Track x Track: Gregor - 'Satanic Lullabies' LP

Naarm/Melbourne-based pop eccentric takes us through his deepest and darkest record to date, track by track

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Image credit: Danny Cohen

Isn’t the word ‘alternative’, when applied to the subject of music genres, somewhat redundant or paradoxical now, given that many of the once ‘alternative’ genres, from fuzzed out grungy indie rock through to slickly produced jump up drum and bass, have now all but permeated every major pop record over the last few decades?

Don’t get me wrong - I’m not saying this is a bad thing at all, rather that just what makes music ‘alternative’ has changed over the years. One artist who I’d describe as ‘alternative’ while still working within broader, experimental pop structures is Melbourne’s Gregor, whose just released his fourth and most exploratory record to date, the brilliantly titled Satanic Lullabies (which makes me double check I’ve not typed ‘Verses’ every time).

To describe the sounds of the album, I’ll have to defer to the brilliantly written press material that says it far better than I ever could: ‘Satanic Lullabies is a modern epic, a bedroom odyssey, like if pre MAGA Kanye made a Disney soundtrack.’ So just what does that actually sound like? The first word that springs to mind to describe Satanic Lullabies is space, with Gregor leaving plenty of space for songs to evolve and breathe and featuring some interesting arrangements.

With influences ranging from jazzy lounge pop to ambient electronic compositions and some emotional ballad action, Satanic Lullabies invites us into Gregor’s world. “I’m seeking to draw attention to the similarities between heaven and hell,” says Gregor, “and to comfort anyone who recognises these.”

To help us recognise some of these similarities and be even more comforted, Gregor was kind enough to dive deep into Satanic Lullabies and take us through it, track by track:

Prelude

Hello, introducing the contradictional themes of life. Find the softest animal and still it has something sharp, be it claws or teeth. It needs to defend itself. Nature is violent. The laws of conservation of energy and matter say nothing can be created nor destroyed, merely converted. Thus we hunt and eat each other. Everything is cute and soft and violent and ugly.

Royal Blues

One of the most unnatural colours if you will. Stygian (after the river Styx which Plato described as being “all of a dark blue color, like lapis lazuli, yet as black as ink.”) blue is a chimerical colour that cannot not exist. Feeling the blues, on the other hand, is one of the most natural phenomena.

Angels

Let them come to you, let them let you come to them, to reveal to you the evils under the surface of every skin, pink and green. Let them sing to you visually from between the trees in the forest without being seen. Let them show you what is already there.

The Magic Pony

Bespangled with silver beads, the pony rides through the clouds to remind you that fantasy and reality entertain an exchange in every melody and memory.

Lamplight

Reigning in the soul's fervour within a peaceful setting may be one of the most difficult endeavours. A piano is sometimes a piano, and always a piece of furniture; and fabulous as both. My piano is Polish.

The Sparkle

What more does one need than a single sparkle to lighten the deepest, darkest of moods?

Flaming Clouds

Relying on romanticisations and phantasmagorias is beautiful but unsustainable. When exhausted, they may give way to dullness and spiritual paralysis, and you may spiral into a nervous, defeated crescendo of sorts.

Reality Rings Loud

We forget, we remember, we forget that we remember then we forget that we wake and we dream and we value reality and dream alike. Groove along in this liminal place of comings and goings to and fro reality.

The Fantasy

There is no fallacy in the fantasy if it believes in itself. A piano once again becomes a piano.

Sick Death

We purge our darker thoughts through artistic expression once in a while to be melodramatic and cathartic. Hank said this song reminds him of Bach, which I enjoyed hearing. This may be used as a lullaby to sing to your haters, or as an antidote to passive aggression.

- Gregor, May 2024