The Upside Down Fishbowl of Freedom

Gilly had always approached the human world with a childlike wonder, and what’s more wonderful to a child than the prospect of becoming an astronaut. This is the bittersweet moment where Gilly first places the big glass helmet on his head and moves victoriously toward the launchpad at the edge of Big Harbor city. As the player moves Gilly down the walkway toward the rocket, Gilly slows to a walk. As his companions Bradley Bigshot and Janet Jeanshorts join Gilly on the walkway, helmets under their arms, the game takes over and the trio finish their triumphant walk, waving at the screaming crowds of New Harborians and signing autographs along the way.

Once the player no longer has control of Gilly, the credits begin to roll on top half of the screen, starting with the corporate sponsors who made the game possible; we were hoping to land sponsorships from the big pet store chains and the department of defense, but apparently our use of anthropomorphic fish people really turned off marketing departments and the only correspondence we received at all was a series of fan letters titled cease and desist letter from someone named Darpa. So we thanked them first and foremost on the credits sequence. And that’s the final shot before the credits really start rolling. “Big thanks to Darpa for all your support”, as the engines fire and Gilly is carried off into the sky.

This is a track where I really started working with sequences notes and patterns by hand rather than playing and quantizing them. The working title was “Hyperpop” because the tones are so crisp and clean, and the arpeggios sustain the movement from beginning to end. There’s definitely some influence from 90s Nintendo on this track that’s not as obvious in other places on the album. When I started sequencing the album, the optimism implied by the instrument choices and harmonic arrangement on this track almost insisted it go near the end, at the highest moment in Gilly’s adventure. The synths give it a vaguely space-y feel, as well, so when the decision was made to end Gilly’s journey off-planet, I knew this would be his victory sequence.

Bishop Grisha