to detail how this EP came to be would require a description of the setting surrounding about 20+ other contrasting songs that haven't quite made it to tape just yet. during the long/short lockdown wilderness years (of 2020-2022) & the arduous, plain aftermath of that, whatever this project is went through somewhat of a hibernation process to emerge as a sort of bitter chrysalis.

at the tail end of 2019, this project had become dejected husk, falling behind due to an artist imposter insecurity, a small US tour cancellation & an intimidating backlog of songs that just weren't going to be finished in a bedroom setting. vain attempts were made with the idea that with a subtle restructure into a new project that that would iron out the creases & make it all make sense. theoretically a different singer; a wider line-up of instrumentation & a less centralised project would turn the tragic fate of this struggling project from failing solo work into a blossoming collective endeavour. however, after a year or so of head-to-the-wall dead end rehearsals, generalised anxiety for all parties & shifting priorities the fate of it all was ultimately left to the ether...

I knew, down the line that if I wanted to salvage any of this material I had written that I had to take ownership for it, to stop coyly pretending like this was somebody else's music project and that some internally fabled potential collaborator would miraculously appear & put all the pieces back on the board in a way that would make me go "I see!", like the planets aligning or something. this prompted me to double down & rename the project Eliots Graveyard (subtly inspired by the combination of a Teen Suicide song name & the stylisation of the band name Jeromes Dream, a favoured band of mine). this time, it would have to be my own litany of morose, existential & personal living-dead emblems of liturgy and I would have to own that.

alongside this, after a wasted decade (and then some) of facilitating & celebrating other people's musical projects & expressions of artistry (in place of my own), I began to realise how capitalistic, hollow & disingenuous most of that "d.i.y." world truly is and how little altruistic symmetry one is afforded by those who ultimately have very little interest in the meanings behind the words and sentiments they often espouse. in the atomised nature of all things, we cannot truly believe in the deference of collective action, not until we truly untangle ourselves from the market place mindscape we've been ushered into inhabiting by the Professional™ world we are forced to exist in. what people often refer to as "community" is essentially disconnected regional clusters of glorified extended friend groups that alienate & reject those who criticise principles that group collectively holds, normally: heteronormative standards. if you're a gay musician, you know ultimately what this feels like: your uppety faggotry is tolerated for as long as you can be perceived as entertaining & useful, but after that: bye-bye, it's remit of the same boys & girls who have something to gain from white-hetero-cis-patriarchy remaining alive & well.

this EP attempts to detail the ways in which nepotistic scenes emotionally manipulate those it considers a liability, convincing them to vilify themselves & question every interaction they have with others in case their radiant otherness is in someway damaging. but what they do not know is that their "community" is hollow & only as strong as its heteromoralistic principles, it cannot truly endure like an organic community does, one unbound to the inevitably competitive & capitalistic conceptions of modern sub-culture: this community too shall pass.