Chama C. Fox - Rebellion

by Chama C. Fox - Jul 4, 2002

Download and listen to Rebellion as OGG (4Mb) or MP3 (9Mb)
Original performance: Apr 21, 2002
This recording: May 26, 2002
Public release: Jul 4, 2002

A word of caution

Warning! This song contains the following bad words: bitch, lust, whips, take, mate, blow, head and lover. It also features the word BEEP. Sensitive people, to whom the word BEEP is disturbing, should go watch a Bi$ney movie instead.

Dramatis Personae

The Narrator	This guy is always there, commenting on everything, but it's kind of funny that none of the other characters seem to hear him.
Roan	The heroine of this story, imprisoned by unfortunate circumstances, but trying to take matters in her own hands. She can be quite a bitch...
Rag	A scrawny wolf fool who tries to cover for Roan's attempts at rabble-rousing.
The Catpain	A sadistic wolf who loves his job as captain of the guards. At some time in the past, he got the nickname "Catpain" for some particular brutal act, and since he liked it, he adopted it as his own.
The Guard	A great admirer of Catpain. He aims to be as nasty as his superior, something that he isn't that good at.
The Prisoners	An absolutely pathetic lot of prisoners whose only skill seems to be to hit the right harmony at the right moment.

Lyrics

Narrator:	As Roan took the stage to convince the other prisoners, little did she know what would await her...
Roan:	Look at you, the sight is pathetic Weary workers without will From cradle to grave, you toil as a slave Is that destiny you fulfill? Let's just do the arithmetic The guards are pitifully few With a brilliant plan, it is certain we can Overman them in one quick coup
Prisoner:	Hah! It's easy for you to come here and bitch It's not your tail that's going to fry
Roan:	Oh, it's sizzling right along with yours But don't you see, it's worth it, It's worth every risk you can take You're forgetting so much... Roaming through the forest, free No more whips or agony Once more master of your fate Hmm... what about your mate? Think of lovers lost out there Life and lust for bitch and mare Yours to take with pleasure if Once again you'll BEEP
Cheer from the prisoners
Roan:	sigh Males... I knew it... Oh well, think about it... Think about it! Stand with me and share my vision (Of light and darkness) There is freedom just behind the door (Want to see more, want to see more) It is time to decide, to stand up and with pride Sound the drums of the final war Time has gone for their derision And it's time for us to vow In life and lust, it is certain, we must Follow in rebellion now!
The prisoners chant "Rebellion, rebellion", unaware of the fact that the guards silently appear...
Catpain:	Stop it!
Roan continues trying to get the prisoners into action
Catpain:	Shut up, bitch!
Narrator:	Shouted the captain of the guard As he landed a heavy blow with the hilt of his sword on the back of Roan's head
Catpain:	And what's that chanting? Did I hear "Rebellion"?
The prisoners make embarrassed sounds, stalling for time
Rag:	Hmm... rebellion... we sell gin... We sell gin!
Narrator:	And then a grey shape stormed forth from the shadows to rescue the day
The prisoners quickly figure out the game, and start singing "We sell gin"
Rag:	We sell gin for most fabulous prices What flavour entices your fancy or whim Have no fear, we sell beer And our ale isn't stale There is more, better learn to swim (Where your tongue will ride) Don't you think! (On the golden tide) Just you drink! (Our wine is best) Lift your cup! (Put it to the test) Bottoms up!
Catpain:	Silence!
Narrator:	Yelled the captain of the guard again
Catpain:	That goes for you as well!
An abrupt whip lash silences the poor musician. The peaceful catpain obviously hates all forms of violins...
Catpain:	And who is that?
Guard:	Nah, it's just that no-good rag we picked up Thought he'd be safe with us... heh... Asked us to take him in
Catpain:	No really... seriously!
Guard:	laugh Yeah, he's been in...dentured ever since Worthless but harmless... just a moron.
Rag:	(invoking special fool powers) A fool, m'lord, but perhaps not such big a fool as yourself...
Rag unfortunately botches, and is silenced by a hard whip lash
Catpain:	Such insolence! I've never... Hmm... very well, you can stay here with your new friends tonight. I've just thought out something very special for you in the morning. Sleep well if you can! Oh, and bring the bitch She's up for some... treatment as well...
The wolves chuckle cruelly as they drag the unconscious Roan away

History

Rebellion (We Sell Gin) is a cinematc sequence [sic], tailor-made for a certain scenario. It was quickly written and pre-recorded between gaming sessions, as to hook into the current story line. It was performed with Roan and Rag done live and the other voices pre-recorded.

The current party had ended up as prisoners in a mine. They were treated very badly, and some feared they might perish. Roan, a botch... er... bitch, attempted a scintillating rabble-rousing speech to convince the other rather lethargic prisoners that they really wanted to get out of there. For a while, it seemed to succeed, but then she was stopped (in a quite abrupt manner) by the guard. Rag, another prisoner (and a fool) attempted to cover for her by convincing the guards that they weren't really planning rebellion, merely selling gin, in an "improvised" musical number that only can happen in cinematc sequences. :) The outcome? Well, better luck next time...

Recording this song was a lot of fun. Since I didn't have to take the task seriously, I had a lot of freedom to experiment and try things that I'd never dare, normally. All voices were done by me (Chama, and my apologies for bad voice acting :), the orchestra by my trusty ol' synth, and special effects... er... whatever was at paw. In this respect, this recording was rather "oldsk00l".

The cavernous ambience was done by recording rummaging a hand through a bag of chips for a long time and then wreaking havoc on the sample with forwards and backwards reverb effects. As I'm writing this, my hand still smells of the d*rned stuff...
The whip was done vocally by making a swishing noise followed by a loud tongue click (African style), and finally applying a bit of distortion to it.
I never thought I'd have any use for the "Record Stop" effect. Well, I was wrong...
Shame on me... I did't have any dice at hand... and I call myself a role player! Oh well, where there's life, there's lus... logic. I unscrewed a few screws from my computer case, and used those together with a digitizing pad to come up with a decent sound.
No Roans were harmed in the making of this song. The "sword" connecting with the back of her head was the Win32 Superbible connecting with a loudspeaker while recording. What didn't make it into the song were the ensuing hectic seconds when I was trying to rescue the microphone and computer from spilled orange juice after the loudspeaker hit the glass...

Finally, encoding Rebellion wasn't as easy as it would seem. Due to the high complexity of the surround effects (such as the cavernous ambience), it did not encode well in less than 256kBit as MP3, yielding a file of the staggering size of 9Mb. Ogg Vorbis handles surround much better, and encoded as OGG, it only took 4Mb. Therefore, I offer both versions for download. The MP3 sounds slightly better but is quite a lot larger.