need devote our lives to empowering them in this world, instead of just telling others they need to listen to us.
B: As musicians we are conjurers of Space. Sound biologically affects our sense of balance, our sense of dimensions. When we play we conjure visuals, we transport people into realms of creation. The beat is the wall, the melody the happenings, the reverb the size. Is this not enough? If we cannot hear the capability of this now then what makes you believe we would be capable of hearing such Spaces in the future? Mustn’t we just resist the shrinking rooms, mustn’t we just shout into the wallpaper and hope the neighbour has their headset off and can hear us. Submission to the CPU is a submission to a box. Music allows us to expand that box into any place we can fathom. If you agree, then don’t we already have the infinite universe at our disposal? Aren’t we already enriched?
A: But what is a song that is never heard? A forgotten memory?
B: A song is never not heard. If no humans may hear you, then some other creature might, some bacteria on your body will tremble with its vibration. Let me pose it like this: all the songs before recordings and all the songs sung which are never recorded, does their inability to be recalled undermine the fact they happened anyways? We have not discovered life beyond this planet, does that mean because an outside listener has not heard us that we are silent?
A: I don’t understand you. Of course our music exists, we have all heard it.
B: But so too does the singer of the unsung song not hear themselves and be comforted?
A: That resonants True but you are nostalgic, remember the fact which I have spoken: truth and falsehood are but two of the same purchases of Space. And it cannot be denied the world we exist in, the degradation of artists as criminal and diseased. Our tools, of Truth and of conjured Space, is not adequate anymore, that is what I am professing. If our tools for constructing the world were good enough then we would be living in a world that was shaped at least in our favour. But we are outcasted and impoverished. We are endangered. Music is fine for you but not for the billions. I am speaking of revolution, from the bit up. Block by block. We need to play upon a new melody which may be heard into the cyber ear. A new fashion. A new. You are out of date now. If you could calculate a model for what would really resonate with people you would be much more efficient.
B: My program dictates a differed definition of efficiency. I am hoping to recalibrate the human soul, not human produce.
A: But no human has any idea what that could even mean. We are beyond souls now. You are trapped in a box, a gridlock of past ideals.
To Mohawk_Baboon these voices are just that: voices. All is heard equally in the noise, the dripping fuzz of his mind. He notices his friend, the one who he loves and the only one he sees and hears. She is sitting on a couch in a cloud of smoke. She stares out dreary eyed. He knows she is not hearing anything either. He sees those dead eyes and whispers in her ear that he loves her. She only feels the heat of his breath on her neck. She turns to him.
“What?”
“Let’s go.”
She takes his hand and they leave, the noise continuing to build behind them.
For our brief character, known by his handle Mohawk_Baboon, this bleak, dark city is his preferred choice. He whistles a tune that none can hear. He passes the bodies that are mute, talking with each other, and smell of new cars. They are hypnotised by the sound of their own voices. They call out, “Is there anybody there?” Hearing only themselves and thinking, oh, good, we’re all here. His footsteps find puddles, his socks soak. Breath fogs. A thought cannot form in his head without becoming transposed by some CPU slogan he’d heard countless times throughout his young life. But for Mohawk_Baboon this is the pinnacle of peace: a dripping, sterile fuzz. He refuses the enlightenments of the CPU. But also, he refuses to feel alive. His pride is to be alone, even among these billions of bodies.
He is venturing down, away from the bodies now, into an alleyway and into a small, plain door. This is the House of People, or so it is known among them who are aware of it. A small club of self-proclaimed radicals. He sits and listens to a conversation:
A: Forget Truth. It is a currency of past civilisations. And likewise forget Reality too. Our future is in an economics of other falsehoods, ones which are undeniable. The currency today is Space. Space to fill is what everyone wants, needs; data, development, construction, expansion. And the CPU promises primarily space. Space for Truth and Space for falsehoods, either is the same purchase of this currency. They promise infinite universe’s for each of us. That’ why They are in power, because They are Space and They offer its emptiness for all to fill. The argument against the CPU needs to end, for such arguments only resist an unstoppable force. We need to enrich ourselves in this world, we need to endeavour to enter it deeper than any others, to find enterprise in its early construction and thus empower ourselves to really shape the future. Our ideas, which we gather to share here, about Art and its significance, needs to not be lost, that should be our decisive cause. Ego is what obstructs us. If we submit ourselves to ideas which seek to possess us then we need devote our lives to empowering them in this world, instead of just telling others they need to listen to us.
B: As musicians we are conjurers of Space. Sound biologically affects our sense of balance, our sense of dimensions. When we play we conjure visuals, we transport people into realms of creation. The beat is the wall, the melody the happenings, the reverb the size. Is this not enough? If we cannot hear the capability of this now then what makes you believe we would be capable of hearing such Spaces in the future? Mustn’t we just resist the shrinking rooms, mustn’t we just shout into the wallpaper and hope the neighbour has their headset off and can hear us. Submission to the CPU is a submission to a box. Music allows us to expand that box into any place we can fathom. If you agree, then don’t we already have the infinite universe at our disposal? Aren’t we already enriched?
A: But what is a song that is never heard? A forgotten memory?
B: A song is never not heard. If no humans may hear you, then some other creature might, some bacteria on your body will tremble with its vibration. Let me pose it like this: all the songs before recordings and all the songs sung which are never recorded, does their inability to be recalled undermine the fact they happened anyways? We have not discovered life beyond this planet, does that mean because an outside listener has not heard us that we are silent?
A: I don’t understand you. Of course our music exists, we have all heard it.
B: But so too does the singer of the unsung song not hear themselves and be comforted?
A: That resonants True but you are nostalgic, remember the fact which I have spoken: truth and falsehood are but two of the same purchases of Space. And it cannot be denied the world we exist in, the degradation of artists as criminal and diseased. Our tools, of Truth and of conjured Space, is not adequate anymore, that is what I am professing. If our tools for constructing the world were good enough then we would be living in a world that was shaped at least in our favour. But we are outcasted and impoverished. We are endangered. Music is fine for you but not for the billions. I am speaking of revolution, from the bit up. Block by block. We need to play upon a new melody which may be heard into the cyber ear. A new fashion. A new. You are out of date now. If you could calculate a model for what would really resonate with people you would be much more efficient.
B: My program dictates a differed definition of efficiency. I am hoping to recalibrate the human soul, not human produce.
A: But no human has any idea what that could even mean. We are beyond souls now. You are trapped in a box, a gridlock of past ideals.
To Mohawk_Baboon these voices are just that: voices. All is heard equally in the noise, the dripping fuzz of his mind. He notices his friend, the one who he loves and the only one he sees and hears. She is sitting on a couch in a cloud of smoke. She stares out dreary eyed. He knows she is not hearing anything either. He sees those dead eyes and whispers in her ear that he loves her. She only feels the heat of his breath on her neck. She turns to him.
“What?”
“Let’s go.”
She takes his hand and they leave, the noise continuing to build behind them.
Lyrics:
In the west shadow grows, all consumers into rows, Sci-fi existence, dancing for the system.
Sooo, you wanna rule the world, ahhhhh, at war with natural law.
Life breaks through, things are gonna get better now, oh we are the C, of the system we choose.
Sooo, you wanna rule the world, ahhhhh, at war with natural law.
Life breaks through, things are gonna get better now, oh we are the C, of the system we choose.
Back in 2021 when ‘C.P.U’ was to be named ‘Cyborc War-party’ we had this drawing made for the single art.
It’s a Cyborc.
Drawing by Madè Kosala.
It’s a Cyborc.
Drawing by Madè Kosala.