No more than a couple weeks ago, in a post about mythologically-monikered LA-based producer Daedelus, I mentioned my life-long love of myth, fantasy and comic books. As an extension of my appreciation of those three things (coupled with the fact that I grew up in a house full of wanna-be artists) I developed a habit for drawing the heroes of legend, my own fantasy characters, and lots of super heroes. In fact, I spent most of my youth scribbling in note-books, decorating poster-board with sketches of enormous figures and filling in panels outlined on sheets of Bristol board with intricately illustrated scenes.
Some of the biggest influences on my very young mind were sword-and-sorcery fantasy artists Frank Frazetta and Boris Vallejo, who were both popular with members of family. My young mind was enraptured by their sumptuously rendered paintings of scantily clad damsels and heroic protagonists engaged in battle with all manner of fantastic creatures. It was like looking at a mashup of children’s fairy-tales, the mythology I was a student of, afternoon cartoons, comic books and the “adult entertainment” I’d only caught glimpses of at the time. Soon enough though I’d discover Heavy Metal magazine, which was designed to showcase the pulp-influenced fantasy-art aesthetic and combined all of the aforementioned in a very literal sense. And when I did I studied it, and the art of the Frazettas and Vallejos of the world, trying to pick up some tricks I could apply to my own work.
A hand injury during my teens all but erased those years of study and practice, as well as my aspirations of becoming a serious illustrator one day. And while I never forgot the artists I’d admired as a kid I hadn’t seen much of their craftsmanship in the ensuing years. That is, until the day after I made that Daedelus post, when I saw artwork (pictured above) I was positive was the handiwork of Boris Vallejo himself gracing a brand new album cover! I couldn’t hold back my excitement, so I shouted “holy fuck” and began a little digging, quickly learning that the album in question, Exodus, was by DJ, musician, producer and music video director (he directed the memorable clip for Tiga’s cover of Nelly’s “Hot In Herre”) Alex Moulton, and that the sprawlingly fantastic cover art was in fact by Boris Vallejo and Julie Bell, Boris’ wife and longtime model who is herself a painter too. But that didn’t give me any insight as to why a contemporary Electronic Dance Music act tapped Vallejo and Bell for the sort of gatefold-hogging artwork that hasn’t appeared on an album cover since the ’70s.
The answer came soon enough, and it proved pretty simple; Exodus is a concept album, created as a tribute to the epic concept albums of the 1970’s, as well as the generally progressive musical spirit of the era. The inspiration for the concept — a loose, heterogeneous mish-mash of Sci-Fi/Fantasy clichés — is hard to pin down — especially since it’s wholly instrumental, so the story is told musically not lyrically — other than it being a throwback to the fantasy futurism so common during the ’70s. But the sonic touchstones of the album — Prog-Rock, Krautrock, proto-Electronica, Giorgio Moroder, Vangelis, The Loft and Paradise Garage-style Disco, Arthur Russell, spacey Euro-Disco, Synthpop, Electrofunk, House and Techno — are pretty easy to discern after even the most cursory listen. And from the first track, a vintage synth-soaked space-march called “Overture,” it’s clear Moulton and his team of collaborators — including drummer Daniel Correa (Samurindo), bassist Jonathan Maron (Groove Collective), guitarist José Luis Pardo (Los Amigos Invisibles) and keyboardist Roger Joseph Manning, Jr. (Air and Beck) — aren’t going to have any trouble conjuring memories of proggy late-’70s space operas or the Bladerunner soundtrack.
Alex Moulton “Flaming Swords”
Nervously volatile kit-smashing, echoing bass plunks, trickling synths, speeder-bike whines, percussion rolls, sweeping electronic washes and alien church-organs make “Flaming Swords” equally suited for noir space-westerns, Italian horror flicks, Lalo Schifrin-scored copsploitation dramas, or Incredible Bongo Band b-sides. Tunes like the title track, “Meridians,” “Out of Phase,” and “Vicious” recall Moroder’s collaboration with Sparks, the funky French Electro-House of Daft Punk, early Techno and the coldest, danciest, most robotic of ’80s Synthpop. But on “Together Again,” “Pandemonium,” “The Sacrifice” and “Paradise” Moulton and company seem enamoured of the soulful, Afro-Carribean flavored New York House (think: Body & Soul, The Shelter, etc.) that grew out of Larry Levan’s Disco eclecticism, and could easily have fallen off a Louie Vega record with all their tribal percussion, feathery guitars, jazzy chords, slinky synths and pounding drums. And finally, album closer “L’Arc En Ciel,” like many of the album’s short interludes and percussion-free compositions comprised of nothing but space-dusted synths, gives off an air of majesty and beauteous wonderment akin to something off of the Flaming Lips‘ own progressive conceptual opus Yoshimi Battles the Pink Robots.
According to Moulton, he intended for the album to serve as a narrative (he even fleshed out the storyline, which — he alleged in a message board posting — he’ll eventually reveal via this website), but one that would envelope the listener and persuade them to create their own cinematic vision of futuristic adventure and melodrama to accompany the music of his mind. He succeeded in that respect, ’cause if I still had all my old drawing supplies I know I’d be listening to Exodus for inspiration while scrawling Vallejo-influenced rip-offs of Krull and Yor, Hunter from the Future all over the nearest page of paper stock.
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