By Melanie Sosa
Battles against giant monsters, feuds with gods and witches, a tragic love story, and the repeated question about the use of morality in the face of protecting the people you love. If you think these concepts sound like the plot points of a grand epic, well, you’re not wrong. It’s in the name after all.
Creator Jorge “Jay” Herrans has just released his newest saga as part of a series of conceptual albums based on Homer’s Odyssey. Since its release on December 25th,, 2023 (a very nice Christmas present for many fans), it’s been extremely well-received, with artists taking many of the most recent songs and releasing animatics, storyboards of an animated project, online.
Now, if you have never heard of Epic, allow me to get you up to speed. Epic is a project written and produced by Herrans that began on his TikTok page, @jorgeherrans. According to Epic’s official wiki, Herrans started composing the musical work in 2019 when he was still in college. In 2021, he began posting clips of the songs he came up with, attracting new listeners and followers. Herrans had finally come out with the first official album in 2022, with the Troy Saga now garnering millions of views. Among the most popular of his releases, “Warrior of the Mind” and “Just a Man,” establish Odysseus’s mentor-mentee relationship with the Greek goddess Athena and the continued motif of the flaws in his morality in the face of a cruel world.
Herrans then released the Cyclops Saga, which sees Odysseus and his crew coming back from the war and encountering the Cyclops as they stop for supplies, marking the beginning of the Odyssey and the many years our protagonist will be kept from his kingdom and family. A couple notable tracks are “Survive” and “My Goodbye”.
“Survive” depicts Odysseus and his crew battling against the Cyclops, who threatens to eat them in retaliation for them hunting his sheep. The track features intense chanting, drums, and Herrans’s vocals as Odysseus commands his men. Because the album remains an auditory medium, the language of the music portrays the action and the stakes. An example of this is when horns underplay Odysseus’s leadership, signaling his heroic actions during the chorus. Bagpipes are introduced into the instrumental section where the Cyclops and the army clash. The bagpipes add tension to the other sounds of shouting men and clashing swords. The song builds up to the climax as the Cyclops attacks back, with only the sound of the large booms of his club as the beat between his threatening lines. The Cyclops repeats the lyrics of Odysseus’s chorus as the low moan of strings signals oncoming doom to many of Odysseus’s men.
Herrans is very open with his thought process behind the composition of each song, often sharing his drafts so fans can follow along with him. For Athena, Herrans says he uses piano trills within his music to mark the presence of the Goddess of Wisdom, along with a ticking clock to signal the stop of time. The audio mixing reflects this, as the introduction to Athena’s song begins with a cut off repeating of an ethereal synth to signal her entrance. Electric guitars often accompany Odysseus as he faces danger throughout his journey while also representing Odysseus's troubled feelings toward Athena. The motif from “Just a Man” returns as Athena realizes that Odysseus’s struggle with his actions and morality stops him from being as ruthless as he needs to be. Compared to the previous songs, “My Goodbye” is a much calmer, yet beautifully tragic piece as it signals the ending of a relationship between a mentor and her student.
I’ve discussed the musical language in previous albums, but what about the newest addition to the saga? Well, four songs have been released and Herrans’s skill of creating recognizable and prominent motifs within his music returns in the Ocean Saga.
Grand choruses and trumpets return for the introduction of “Storm,” where we are thrown in along with Odysseus and his crew as they battle the elements aboard their ships. We hear the crashing of symbols coinciding with the crashing of the waves and the electric guitars returning to play under Odysseus as he faces another perilous situation he must outmaneuver. For a moment of respite, the wind instruments come in as they spot the island in the sky, which alludes to our next song.
“Luck Runs Out” features a duet between Odysseus and Eurylochus, played by Armando Julián. The melodic and softer song resembles modern pop. It not only captures the trust between two long friends, but the authority clash between Captain and right-hand-man. “Luck Runs Out” deals with many points, such as Aeolus and his tricks, the distrust between Odysseus and his crew, and Odysseus's aching need to go back to his family. “Keep Your Friends Close” uses playful wind flutes and angelic voices to make up the background. Kira Stone plays the equally playful and tricky Aeolus, God of the Wind. Abruptly, the music becomes dark as the little playful voices of backup singers betray Odysseus as he tries to keep his newly gifted bag of wind. The chorus from “Storm” returns within the song as Odysseus’s crew opens the bag, leading them getting blown right into the path of a vengeful God of the Sea.
As hardcore as any villain song can get, “Ruthlessness” lives up to its name, featuring the talents of singer Steven Rodriguez, who captures the harsh reality and looming danger of an angered god with his rough vocals. The introduction is a powerful one, with its rapid piano entrance leading up to a heavy booming and the choral chanting of Poseidon’s name. Electric guitars fully back up Poseidon as he takes his revenge for the murder of his son, the Cyclops he had blinded before. With his performance, Rodriguez captures a villain we love to hate, teaching Odysseus a harsh lesson: that ruthlessness is necessary when dealing with a vicious world.
[Collaboration with @gigi for the teaser EPIC: Th... | kira stone | TikTok]
The Ocean Saga has Odysseus facing the consequences of his actions, all while hammering into him that his mercy and hesitation will cost the lives he seeks to protect. The musical language of electric guitars and rampant trumpets, which accompany danger, or calmer moments with softer, upbeat instrumentals, all work together to color Odysseus’s journey back home. With his killing of Prince Hector’s baby in the Troy Saga to losing his crew and men in his battle with the Cyclops and his face-off with Poseidon, Odysseus continues to struggle with the dangerous balance of doing what is best for himself and crew and doing what he believes is right.
I would recommend checking Epic’s albums out, even if you have no desire to look into every detail. So far, there have only been three released sagas out of the planned nine. Herrans also has an extensive amount of TikToks and shorts going into detail about his current process and snippets of songs he’s planning. Not only is the music thoughtfully made, based on a timeless classic of Greek literature, but it is a chance to join an online community where many artists and creatives have embraced Herran’s work and continue to add to it. It truly is an amazing thing to be a part of.
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