ARTISTS
the artists of the cocoon concepts record label:
COCOON - TRIANGLE - birdcage pram - the von tones
COCOON AKA (TONY TRALONGO'S COCOON)
The underground music scene in Melbourne is one of the most vibrant in the world. And from this emerges Cocoon, one of it’s most reclusive and underground of artists.
Tony Tralongo is the creator of Cocoon, and has been creating music since the beginning of the 1980’s. He started out writing pop songs for Ma Damquree, a band he formed with Steve (Irish) O’Prey. The song writing team evolved and as the band grew the music became decidedly more progressive, influenced by the likes of Rush, King Crimson, Yes and other ‘prog’ greats. During this time Tony created ‘the Pad’ in Fawkner, where the band rehearsed and equally as important, jam nights were a regular occurrence with many friends invited to join in. Members of Mister Reaction, 321, Taipan and other close friends spent many nights partying and then retiring to the instruments where ‘free jamming’ was the order of the day. Birdcage Pram, one of the most obscure and progressive, ‘free jam’ projects around managed to record some sessions with Tony at ‘the Pad’. This is where Tony’s Cocoon concept really began, collaborating on keyboard experiments, guitar synthesizer and Robert Fripp inspired guitar work. Ma Damquree eventually split when Steve joined the Badloves and Tony joined Taipan.
Traditionally a hard rock band, Taipan recruited Tony on guitar and Rob Tronca, also from Ma Damquree, on keyboards. They were looking to experiment with the progressive rock sound and moved into ‘the Pad’. The jam nights continued with more energy and chemical-induced inspiration than ever. Tony played with Taipan for several years, culminating in the 1984 release of ‘1770’, their one and only truly ‘prog’ album. After this period, ‘the Pad’ was closed down and in 1985 Tony moved his operation to Churchill Studio where he continued on his Cocoon concept, experimenting with new instruments such as the Korg T2 and entered the realm of multi-tracking on Tascams and other machines. He concentrated on neo-classical and soundtrack inspired ambience, working strictly solo. Morphett Studio soon followed in 1986 and this is where the idea of Tony Tralongo’s Cocoon truly came into being. He created progressive, soft rock and pop hymns, collaborating with the likes of Tony (Ralph) Nardella, a drum machine wizard. Former band members came to join in such as Rob Tronca, Steve O’Prey, Emilio Sarpa, Dave Zerafa and many others. These sessions produced a three record set by Tony Tralongo’s Cocoon. ‘Burning Light’ in 1988, ‘Warm Love’ in 1990 and ‘Mystery Island’ in 1993. After years of writing songs and playing gigs Tony became disenchanted with the ‘live scene’ and decided to go completely undergound.
From 1994, Tony condensed the name to simply Cocoon and directed his efforts back to soundtrack and ambience. Using material written during the Churchill Studio sessions as inspiration, he created a new soundtrack-themed off-shoot for his material that clearly fits into this genre. The first album being ‘Soundtrack for Short Film’ in 1999 and followed up by ‘Soundtrack2 – Landing at Dawn’ in 2001. He persued other interests and started a family at this stage of his life which lasted until 2010. These years provided the ideal opportunity to ‘recharge his creative batteries’ and re-appear with a new found passion for his musical creations. All releases were digitally remastered from his master tapes in an attempt to make them more relevant to today’s music scene.
In the last few years, Cocoon has gone completely retro. His latest album, titled ‘Spaceship Cocoon’ is a tribute to Krautrock, that is, the German Kosmiche music scene during the 1970’s. The diversity of sub-genres explored is astounding and the sky is the limit.
Tony Tralongo is the creator of Cocoon, and has been creating music since the beginning of the 1980’s. He started out writing pop songs for Ma Damquree, a band he formed with Steve (Irish) O’Prey. The song writing team evolved and as the band grew the music became decidedly more progressive, influenced by the likes of Rush, King Crimson, Yes and other ‘prog’ greats. During this time Tony created ‘the Pad’ in Fawkner, where the band rehearsed and equally as important, jam nights were a regular occurrence with many friends invited to join in. Members of Mister Reaction, 321, Taipan and other close friends spent many nights partying and then retiring to the instruments where ‘free jamming’ was the order of the day. Birdcage Pram, one of the most obscure and progressive, ‘free jam’ projects around managed to record some sessions with Tony at ‘the Pad’. This is where Tony’s Cocoon concept really began, collaborating on keyboard experiments, guitar synthesizer and Robert Fripp inspired guitar work. Ma Damquree eventually split when Steve joined the Badloves and Tony joined Taipan.
Traditionally a hard rock band, Taipan recruited Tony on guitar and Rob Tronca, also from Ma Damquree, on keyboards. They were looking to experiment with the progressive rock sound and moved into ‘the Pad’. The jam nights continued with more energy and chemical-induced inspiration than ever. Tony played with Taipan for several years, culminating in the 1984 release of ‘1770’, their one and only truly ‘prog’ album. After this period, ‘the Pad’ was closed down and in 1985 Tony moved his operation to Churchill Studio where he continued on his Cocoon concept, experimenting with new instruments such as the Korg T2 and entered the realm of multi-tracking on Tascams and other machines. He concentrated on neo-classical and soundtrack inspired ambience, working strictly solo. Morphett Studio soon followed in 1986 and this is where the idea of Tony Tralongo’s Cocoon truly came into being. He created progressive, soft rock and pop hymns, collaborating with the likes of Tony (Ralph) Nardella, a drum machine wizard. Former band members came to join in such as Rob Tronca, Steve O’Prey, Emilio Sarpa, Dave Zerafa and many others. These sessions produced a three record set by Tony Tralongo’s Cocoon. ‘Burning Light’ in 1988, ‘Warm Love’ in 1990 and ‘Mystery Island’ in 1993. After years of writing songs and playing gigs Tony became disenchanted with the ‘live scene’ and decided to go completely undergound.
From 1994, Tony condensed the name to simply Cocoon and directed his efforts back to soundtrack and ambience. Using material written during the Churchill Studio sessions as inspiration, he created a new soundtrack-themed off-shoot for his material that clearly fits into this genre. The first album being ‘Soundtrack for Short Film’ in 1999 and followed up by ‘Soundtrack2 – Landing at Dawn’ in 2001. He persued other interests and started a family at this stage of his life which lasted until 2010. These years provided the ideal opportunity to ‘recharge his creative batteries’ and re-appear with a new found passion for his musical creations. All releases were digitally remastered from his master tapes in an attempt to make them more relevant to today’s music scene.
In the last few years, Cocoon has gone completely retro. His latest album, titled ‘Spaceship Cocoon’ is a tribute to Krautrock, that is, the German Kosmiche music scene during the 1970’s. The diversity of sub-genres explored is astounding and the sky is the limit.
TRIANGLE
THE STORY OF TRIANGLE
The TRIANGLE story began with the desire of two individuals to create an album free of all the commercial pressures. This idealistic concept would contain all the musical elements they ever dreamed of putting into an album and would focus on the music, a story with a message, and not on the most commercially acceptable representation. Tony Tralongo and Emilio Sarpa have been friends since the 1980’s when they were both band members in Taipan. Emilio had used Ren Parisi and his facilities at Melbourne Studios many times to record Taipan albums. Between them, they had accrued some of their own obscure pieces which were not in their native genres, but rather, in the genre of a soundtrack to a horror movie. Tony was also a friend of Ren so, inevitably, Ren was approached to join the collaboration and the band TRIANGLE was born.
The logo of TRIANGLE is the unicursal ‘Valknut’, the Norse Viking symbol. Similarly, our combination comprises a trio of composers, producers, multi-instrumentalists and technicians.
THREE SIDES OF TRIANGLE
TONY TRALONGO
Pipe organ, mellotron, synthesizers, sampling, 12-string acoustic, electric guitar, guitar synthesizer, vocals.
Tony creates his original music under the name of COCOON and is the owner of Cocoon Concepts Record Label (CCRL). This is his first band project since going solo many years ago.
EMILIO SARPA
Bass guitar, synthesizers, sampling, 12-string acoustic and electric guitar.
Emilio is the songwriter, vocalist and bass player of TAIPAN, one of Melbourne’s hard rock/heavy metal pioneers.
REN PARISI
Narrative voices, synthesizers, electric guitar, sampling, drums and percussion.
Ren was the engineer/producer and owner of Melbourne Records. Ren is otherwise known as REN REICH and is now operating under the name of Reich Records.
THE MUSIC OF SHOCKWAVES
Progressive – if you like King Crimson * Gothic – if you like Black Sabbath and Goblin * Psychedelic – if you like Pink Floyd * Rock – if you like Rush and Krautrock
THE STORY OF SHOCKWAVES
This is an epic tale of a man who lived on the fringe of his community, an alchemist. In a state of permanent fear and hiding, he recounts his ordeals in the most philosophical and tragic manner. The stage is set in medieval times at around the fifteenth century. The alchemist takes us even further back, thus being ancient in his view, to the fourth century, a time that was a turning point for western civilization. The alchemist exposes the Roman Emperor Flavius Constantine and how, through his Council of Nicea, rewrote the Roman Catholic Bible and history in general to suit his own agenda. From then on, all freethinking individuals such as the alchemists were branded as heretics. Being branded a heretic, and exposing these secret truths were punishable by torture and then death. These truths are still hidden from us to protect the consensus reality created by today’s establishment. These facts still send shockwaves through the new world order. The alchemist’s story and his observations are a warning not to blindly accept the consensus reality provided to us all at birth.
Each of us is born into a social order that has already arrived at a “consensus reality.” Humans act in repetitious ways that become habitual. These soon become socially acceptable ways of behaving. After a while, these ways become “legitimised.” These then become unconscious and gradually evolve into laws of reality. We no longer question them.
In fact they are not reality at all. Other cultures do things quite differently. The consensus reality is what we’ve all agreed on as constituting reality.
“We learn at journey’s end what we knew from the very start.”
The TRIANGLE story began with the desire of two individuals to create an album free of all the commercial pressures. This idealistic concept would contain all the musical elements they ever dreamed of putting into an album and would focus on the music, a story with a message, and not on the most commercially acceptable representation. Tony Tralongo and Emilio Sarpa have been friends since the 1980’s when they were both band members in Taipan. Emilio had used Ren Parisi and his facilities at Melbourne Studios many times to record Taipan albums. Between them, they had accrued some of their own obscure pieces which were not in their native genres, but rather, in the genre of a soundtrack to a horror movie. Tony was also a friend of Ren so, inevitably, Ren was approached to join the collaboration and the band TRIANGLE was born.
The logo of TRIANGLE is the unicursal ‘Valknut’, the Norse Viking symbol. Similarly, our combination comprises a trio of composers, producers, multi-instrumentalists and technicians.
THREE SIDES OF TRIANGLE
TONY TRALONGO
Pipe organ, mellotron, synthesizers, sampling, 12-string acoustic, electric guitar, guitar synthesizer, vocals.
Tony creates his original music under the name of COCOON and is the owner of Cocoon Concepts Record Label (CCRL). This is his first band project since going solo many years ago.
EMILIO SARPA
Bass guitar, synthesizers, sampling, 12-string acoustic and electric guitar.
Emilio is the songwriter, vocalist and bass player of TAIPAN, one of Melbourne’s hard rock/heavy metal pioneers.
REN PARISI
Narrative voices, synthesizers, electric guitar, sampling, drums and percussion.
Ren was the engineer/producer and owner of Melbourne Records. Ren is otherwise known as REN REICH and is now operating under the name of Reich Records.
THE MUSIC OF SHOCKWAVES
Progressive – if you like King Crimson * Gothic – if you like Black Sabbath and Goblin * Psychedelic – if you like Pink Floyd * Rock – if you like Rush and Krautrock
THE STORY OF SHOCKWAVES
This is an epic tale of a man who lived on the fringe of his community, an alchemist. In a state of permanent fear and hiding, he recounts his ordeals in the most philosophical and tragic manner. The stage is set in medieval times at around the fifteenth century. The alchemist takes us even further back, thus being ancient in his view, to the fourth century, a time that was a turning point for western civilization. The alchemist exposes the Roman Emperor Flavius Constantine and how, through his Council of Nicea, rewrote the Roman Catholic Bible and history in general to suit his own agenda. From then on, all freethinking individuals such as the alchemists were branded as heretics. Being branded a heretic, and exposing these secret truths were punishable by torture and then death. These truths are still hidden from us to protect the consensus reality created by today’s establishment. These facts still send shockwaves through the new world order. The alchemist’s story and his observations are a warning not to blindly accept the consensus reality provided to us all at birth.
Each of us is born into a social order that has already arrived at a “consensus reality.” Humans act in repetitious ways that become habitual. These soon become socially acceptable ways of behaving. After a while, these ways become “legitimised.” These then become unconscious and gradually evolve into laws of reality. We no longer question them.
In fact they are not reality at all. Other cultures do things quite differently. The consensus reality is what we’ve all agreed on as constituting reality.
“We learn at journey’s end what we knew from the very start.”
birdcage pram
Avante-garde progressive rock collective. Specialised in psychedelic free-jam. More info to come soon.
For now, click HERE to check out the Birdcage Pram on COCOONCONCEPTS Channel on YouTube.
For now, click HERE to check out the Birdcage Pram on COCOONCONCEPTS Channel on YouTube.
the von tones
Please click HERE to go to The Von Tones dedicated page.