Liner Notes for "He must have contemplated his death during those long drives on the bypass at night"

The bulk of the modern human race spend the entirety of their lives attempting to ignore the fact that they will die. An event that was solemnly and sacredly prepared for in cultures that preceded us has been relegated to nightmares and sudden spasms of unwelcome thought. At his emotional and spiritual peril, man consigns death (and the many things that he fears and doesn't understand) to the vast unconscious realm where he believes his secrets are kept safe.

I had a neighbor who was stricken with an unnamed illness and who hadn't long to live. He lived in Columbus, Ohio previously and confided to me that he knew that he was seriously ill before he was diagnosed. He discussed long drives on 275 at night, endless hours of driving the loop around Columbus. Thus, I conceived the title; but I hadn't yet received the tools and illumination necessary to write the music. I struggled unsuccessfully to produce the album.

As so often occurs, two years go by and the music hasn't been written. I had just buried my grandfather in the cemetery near my home and I'm lost in the forest, sick with grief and sorrow. During this aimless exodus away from my family and the funeral procession, the consideration of the meaning of death was central in my thoughts. From this painful contemplation in the holy wilderness, a different album was conceived: “He disappeared into the forest, yet he remained with us” a work that concerns the impossibility of ending and the everlasting nature of existence. It also became apparent that I had to write about death for a person who had an entirely different outlook on the subject if I was to successfully create this album. I had to write about death's fearsome properties and hopelessness for the majority of human beings who intentionally ignore it to illuminate it's dark corners so that the things that stay hidden are called forth into the light and are shown to be sort of bruised, sorrowful things but not as frightening as we thought. So, I was able to begin in earnest on this album: Automobiles for our accidental protagonist are rhythmic and propulsive, night is haunting and harrowing, the bypass is an abstract spiritual plane, death is a ghastly, unknown thing that stalks our protagonist in the hidden places inside himself. So here it is: the fruits of my flawed empathy, the sum of my mistakes, the cause of many sleepless nights...