Nok Varen

Nok Varen was born in Levski. He grew up in a station where the noise never truly stops, even when you think you are alone. At the age of ten, a Vanduul attack took his parents, both miners. After that, Nok learned to get by on his own, without really knowing how. He found refuge in music. Not to understand things, just to endure.

He listened a lot. To everything. But he always came back to electronic music, to those constructed sounds, sometimes imperfect, capable of filling space without asking for explanation. Music became a stable place, when everything else was moving too fast.

Nok became an electronic maintenance technician. He fixed what stopped working, and sometimes, if time allowed, he modified modules just to see how far they could go. In Levski, his work naturally led him to the equipment of The People’s Radio. At first, he only came to repair. Then he stayed a little longer. That was how he met Jade. They connected quickly, without effort. From that point on, TPR called him directly for troubleshooting and electronic maintenance, bypassing the usual channels.

Over time, Nok learned to listen differently. He observed how tracks were built, how sounds were assembled, how silence was allowed to breathe. He sometimes tried mixing, without really knowing what he was doing. He liked it when things sounded right, but not too clean. He was afraid of getting it wrong, but even more afraid of freezing things in place.

He also dreamed of seeing something other than Nyx, and above all of having his own ship, with a small space to tinker, maybe a computer, and somewhere to listen, try things, remix. Since Nyx did not offer much for that, he set course for Stanton. There, he met ordinary people, busy with their lives, who wrote, sang, or played without trying to build a career. Very quickly, a simple idea crossed his mind. What if they tried something together.

As he was leaving Orison, Nok drifted in suborbital space for several hours. He wrote down a few phrases, vague intentions. The idea of a collection of music and songs, carried by unknown voices of the Verse. The name came to him then. SubOrbital Records.

It was not a goal. He simply became its conductor, without really seeking it. He had the idea, but the encounters would form its heart. He kept listening, adjusting, letting things happen, as he always had, making sure that somewhere between noise and silence, something sounded right.

The week spent with those improbable encounters in the TPR studios affected him deeply. Something had changed. And on that final listening day, when Across the Clouds took shape, he knew immediately that he would continue the SubOrbital adventure, without trying too hard to know where it would lead.

Associated tracks

• The line Below (remix)
• No Safe Jump
• Across the clouds