This is NOT an album from The Mars Volta.

This is a fan-made, fan-edited, compilation of various works of The Mars Volta and in absolutely no way whatsoever was Omar Rodriguez-Lopez involved.

This is NOT an album from The Mars Volta.

I was asked to make a Volta mix tape recently, for a friend of a friend, that was into progressive type music, but had not heard the Volta.  While I think perhaps the best way to get into this music is through an album by the band, I came up with an idea and I thought I would give it a shot.

The goal was to pack in as much Volta as possible into a single disc, and still maintain some sense of flow.  The result is a collection of clips from their debut Tremulant EP up through to The Bedlam In Goliath, which was from day one, always named A Bed Of Broken Windows.

There isn’t any super flashy editing here, only some splicing and maybe a clever overlay now and again.  But this project did not take me any short amount of time, and the real effort ended up being in the story that is told, and in the commitment to making sure certain things and certain moments found a place in this disc.  Much like this is a merged collection of all of their albums musically, it is also a merged story, from the various stories that have been told through these same albums.

In short, A Bed Of Broken Windows tells the story of Frances of Sound and Light, and it begins with his life heavily addicted to strong narcotics.  His life is turmoil and his addiction to drugs rules his life.  He awakes one day to find himself being held captive by a group of religious extremists who intend to exercise the demon that is in him, and end the turmoil of his life.  They succeed, though not without struggle, and the demon is released from Frances of Sound and Light.  But when Frances comes to, he feels entirely empty, as if his life had been erased and then recreated as something meaningless.  Not after long, Frances escapes the captivity of the religious extremists and he takes his own life by jumping through a glass window in an abandoned project apartment building.



The Mars Volta

A Bed Of Broken Windows

I. Caveat Emptor
  1. Dawning of This Plague
    a. Frances of Sound and Light
    b. Inertia Lost
    c. The Drunk Ship Sails
    d. Shake That City
    e. Defected
  2. To All That Enter Here

II. Bedlam
  3. Fumigate My Mental Hygiene
    a. With Idle Tooth
    b. In a Pocket Full of Drink That I Have Drunk
  4. Widowed
  5. Crown of Maggots
  6. Poachers in Your Home

III. Blinded By Heaven
  7. The Word Is Made Flesh
    a. God's Tritone
    b. Ask Metatron
    c. A Second Chance to Inhabit the Living
    d. Siphon Off All Our Blood

IV. The Tremulant Sings
  8. The Others I've Become
  9. This Never Happened
    a. This Chalk Outline Will Circle This City
    b. Take the Veil
    c. Broken Windows
    d. Muted