Release Date: 12/12/2023

33 is the 11th canonical album by RANGES and marks the central point in the structure of The Octaves. It is the hinge between what came before and what follows—a midpoint between ascension and descent. Everything prior builds toward it. Everything after refracts from it. It is the still point around which the rest of The Canon turns.

This album is a study in duality—not just conceptually, but architecturally. Every element—visual, sonic, structural—was designed to express the tension between opposing forces. Chaos and Order. Fragmentation and Unity. Strategy and Surrender. Where previous works sought meaning in the climb, 33 pauses at the crux, holding both ascent and descent in view. It does not move upward or downward. It remains centered.

The album’s 2xLP format enforces this divide. The first LP is built from six songs that together total precisely thirty-three minutes. But hidden within them is a deeper rhythm: thirty time-coded movements, each with a paired textual passage. These fragments form the Lower Law—a descent into opposition, war, mortality, ritual, and suffering. It is a realm of conflict and consequence, a checkerboard of deliberate moves. It speaks the language of the divided self.

The second LP answers with three longform pieces totaling exactly thirty-three minutes in duration as well. These are the Higher Law, forming a mirrored ascent from the chaos below. Their titles draw from the stages of the alchemical process: Nigredo Melancholia: A Black Blacker Than Black, Albedo Redintegrata: The Whitening, and the Magnum Opus: Ordo ab Chao. The music opens, expands, purifies. The accompanying text shifts from opposition to reintegration, guiding the listener through a ritual reconciliation of the fractured self. This is not escape—it is return. A higher form of order that rises through the ashes of collapse.

Visually, the album echoes these themes without explanation. Its iconography is centered, balanced, and symbolic. Opposing forces are present, but neither dominates. The journey lies between them. The details matter less than the feeling they evoke: symmetry, judgment, sovereignty, and collapse. The design does not illustrate the music—it inhabits the same architecture.

33 is the midpoint of the The Canon. The balance between chaos and order. The union of Thirty and Three. It is the moment the spiral tightens before it begins to unwind again. The stillness before the turn. The Cultus lives in these oppositions. And 33 is where they are held, if only for a moment, in perfect tension.

THE TENTH TRACK

Not listed. Not announced. But always there.

The vinyl release of 33 ended with a lock groove—an intentional interruption. Side D closed with the ninth track, but the record did not. Beyond the groove, pressed into silence, was a hidden piece known only as X.

There were no instructions. No credits. Only the suggestion—visual, physical—that something remained. To hear it, one had to act. To break the cycle. To lift the needle and move it forward.

For months, it was left unspoken. A quiet test of attention.

On April 16th, 2024, X. was finally revealed. Released as a standalone single—after the album that held it. A reversal of form.

This is how The Cultus works. Some things must be found before they are given.

33 - Deluxe Edition

Two sides. Thirty and Three. A game set in motion.

The Deluxe Edition of 33 was conceived as a talisman—equal parts vessel, offering, and altar. Each element was created to reflect the album’s central theme: the tension and balance between opposites.

The vinyl pressing appears in black and white—180g discs housed in a heavy gatefold jacket with silver foil markings, matte and resistant to touch. Inside, a code for digital transmission. Beneath that, the board itself.

The slipcase is a hand-crafted, white-washed wooden box, screen-printed in-house and designed to function as a chessboard. Accompanying it: two full sets of sculpted resin chess pieces. Each move deliberate.

The album is also presented in mirrored formats. On CD: Chaos in black, Order in silver, housed in an eight-panel digipak. On cassette: twin shells, black and white, joined in a dual case. Each reflects the other—twin eyes of the same form.

To accompany the ritual: Order & Chaos Coffee, a dual roast of Ethiopia Yirgacheffe beans—one light, one dark—sealed in printed tubes.

The included Fig. 33 shirt bears the emblem that first appeared in the Confusion of Tongues gatefold—now resurfaced at the axis of The Octaves. It is not an echo. It is a return.

All hand-touched. All finite.

This is not a collection of items. It is a construct. The board has been set. The pieces are already in motion.

Pr3lud3 IV

Release Date: 09/01/2023

The form before the form. The frame beneath the weight.

A reduction of what was to come. Released before the unveiling of 33. As like previous Prelude offerings, guitars and drums removed. Only atmosphere, breath, and motion remain. Not absence—revelation. What lies beneath the surface of 33 is made audible here.

This is not a preview. It is an orientation. The album’s structure rendered skeletal—blueprints instead of stone, geometry instead of mass.

This is where The Canon begins to divide. The Cultus stirs in silence.

The GREAT WORK

Sound as process. Form as ritual. A path through dissolution into light.

Release Date: 03/30/2025

The Great Work is a four-cassette artifact—an interpretation of the Hermetic Magnum Opus rendered in sound and symbol. It follows the ancient alchemical progression: Nigredo, Albedo, Citrinitas, Rubedo. Each stage a descent and refinement. Each color a veil. Each tape a chamber of the Work.

The compositions are drawn from within The Canon—familiar material dissolved, slowed, and reformed to reflect the qualities of each stage. This is not repetition, but transmutation. The dissolution of the known in pursuit of something higher. The songs breathe differently here. Slower. Heavier. Intentional.

Where 33 stands as the axis—the still point of balance between chaos and order—The Great Work turns around it. The same dualities refracted into stages. The same symbols rearranged as steps. If 33 is the crux, The Great Work is the crossing. An extension of its structure, its silence, its spiral.

The visual language mirrors the sonic progression. Nigredo opens in shadow—crows, ash, and the serpent. Albedo follows with reflection—lilies, silver, and the moon. Citrinitas carries the awakening—suns, lions, and the first breath of gold. Rubedo completes the cycle—roses, the stone, and the rising of the phoenix.

The cover bears a familiar glyph—Fig. 77—originally hidden in the inner gatefold of Confusion of Tongues. A symbol of squaring the circle. Unification through paradox. It now stands as the seal of The Great Work, appearing on each cassette cover and the accompanying shirt. Not decoration, but declaration. The Work begins and ends within this shape.

Each tape is encased in hand-printed detail. Numbered. Finite. The box is not packaging—it is an altar. A sealed vessel for a ritual in sound.

The Great Work is not meant to be collected. It is meant to be undergone. To move through its stages is to mirror the self within the fire—to see what remains.

I. NIGREDO

Blackening. Dissolution. The death before the Work begins.

The first phase enters under cover of ash. Compositions drawn from Bonhoeffer, The Ascensionist, and Babel are stripped of urgency and light—slowed, reduced, and rendered opaque. The familiar becomes foreign. The weight of sound settles inward.

This is not a representation of Nigredo. It is an immersion in its atmosphere. Cold. Rooted. Quietly unraveling. The Work begins by stepping into the dark.

TRACK LISTING

1. Silence in the Face of Evil is Itself Evil (13:43)

2. The Ascensionist (10:42)

3. Tower (10:19)

4. Demagogue (09:20)

“In shadow's grip,
all breaks apart,
the seed of truth,
begins its start.”

II. ALBEDO

Whitening. Reflection. The clearing after collapse.

Emerging from shadow, the second phase brings a sense of distance and light. Compositions drawn from Cardinal Winds and 33 are reinterpreted with clarity and restraint—washed in silver tones, stretched to stillness.

There is no ascent here, only release. The textures remain sparse, open, reflective. If Nigredo is burial, Albedo is exposure. The mind begins to quiet. The mirror begins to clear.

TRACK LISTING

1. Deluge (11:11)

2. Solace (10:56)

3. The Slings and Arrows of Outrageous Fortune (10:06)

4. Warhorse (08:51)

“A silver glow,
the soul is cleansed,
from waters pure,
new light ascends.”

III. CITRINITAS

Yellowing. Awakening. The first movement toward the sun.

The third phase introduces light with weight—brightness without resolution. Drawn entirely from 33, these reinterpretations carry a quiet urgency. Shapes begin to reform. Patterns reemerge beneath the haze.

The sound does not rise, but it leans forward. There is warmth here, but also uncertainty. Illumination is not clarity—it is awareness. The Work begins to turn. The veil begins to thin.

TRACK LISTING

1. The Spear of Longinus (09:03)

2. Iron Fist in a Velvet Glove (06:41)

3. Nigredo Melancholia: A Black Blacker than Black (19:00)

“The golden flame,
brings life anew,
illuminated paths,
reveal the true.”

IV. RUBEDO

Reddening. Completion. The closing of the Work.

The fourth and final phase. The color deepens. The pace holds. The silence changes shape.

Rubedo is not a return—it is a settling. The work no longer in motion, but sealed. The circle intact. The stone unmoved.

TRACK LISTING

1. Albedo Redintegrata: The Whitening (11:02)

2. Magnum Opus: Ordo ab Chao (18:45)

3. X (11:38)

“The crimson crown,
the work is done,
the Stone is formed;
All becomes one.”