Elucid: Guitar		Photo by Alan Klem

 

Influences: AC/DC, Anthrax, All That Remains, Arch Enemy, Black Label Society, Bach, Beethoven, Johnny Cash, Children of Bodom, Cradle of Filth, John 5, Dimebag Darrell, Jon Donais, Andy Frazier, H.I.M., Oli Herbert, Iced Earth, In Flames, Robert Johnson, Jeff Loomis, George Lynch, Bob Marley, Megadeth, Ministry, Nevermore, Ozzy, Django Rheindhart, Randy Rhoads, Shadows Fall, Sinergy, Slayer, Cat Stevens, Steve Vai, Glen Tipton, Eddie Van Halen, Zakk Wylde, Yngwie Malmsteen, Frank Zappa

Elucid - \ee - LOO - sid\ 1. noun: One whose meaning is clear, yet obscured by mystery and secrets; 2. verb: to make One's clear meaning obscured by mystery and secrets; 3. adj.: having the quality of being obscured by mysterious circumstances.

The story of Elucid begins in the Golden Age of the Olympian gods. He is actually the 21st century reincarnation of Orpheus, the greatest musician in all of Greece.

Apollo, the god of the sun and music, son of Zeus and twin to Artemis, bore a son named Orpheus. An accomplished magician through his art, his main instrument was the lyre. Kings, queens and the gods themselves beckoned for him to play, and he loved to entertain anyone who wanted to hear him. But above all, he loved his intended wife, Eurydice.

Orpheus and Eurydice were a pair from the day they met. In fact, he planned on marrying her. But tragedy struck on the day of their wedding. A snake bit Eurydice and the poison killed her. Orpheus was grief-stricken, and the music stopped. Feeling for his son, Apollo granted Orpheus permission to travel to the Underworld to retrieve his beloved. With his lyre in hand, Orpheus traveled to the Underworld to take back his wife-to-be. While there, he ran into all kinds of beasts, monsters, and minions of Hades, god of the dead and the Underworld. His defense was his music. Playing his lyre would put them all under a hypnotic state of euphoria so that he could pass.

Making his way to the Elysian Fields, where lost human souls were doomed to roam the Underworld, Orpheus excitedly found Eurydice. Just as he was to reach for her, the minions of Hades grabbed them both. There they stood before the god of the Underworld. Hades was furious that anyone would try to take a dead soul back to the land of the living. Knowing that his son was in danger, Apollo went before Hades and pleaded with him to release his son and his son's beloved.

Hades angrily explained the rules and was ready to have them thrown into the darkest pits of Tartarus where souls burned forever, but Orpheus promised to play music from his lyre as a bargain. Carelessly, Hades agreed that if he liked it, he would let them go. Orpheus played to the best of his ability until all of the Underworld could hear and feel his music. Even the grim face of Hades started to turn, and his wife Persephone demanded that he let them go.

Hades conceded, but on the condition that Orpheus not look back to see Eurydice. He must turn to see her only when they reached the land of the living. With that, they began their trek together, Eurydice steps behind Orpheus. Walking back home, Orpheus imagined the time he and his beloved would spend together, but he soon started to have doubts: what if Hades was lying? What if she wasn't following him at all? Nervously, he looked back and there she was; she had been following him all along! At that moment, Eurydice disappeared back to the Elysian Fields. Orpheus returned to Earth alone, heartbroken and disappointed.

Years passed and Orpheus traveled from village to city playing for drunken fools. Then, he ran into an angry mob who heard of his betrayal to Eurydice, and they killed him. Apollo took his son's lifeless body to the Elysian Fields where he was reunited with his beloved. They were finally together and happy, but it would not last.

Thousands of years passed and the time of the gods is now long forgotten. The Underworld continued to grow. The Elysian Fields were overflowing with souls and many wished to walk Mother Earth again. To calm them, Hades granted reincarnation to those who wanted it. However, when re-born, they would be made unaware of who they were in their previous lives. Eurydice leaped at the chance to be alive and among the living again. Orpheus wished to go as well... if he could be with her. But with the rules dictating that neither would recall their past selves, how could they be assured that they would be together? Orpheus called for his father, Apollo, to help him, whereupon the two made a pact: After some time--a quarter century, when it would be less likely that Hades was watching--Apollo would find his reincarnated son and assist him in reuniting him with his love. With that pact, the two souls agreed to be born into new bodies and new lives. Now known as Elucid, an accomplished musician, Orpheus was re-born unconscious of his former self.

Twenty-five years passed and Apollo went to Elucid. The young man, bewildered but awed by Apollo, listened as the god informed him of his former identity as the greatest musician and magician Greece had ever known. He told the young man that he must go in search of Eurydice. However, he explained, once finding her, Elucid must not reveal the secret of his former identity or hers, or he will again return to the Underworld.

Having quickly discovered Apollo's interference with their reincarnation agreement, Hades commanded his alien minion, Futurist Tarquinius, the lead guitarist of Lucretia's Daggers and future incarnation of the rapist Sextus Tarquinius, to trick Elucid, into the band. Futurist cast a spell on Elucid to take his place as guitarist so that Futurist could conduct his nefarious deeds behind the scenes. Elucid, thinking Lucretia X. Machina--the band's singer and descendant of the 6th c. BCE heroine Lucretia of Rome--is his beloved Eurydice reborn, agreed to join them. Apollo, no longer able to communicate with Elucid, can only watch as his son is being misled. Or is he? Only time will tell....