The Death Zone

I talked about how, when I was in school, the other kids would "play" fake executions with me, using knives, or the threat of beating me to death. This gave me anxiety and mortal fear. But there was more to it. I not only experienced the fear of death, in these situations I felt as I was really dying. As I would die and the world around me too, and I was watching what was happening to me from the outside. But yet I was still alive. Think of it a bit like going to the "Upside Down" in Stranger Things without the monsters but with the fear. But yet, I was still breathing and alive and being there. I will call this sensation the "Death Zone" from now on. At first I was only in the Death Zone when these events happened. But eventually it spilled over in other areas of life as well. And believe me, it's hard to do everyday things like going on a train to the inner city and go shopping when you feel as you would die for real. But eventually, I really managed to do so. What helped me was Hardcore Techno. When I first heard this music, the sounds, the screams, the atmosphere felt so familiar - like they would come straight from the Death Zone. This gave me a way to control these feelings; I could listen to Hardcore and when the feelings got too much for me, I could just turn off the sound. Eventually, I mastered these transitions. When I started doing music myself, the direction of transfer was the other way round: I tried to get as many sounds as possible out of this sensation into my tracks. As I said, I always felt that gave my music an edge over some other producers, as it was based on all too real feelings of real terror. When I got to know other people in the Hardcore scene, a lot of them told me they had similar or comparable experiences in their life.
Later in my life I read some psychological studies that birth and death are the most extreme and powerful and 'advanced' states a human can experience. By putting this 'pseudo' death state into music, maybe I really managed to do something powerful and interesting regarding art (or maybe I failed? I'm not to judge). So this is the root of my art. Sometimes I thought that this thing was maybe too negative and twisted, and tried to get into a more positive foundation; but trying so always had very adverse effects. So I got back to it. Maybe one day I will find a different way to this and indeed a more positive way.