Everywhere at the End of Time (Main)

“When work began on this series it was difficult to predict how the music would unravel itself. Dementia is an emotive subject for many and always a subject I have treated with maximum respect. Stages have all been artistic reflections of specific symptoms which can be common with the progression and advancement of the different forms of Alzheimer’s. Thanks always for your support of this series of works remembered by The Caretaker.” – The Caretaker (Bandcamp)

Everywhere at the end of time

The album art used to represent the album overall, also used for Stage 6.

Artist

The Caretaker

Released

September 2016 – March 2019

Length

6:30:32

Label

History Always Favours The Winners – HAFTW025

Producer

James Leyland Kirby

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Album Information:

Everywhere at the End of Time (commonly abbreviated as EATEOT and stylized as Everywhere at the end of time) is a series of six albums by The Caretaker, beginning in September of 2016 and ending in March of 2019. Each album corresponds to a stage of dementia — more specifically, Alzheimer’s. The series was made as a conclusion to the Caretaker project, with Leyland Kirby “diagnosing” the Caretaker with dementia to kill it off. The series has 50 tracks overall, costing £5 GBP on Bandcamp.

While there are 7 officially recognized stages of dementia, only 6 stages have representative albums in EATEOT. This is because the first stage in clinical terminology has no symptoms expressed and thus would simply be the original works sampled in the album.

On the same day that Stage 6 of the project was released (March 14, 2019), an album called Everywhere, an empty bliss was released, which contains scrapped and unused songs from EATEOT.

Creation

Following An Empty Bliss Beyond This World, Leyland Kirby looked to further explore the concepts of Alzheimer’s and Dementia. Whereas An Empty Bliss represented a sort of “day in the life” of an Alzheimer’s patient, the next release would have to expand upon the concept.

The concept of exploring the progression of dementia would become the main focus for the Everywhere At The End Of Time project.

Stage 1 (A+B)

Main article: Everywhere at the end of time – Stage 1

Stage 1 of the project was released on September 22nd of 2016. Around this time, Leyland announced that Everywhere At The End Of Time would be the last series of releases under the the Caretaker moniker.

The album opens with the track It’s just a burning memory, which is the first usage of Heartaches in the project. Each side of the first album contains six tracks, totaling 12 songs. The album concludes with My heart will stop in joy, a grandiose brass ballad with a triumphant melody and instrumentation.

With the exception of the fifth track, Slightly bewildered, the music sounds very close to the original samples, with little distortion. The static is also generally quiet and calm.

Stage 2 (C+D)

Main article: Everywhere at the end of time – Stage 2

Stage 2 was released in April of 2017. At large, samples more melancholic or “sadder” in tone are used rather than the brass ballads of Stage 1.

The album begins with the track A losing battle is raging, taking a poorly-preserved record and turning it into a long meandering memory hanging just above a thick brain fog. Surprisingly, tracks in Stage 2 are less altered than Stage 1 due to some tracks utilizing the full song rather than just a loop. However, the samples counteract the fewer effects, creating a more emotional experience than the previous stage. Much like Stage 1, tracks are still relatively calm and recognizable, with some exceptions (e.g. Glimpses of hope in trying times). There are 5 tracks on both the C-side and D-side of the album, coming to a total of 10 songs. The album concludes its runtime with The way ahead feels lonely, an orchestral piece that signifies that The Caretaker is aware of what is to come.

Stage 3 (E+F)

Main article: Everywhere at the end of time – Stage 3

Stage 3 was released in September of 2017 and represents the fourth clinical stage of dementia.

The opening track, Back there Benjamin, is a highly distorted version of Goodnight, My Beautiful. Attentive listeners may notice that it shares the same motif as Libet’s delay from An empty bliss beyond this World. Indeed, most of Stage 3 appears to be an attempt to recall An Empty Bliss, as all the track titles are mashed track titles from Stages 1 and 2, as well as An empty bliss beyond this World. (For example, To the minimal great hidden pulls its name from Pared back to the minimal, track 10 of An empty bliss, and The great hidden sea of the unconscious, track 03.)

Tracks in Stage 3 are dramatically more distorted and choppy than in the previous two tracks, with violent static and scrambled audio not heard at all in the previous two tracks. Despite all this increasing degradation, large portions of melodies are recognizable. There are 8 tracks on both the E-side and F-side of the album, coming to a total of 16 tracks – the most out of any EATEOT album.

The album – and the “lucidity stages” at large – conclude with Mournful cameraderie [sic], the last clear appearance of Heartaches, drowned by drones and mutilated to the edge of recognition.

Stage 4 (G+H+I+J)

Main article: Everywhere at the end of time – Stage 4

Stage 4 was released in April of 2018 as the first of the Post-Awareness albums.

The album starts with Stage 4 Post Awareness Confusions, with song names being more clinical, as if The Caretaker is too lost to properly name anything anymore. The musical flow fades away into chopped up notes and ambient drones, signifying the Caretaker’s decreasing ability to recognize anything. Each side of the record only consists of one track with multiple sections. Side I of the record, Stage 4 Temporary Bliss State, is notable for having a somewhat recognizable melody (Bewildered in other eyes from Stage 3), albeit extremely distorted. The album concludes with Section D of Side J’s Stage 4 Post Awareness Confusions, sometimes called Post Awareness Confusions 3. This section is notable for being extremely calm compared to the whirlwind of sounds that was the last three tracks.

Stage 5 (K+L+M+N)

Main article: Everywhere at the end of time – Stage 5

Stage 5 was released in September of 2018 as the second of the Post-Awareness albums. The album kicks off with the highly scrambled track Stage 5 Advanced plaque entanglements, a far more extreme and distorted experience than any Stage 4 track had to offer.

The tracks are marginally longer than in Stage 4, maintaining the same “one track per side” style and medical titles as Stage 4. The last two sides, Stage 5 Synapse retrogenesis (a reference to the retrogenesis theory of neurodegeneration) and Stage 5 Sudden time regression into isolation, take on a far less chaotic and more ambient tone, although static is still heavily prevalent in the two. The album ends with an isolated drone, which is quiet compared to the rest of the album, carrying on to a lonelier Stage 6.

Stage 6 (O+P+Q+R)

Main article: Everywhere at the end of time – Stage 6

Stage 6 was released in March of 2019. It is the third and final Post-Awareness album, the final album of EATEOT overall, and the last official Caretaker release (if both versions of Everywhere, an empty bliss are ignored).

Stage 6 follows the same side pattern as the last two albums, however the titles take ignore the clinical titles and take a more poetic approach. The album opens with Stage 6 A confusion so thick you forget forgetting, containing long walls of drones and faint tunes. The music here has been reduced to nothing but ambient drones, with even the static eventually disappearing. No melodies are clearly recognizable throughout most of the album, with many songs being very slowed down and faint. The final track, Stage 6 Place in the World fades away, transitions from an ambient drone to a long church organ lasting approximately 9 minutes.

The organ then suddenly cuts away to the sound of a record needle, and a mostly clear tune plays for around 7 minutes, theorized to represent either death or terminal lucidity. It uses the same sample as Friends past reunited from Selected Memories From The Haunted Ballroom and A stairway to the stars. The 20 year-long project concludes with a minute of silence, which represents a period of quiet during funerals in respect for the dead person.