CHARACTER 002 · MY BLACK HEART
The Woman With The Black Heart
She loved once. It did not go well. She has since decided that feelings are vastly overrated.
ENTER HER STORY →
A collection of songs, stories and unfortunate people.
Enter at your own discretion.
VOL. I · THE HOUSE OF MISFORTUNE
THE HOUSE OF CARNIVALESQUE OBSCURA
Welcome, ladies and gentlemen.
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You have stumbled upon a curious little corner of the night.
Here you will find songs about sinners, romantics, misfits, villains, broken hearts and people who have made several questionable decisions in succession.
They are not heroes. They are not entirely villains either. They are simply the inhabitants of this strange carnival — the damned, the beautiful, and everyone who falls somewhere between.
CHARACTER FILE · 001
The Ringmaster
A.K.A. THE DEVIL
“Everyone has a price. Some people simply haven't been introduced to it yet.”
Proprietor. Host. Occasional tempter. The Devil runs the show with the confidence of a man who has never once had to read the terms and conditions.
He knows everyone's secrets, remembers everyone's sins and has an irritating tendency to appear precisely when someone is about to make a terrible decision.
OccupationRingmaster & TempterSpecialityBad ideas, beautifully presentedCurrent whereaboutsBehind the curtain
READ HIS CONTRACT →
THE CAST
The Damned & The Beautiful
Every song needs somebody to blame.
CHARACTER 003 · ANOTHER DAY
The Melancholic
A man who has made an art form of disappointment, introspection and staring accusingly into mirrors.
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CHARACTER 004 · SHE MAKES ME NERVOUS
The Nervous Romantic
He has survived heartbreak, loneliness and existential dread. Then she walked into the room.
ENTER HIS STORY →
CHARACTER 005 · HOLD ME TO THE NIGHT
The Lovers
Beautiful. Doomed. Entirely aware that dawn is coming and choosing not to discuss it.
ENTER THEIR STORY →THE CARNIVAL SONGBOOK
Seven Tales From The Dark
Turn the page. Try not to judge the characters too harshly. They are already doing that themselves.
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The Devil's Bargain
A deal with the Ringmaster. A signature in blood. A spectacularly poor decision.
Why Won't Everybody Just Leave Me Alone
An entirely reasonable request from a man who has had quite enough of everybody.
My Black Heart
Some hearts break. Others simply learn to enjoy the darkness.
After The Rain
The storm passes. The world carries on. Not everyone gets the memo.
She Makes Me Nervous
Love at first sight, if first sight had been accompanied by a mild panic attack.
Nobody Can Take It All Away
When everything else is stripped away, some things stubbornly remain.
Reflections on Melancholia and the Gentle Art of Self-Hatred
A lengthy title for a man with plenty of time to think about what went wrong.
THE ILLUSTRATED EDITION
The songs become stories.
These aren't simply songs sitting on a page. Each one belongs to a world.
Gothic streets. Broken mirrors. Blood-red contracts. Moonlit lovers. Devils in expensive coats. People who should probably have made better choices.
The Carnivalesque Obscura website becomes their comic book — part songbook, part character archive, part dark little theatre.
BROWSE THE CAST“
We don't make the darkness.— THE RINGMASTER
We merely give it a stage.
THE FINAL CURTAIN
The Carnival Never Really Closes.
When the music stops, the characters go home.
The Ringmaster doesn't.
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See you after dark.