Lapse, conceptually or actually, is about just that - reLapse. To aesthetically achieve this overarching sense of repetition, it was important that I return some of the sound to the album Meditations. This way, the work is stylistically cyclical while also evolving and breaking away from Nulla and Sanctum enough to show the technical and artistic progressions I have concentrated on. Specifically, I was very much interested in recapturing the essence of Meditations “I” which is focused on a higher tonal range than the majority of my sound work as well as this consistent repetition, but abstracted pulse. Different from Meditations “I”, however, is how the higher tonal range is often paired with the bass and mid-range drone I have become comfortable within. This sort of duality within Lapse is becoming more and more important to the sonic palette of Felnyrii and how I think about the conceptual side of the work. Spreading the performance of each piece between a few distinct ranges allows me to imagine them as separate voices. The different voices are often struggling between harmony and dissonance. I believe this train of thought began with Sanctum’s overwhelming bass that suffocated anything that attempted to push through. Utilizing these voices, I had previously used the entire collection to address singular moments, though Lapse progresses beyond this to be an archive of a larger span of time.

The album as a whole is my strongest work because of its unified, yet abstracted, narrative from piece to piece. Which, I typically have a moment or action in my mind when producing work, Lapse is more specific, however, and I believe that gives it a sense of movement over the entire collection that translates to the listener more concretely. Since I began thinking of Lapse as a project, I had also been falling to my depression fairly severely. After a series of major familial related tragedies that made it difficult to function academically, let alone internally, I was stomaching my own pain in order to keep myself from further burdening those around me. This complicated itself over the year, though by performing the pieces found in Lapse I was capable of reach out and returning to psychiatric aids. However, over this time I found myself thinking back to previous suicide attempts and tactics, particularly the moments within my first year at Southern Illinois University. The thoughts that stem from my core depression always seem reestablish themselves around transitionary episodes in my life or moments of perceived accomplishment, like completing a degree for instance.

The other component of my recent struggle that is embodied in Lapse is a period of relative uncertainty as I searched for an alternate medication for this issue I have lived with since grade school. Sertraline and Citalopram had run their course in the past and my chemistry had become tolerant to those medications. Though never, to my knowledge, has a medication affected me as adversely as Bupropion did this year. Portions of this collection attempt to illustrate some of the experiences brought on with this medication. Horrid moments of slipping lucidity and control that seem to reveal more of what is within myself.