A distended bass line tweaks, followed by a melodic series of notes that fall from one another like a soft summer rain over ancient marble. Like a naturally-occurring crystal formation, lost for years, perfect in its geometry, he creates, generating a sinister refulgence that shines through the underdark of Parkdale... this is Animalmonster. He is creature of vast potential, fusing the new with old in a perpetual battle against the silence of time. Animalmonster unleashes his Pandora's Box of beats and clicks with furious stillness and unrelenting control. Matt Thomas braved the box of Pain, the trials of the Forest of Personal Reflection and Sadness and the Beast of the Mind to sit in the Great Clearing with Animalmonster for one Moon and ask how the ancients made the sky weep.

Your soundscapes are lush, full and haunting...what do you use to create your sounds?

a. PARCHMENT
b. BLOOD RED INK:
Parchment Ink Concentrate, 1 Ounce
Bouauet X-120, 1 Dram
Water, 1/2 Ounce

i. Draw the pentacle.
ii. Bury the manuscript face down under a suitable oak.
iii. Invoke the Spirit.
iiii. Wait. Baphomet rises unheralded.

Your music bleeds like 70's experimental film. If you could set your music to images what would they be?

Clouds.

You do stuff with Blocks Recording Club. What tips do you have for the virginal D.I.Y. kids out in Internet land?

This too shall pass.

Please describe your live performance using a medical operation, a children's television show and a fattening dessert.

EXPRESSTRAINTOYRBRAIN'¦ Mille Feuille.

As well as being my favourite album for wandering the street at 5am in the middle of winter, your last album MIGHTY MAGNIFICENCE glowed in the dark and had a glorious diamond cover. What will your live show sound like and how beautiful will it be?

Look into the sun. Only this will approximate its beauty.

If the indie kids were rats and you, Animalmonster, were the Pied Piper of the indie electronic township, where would you lead us?

Babylon. Adrift in the Charlenese Ocean.

If you could be any animal or monster what would it be and what would you destroy?

A bird. Insects mostly.

Tell us a bit about your process of creation. Please don't forget to include your outfit of choice, most musically productive treat and most inspirational distraction.

See question #2. I don the vestments appropriate to an adept of my order, strictly following the protocols of the Elders of Zion in concert with the oaths of a knight of the Rosy Cross. I follow an ascetic diet, eating only that which is given to me freely, as befits a hermetic monk of my order. My leisure time is spent in my library, which contains a large collection of hermetic and occult texts. It is in this sanctuary, in solemn and penitent mediation, where I contemplate the mysteries of the Ancients and continue their search for the Divine in all its forms. The eternal triumph of the sublime will not come to the foolish charlatan but only to the devoted and pious scholar. It is this knowledge which sustains my solitary existence, spurring me on through endless texts and riddles with nary a soul with which to share my discoveries. Alas! As I draw nearer to that final epiphany, approaching the ecstasy of divine erudition, I fear it may come too late. Yet if I should expire before I reach my lofty goal, I know there will be another to continue my work, and another to continue his. It is through this infinite chain that the members of my order have long hoped to achieve enlightenment, each brother building upon the work of his predecessor. I know that none have been so close as I, and none will be so close as my successor. One day we will reach our goal, our brothers will resurrect us, and we will smite our enemies upon the slopes of Olympus in a final battle for the universe and its constituents, both mortal and spiritual.

By Matthew Thomas