THE COMMUTER
Based on
"THE COMMUTER"
1953
“Olham was trembling. His teeth chattered. He looked from the knife to the body. ‘This can't be Olham,’ he said. His mind spun, everything was whirling. ‘Was I wrong?’ He gaped. ‘But if that's Olham, then I must be –'
He did not complete the sentence, only the first phrase. The blast was visible all the way to Alpha Centauri.”
Although the many mysteries of our reality are certainly not uncommon themes in the world of Philip K. Dick, what here at first seems like a simple story takes a twist that is hard to wrap one’s mind around. “The Commuter,” though not obviously embedded with PKD’s signature philosophizing like other stories, is still yet another example of why his works are more than just purely science fiction. We find ourselves amid what we assuredly think is some sort of misunderstanding, when a so called “little fellow” comes to a train station to purchase tickets to his home in Macon Heights, a place no one has any knowledge of and almost definitely doesn’t exist. After research is done, our protagonist (in this case rail supervisor Bob Paine) decides to venture to where this supposed town would possibly be, and as a result finds himself in an alternate reality.
Throughout this excellent story, we are greeted with a much-more subtle vision of Philip K. Dick. Almost like an episode from The Twilight Zone, it is eerie and hard to fully comprehend, but the brilliance of this tale is the explorative nature of it, questioning the boundaries of what we believe to be true and making us wonder about our own realities, all while keeping our noses glued to the pages. Can we really believe what we never question, or is there at the edge of what we don’t know something that could change our lives forever? Just thinking about that is more than most people are comfortable with, but when one has an explorative spirit like that of PKD, is when we truly tear down the walls of what we think we know to uncover the mysteries or our universe and our reality.
LISTEN
I feel the fear
Surge within
Warping my soul
This shifting reality
From once endless fields
Now arise
A city lost
In time and space
I collide
with the world
Reality is in doubt
We go again
What will I find
Left in this world
Now being changed
Existence rearranged
The little man
Came to me
Going home
To a place unknown
I collide
with the world
Reality like dust to me
This world is changing faster than a speeding train,
and if I'm right it's never going to be the same.
Trapped somewhere in the twilight of existence
This train is bound to stop at Macon Heights
​
I collide
with the world
Seven years, changed somehow
LYRICS: Audun Liland
VOCALS: Audun Liland
DRUMS: Daniele Crisafulli
BASS: Marco Scippacercola
GUITARS: Marco Germani
KEYS/SYNTHS: Stefano Bonatti
PRODUCTION: Marco Germani, Audun Liland, Paolo Agosta
MIXING: Marco Germani
MASTERING: Marco Germani
ARTWORK: The Invisible Presence
CORE IMAGES: Alex Iby, Louis Moncouyoux, Andre Benz, Hannah Cauhepe, Jeffrey Swanson, Jesse Williams