Revisiting Conflagration Part II Dreadnaught

While I was writing and recording the lyrics of the album, I was working for a Korean company teaching English to students over the phone. I remember writing lyrics for the songs during my lunch breaks and going to the old Tower of Doom in Brgy. Pinyahan after work. A handful of the songs were written in the Jolibee on the corner of Kamias and EDSA. I think it still stands now.

The title of the song and the initial lyrics were heavily inspired by Dungeons and Dragons. Many members of the band were then (and still are) occasional Dungeons and Dragons players. The title of the song comes from an epic-level prestige class for dwarves called the Legendary Dreadnought whose abilities included the ability to become immovable once per day (plus one time every five levels), thus the “I will not be moved,” lyric.

On one level, the song is about the absurdity of sticking to your guns even when it’s no longer right to do so. There are things that you will face in life that will make you rethink your principles and values. There are also things that you cannot stop. It’s much smarter to run for cover and take shelter instead of trying to singlehandedly hold back a storm just by the force of your will.  That lyric was also a reference to those psychics who claimed that they could break clouds with the power of their minds. I was going through a very existentialist period in my life back then and a part of this included discarding a lot of the mysticism and paranormal beliefs that I had grown up with. During this time, I was thinking that if some people really did have psychokinetic powers like the supposed cloud breakers did, why did they never do anything for the common good, like say stop a storm from forming.

Also, there are things that one cannot stop no matter how firmly you stand. This song was roundabout way of saying that it’s ridiculous and futile to try to prevent physical attraction/love/lust/whatever from happening.

On Culling, I would make a call back to this song on “I am the Storm.”

During this time, we weren’t putting any solos on a lot of our songs and this (along with Collapse) is one of the few songs that actually has one.  Joel was always a really good lead player and he had a lot of very unorthodox ideas. We always figured that solos weren’t usually necessary in songs because Joel was playing lead lines all over the place anyway.

Joel also didn’t really like to play solos that didn’t really serve the song. For this song especially, it sounds more like a musical interlude that actually brings the song’s energy to a relaxing lull before it builds up really well towards the build up at the end. I’m not a guitarist and I’ve never tried to play figure out that particular interlude but I’ve heard from other guitarists that the solo is low-key difficult to figure out and play. I think that solo was Joel’s guitar playing in a nutshell.

This was also one of the songs that we played on a regular basis. I think we were playing this song even after Dylan had already joined the band. If I were to pick out songs that would define who we were as a band this would be in the top five, perhaps top three even.

About manongyagi

Diplomat, former English Instructor, frustrated writer (because no time), weekend metalhead, unapologetic music nerd, wannabee power lifter, and all-around geek. Loves coffee, the New York Knicks, and Kesha. Hates frogs and the Duke Blue Devils. Makes killer cheeseburgers. Using this partially as a repository for articles I've written in the past for websites that mostly don't exist anymore and possibly as a home for future writing. View all posts by manongyagi

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