FORMERLY KNOWN AS "THE DEVIANT'S ART"
CURRENTLY KNOWN AS "THE MEDIAN'S ARK"
(Or, more pompously, "Music for the Advancement of Hyperpop")

FOR THE TRUE 'DEVIANT' CARVES HER OWN NEW MEDIAN
WE MUST NOT EXIST MERELY IN OPPOSITION
OUR TRUE HOPE IS UNIQUE FULFILLMENT, WHATEVER IT MAY CONTAIN
THIS IS WHAT THE INHUMANE-MADE HORRORS BEYOND OUR COMPREHENSION CAN’T RECREATE

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Meet the MEDIAN'S MANIFESTO ::

==Side 1;; on "THE SOUND";
Ms. Median is in Deep Disagreement with the widespread Insistence that 'HYPERPOP' is "DEAD, BURIED, POORLY AGED, LONG GONE".

This belief seems to largely stem from many of the biggest figureheads in the scene having pivoted away from it in favor of a more streamlined 'INDIE ROCK' sound, or returning to a 'NORMAL POP' sound, among other things. While there's certainly nothing wrong with such artistic progression, Ms. Median believes it is incredibly counterproductive when listeners (or even the artists themselves!) use this as an excuse to tear down everything that came before, throwing it under the bus like a meaningless fad. The 'HYPERPOP' was not—and is still not—an innately Lesser Art than what followed. It is not merely "internet music" (which really doesn't deserve a negative stigma in the first place); it is Life Music. This kind of Maturation does not Necessitate a complete abandonment of 'HYPERPOP' & anything resembling it; that is simply the path some artists independently chose to take. Within her Ark, Ms. Median presents an alternative approach that Embraces rather than Rejects.

Society has not progressed past the need for HYPERPOP's cultural placement; in fact, we are in more dire need of it now than ever before. I refuse to let go of the most unabashedly queer music in recent memory during a period in which we are being legislated out of existence exponentially more aggressively with each passing year. Do not let some random fuckboy with a microphone on TikTok convince you that all of our music has already been overtaken by The Cishets and that we should just give up & go home. Are we really that spineless? Do not let a natural passing of the initial trend convince you that the entire concept of this genre couldn't possibly have anything left to explore & iterate on. Are we really that shallow?

If a truly worthy substitute for HYPERPOP comes along some day, then so be it. But as things stand currently, there is no other sound palette I find truly matches the urgency at hand right now, and as such, The Median's Ark aims to dig even deeper into this one (as well as its associates) to bring about the vibrancy it was once known for. There's still more fun & fury to be had here. And while it's obviously not Literally Enacting The Revolution, anything that helps us stay sane in the process & gives us a more prominent artistic voice is surely some kind of positive. If I'm not yet in a position to attend protests or anything similar, then I must express these ideals through the medium I do know best, that being The Art.

>>>

==Side 2;; on "THE REPLACEMENT";
This side concerns the phenomenon colloquially known as "AI", which Ms. Median will not be gracing with that term at any point beyond this sentence, because actual artificial Intelligence does not exist, and the only people trying to convince us that it does (or soon will) are those who would benefit from our belief in it. What I am actually talking about here is Text-Prompted Generative Models, most notably as they relate to IMAGE & AUDIO formats.

The actual regulation of this technology (which I fully agree it so desperately needs) is a whole can of worms I don't feel there's any use in me opening here; instead, I want to focus on how we as creatives should respond to & cope with the looming threat it represents in the eyes of many.

Let's think back to just a couple years ago, when these models only really excelled at some truly surreal & uncanny blobs of vague familiarity, which I honestly believe could never be precisely replicated even by a living artist. They carried a certain Aura, like a window into a space between dimensions that no one was ever meant to see. Until, of course, these "errors" were completely ironed out, leaving us with nothing but the bleakest implications plainly on display. It has become unavoidably clear since then that the real underlying goal of these services was never to just be a "tool", and certainly not to bolster the creation of legitimately unique art; it is a means of mass-producing the most profitable Sludge possible with utmost efficiency, built off the backs of countless uncompensated creators. Thus, it is my hope that artists come away from this history with a desire to Become IRREPLACEABLE, just as the technology itself once was in its initial janky glory.

Do not cower in fear. Do not divide. What we have here is a golden opportunity for a creative renaissance of sorts — not via the false promises of "democratization" these generative models were sold on, but from an ever-growing necessity for conscious artists to make themselves stand out amidst the sea of slop. It's incredibly telling that some of the very first things to fall under the highest threat of replacement have been lo-fi hip hop beats & naked anime girls, things that have been so comically oversaturated for years that they might as well have already been factory-produced. Of course, this isn't to say they're Innately Soulless, or that anyone working in these fields "deserves" to be replaced; ideally, I would much rather that even the most generic of art remained solely in the hands of actual people. But it's clear we aren't going to be living in that world for much longer, and as such, I believe any artist who is remotely worried about this would greatly benefit from re-examining their work and thinking up ways it could be more bold. Embrace the Esoteric. Get uncanny with it. Put your Whole Pussy into every piece, and let everyone know exactly what makes You YOU. I promise there is so much more left to explore than you may currently realize. Even once all the mindless masses are fully hooked up to their daily algorithmic media intake, we must be right here waiting for the remaining outsiders who actively seek out something truly sentient. They must know exactly where to find us. This is how we win.

• The Median's Ark was indeed originally going to be called "The Deviant's Art", and be much broader in stylistic scope, essentially covering as many overhated genres of music as possible, in an act of provoking the archetypal 'Music Nerd'. I decided against this for a few reasons, most crucial being that I felt this framing ascribed too much importance to The Hatred; I think it's a much more powerful statement to just independently embrace the sounds I'm passionate about irrespective of what anyone thinks, rather than explicitly position this as a Reaction. I would later retool those ideas for TRACK 6 to much greater effect, still including an element of spite towards The Hatred, but also just plainly demonstrating how I genuinely hold """low art""" and """high art""" in the same regard, utilizing elements of both in the same song without a hitch. At the end of the day, I do enjoy 'pissing off the right people' with my taste, but I can't allow that to be my sole motivator, lest I inadvertently legitimize their positions as something that must be acknowledged. This is what I mean when I say "WE MUST NOT EXIST MERELY IN OPPOSITION".

• According to my notes, this album was also originally going to have 15 tracks split into two 'discs' (1-10 & 11-15), titled "The Pllay" and "The Shape" respectively.

I've also got some notes brainstorming ideas for the cover art that never came to fruition:

hyperreal cover art involving me in cool pose green screened in some kind of vibrant bg
maybe head up in the clouds on one side and me coming out of the ground on the other side
incorporate theatrical elements in cover too?

maybe me macro destroying city loool

or from behind turned around upside down ballet type pose looking manic

or giant me standing w arms up reaching behind neck and a buncha mini-mes in various outfits running around the area

• A friend once pointed out to me how The Median's Ark shares an acronym with Transmisogyny-Affected, and while that was completely unintentional, it is remarkably fitting. I wholeheartedly endorse this connection.

• The 3D space in this album's cover, much like LP7's and LP8's, was assembled using ROBLOX Studio.

The 3D models of me, meanwhile, were generated using some website that somehow turns flat images into three-dimensional objects. Here's a closer look at that, alongside the original photos:

I find it fascinating how The 3D Machine decided to give boobs to the "Image6" Roxy solely based on a shot taken from behind. That thing really said "yep, this ass looks female enough" and sculpted accordingly. That's also pretty terrifying if you think about it for too long. And rooted in gender essentialism, of course, but I'd expect no better of an Algorithm. At least in this case the bias was harmless though. I certainly don't mind being depicted with boobs, since I do hope to eventually have them.

• The photoshoot those 3D Roxies were derived from contains dozens of unused source images that never made it into the final cover art. Here's some of my favorites:

• The phrase "what a creature contains" spoken in TRACK 3 was originally read as "what a human contains", and later re-recorded once I had my therian awakening. I have never used that word to describe myself or broadly gesture towards my community ever since. Be more inclusive.

Also, there was a time where this track simply ended with the second segment, only totalling about 5 minutes, but after some time, I had additional thoughts that warranted the creation of a third segment.

• elwood's portion of TRACK 8 was the last thing stopping this album from being released, and we spent hours in a call together at the last minute brainstorming how it'd go. I don't fault them for this, of course; I do the same sort of procrastination all the time.

• In the most basic of terms, TRACK 10 is what happens when you set the tempo of Dariacore tracks to 10 BPM. Or 30 BPM, or something like that. There was more I did to fill in the details, of course, but that's at least how the core of it was created.