Name - Seth D. Anderson Esq.
Inception - 08:07:79
Influences - Skinny Puppy, Coil, Autechre, haujobb.
Function - Main Synth, Samples, Rhythm, Different variations on the A chord.

Name - Nathan R. Anderson-somethingorother.
Inception - 10:26:80
Influences - Any music that moves me... so vast.
Function - Samples, Real Strings, Distortion Provider, Synth Work.

Name - Vince W [19:9:4]
Inception - 01:25:76
Influences - Skinny Puppy, Xorcist, Coil, Beethoven, haujobb, Non, Elliot Goldenthal.
Function - Samples, S.S., Construction.

UMBILICAL's HISTORY

Umbilical's history extends its roots as far back as 1992. In 1992 Vince started a faux band called Side Effects. The idea sprung between Vince and a friend to send tapes back and forth to each other consisting of manually manipulated tape loops (also described as the Pause Unpause Tape method). They created some weird songs that I'm sure the censorship people would have had a field day with if they had ever heard those tapes. After 20 or so tapes, Vince's friendship dissolved and took Side Effects with it.

1996. Vince gets his computer and starts messing with wave files. To him it was a joke. Kind of like a digital version of Side Effects, but he could do weird things to the songs. For fun, Vince did remixes of Nine Inch Nails. They were shoddy, but fun to listen to. Then Vince had an idea: why not do his own songs using his new-found methods. Disorienting noise developed. Vocals soon followed which were done using walkie-talkies (Radio Shack to be specific). The sound quality was poor, but hey, it was a project. He began calling it Welcome To The Noise Machine which was later shortened to Noise Machine.

Noise Machine recorded a few tapes with song titles like Complex, God Fucked Me, The Fine Art Of Fate, Within This Soul, and The Contraption. But there was something missing. Other input. After about a year of doing things himself, he found Seth & Nate on the Internet.

They meet and everything is splendid between them. They all have the same ideas musically. Noise Machine "disbands" and Umbilical is born the summer of 1997. The name Umbilical comes from Seth and lasts the infamous two week test.

The first song starts forming. Inception is its name. It's finished in one day. It was terrible. Vince did a remix and it was decided that this remix would be the "album" version. So Umbilical started a new song called Puppet Strings. It never underwent any changes. Various songs follow such as Antipathy, The Dejected Man, and Tenterhook. Inception went through one more change. This time it was completely re-recorded. New synthesizer and new beats with a new guitar. Umbilical finally had enough material for a demo tape and The Elysium Field was born. Five songs, four interludes, and an intro and an epilogue. The entire program blended together to offer a whole vision.

With his demo out of the way, Umbilical started working on new songs separately. Vince did This Dream by himself and Seth and Nate collaborated heavily together. It was later agreed that the new demo tape would be a complete collaboration. Everyone had to do something in the song. Nate was no longer tied down to guitar, which expanded that sound amazingly and added a whole new depth. Engineering was learned by both Seth and Nate which gave new sounds and ideas. The first song to emerge was ASCII. Promptly after, five remixes formed. Seth did one, Nate did one, and Vince did three (guess he had more free time). ASCII was made into a single with the 20 minute ambient noise piece Surveillance added to the mess. It was bliss.

Work on a new song is now underway. It is a remake of a song Seth and Nate did together, but now with Vince at the helm mixing it. A new single is in the thought process. With a little luck, the new demo will be done by the end of the year.