The following commentary is properly placed on this track's main release, Homestuck Vol. 8.

around 1/15/2012with respect to this album —
about 2 months, 21 days later captured 1/18/2012 Michael Guy Bowman ✑ Tumblr

I figure now is as good of a time as any to make some posts with more extensive explanations of my tracks from Volume 8. I’ll start with “Calamity” and work my way to a certain bonus track and then we’ll see what else people want me to post commentary on.

"Calamity" was inspired by the very same update that inspired the Pantskat craze - the image of Gamzee returning, Warhammer of Zillyhoo in hand is translated into two sonic elements, ie honks and chanting. What I've enjoyed really intensely about Andrew's sense of humor in Homestuck and his other adventures is his gradual elevation of silly details onto the pedestals of utter drama, and with this track I tried to recreate that. You laughed at the honks and the chanting before - now your heart races (at least I hope).

There was a certain difficulty in making "Calamity" really work for me. I had a couple of different sounds I was attempting all at once, each working on their own but sort of fighting for control when mashed together. The introduction and conclusion of the song using a theme from "Walk-Stab-Walk" needed to be really punchy, while I really needed the middle of the song to glide, and the connecting bits with the chanting needed to build and build in tension. There are a lot of different sounds in the song's palette, the most difficult of which to utilize was the enormous saw synth that dominates the middle. Getting that thing to be grand without utterly overpowering the rest of the song was incredibly difficult.

Overall I was really satisfied with how much excitement there is in this song. It's got a big simple melody but it doesn't outstay its welcome. As the album opener, it sets up the stakes and excitement of Homestuck without sort of beating the point into you by lasting too long. I think of it as a cousin to "Sburban Jungle" or at least another song approached in that dramatic, electronic way.

The countdown sample is from a NASA recording, I believe it's the launch of Apollo 11.

7/20/2024with respect to this album —
about 12 years, 9 months later Michael Guy Bowman ✑ Michael Guy Bowman Talks About His Homestuck Music, adapted to text

Okay, Homestuck Volume 8. Calamity. Awesome tune. I don't know what else to say about that. I thought Walk-Stab-Walk was a cool contribution from Erik, and I just wanted to create something that wove that and the honking and all that, and build up to this big showdown moment between Karkat and Gamzee that never happened! You know, we were all just guessing at what Andrew was gonna do next. And sometimes we got it, and sometimes we got it wrong. But at least we got this epic piece of music out of it, huh?

10/28/2011with respect to this album —
about 3 days later Tavia Morra ✑ Tumblr

I had a lot of fun working on Calamity which gave me an opportunity to adapt a very classic Marvel comic book style to Homestuck. My favorite part of the piece is the small touch in Karkat’s eyes where the background shows through, coloring them. As Bowman worked on Calamity I was developing the composition for the art. The moment when Karkat and Gamzee lunge at each other got my heart racing in the sheer epic-ness of the sight. It had to be the track art.