Everywhere at the End of Time

About

Everywhere At The End of Time is a series of albums released by British ambient musician The Caretaker that explore the concept of dementia and how it destroys the mind. Released in 6 parts, the series centers around pieces of ballroom jazz music that over time become corrupted, and destroyed, simulating the memories of one afflicted with dementia. Since the release of its final part, the project has gained a reputation online for being emotionally disturbing, resulting in the project becoming the focus of memes and discussions online.

Composition

Everywhere At The End of Time was fully made over the course of 10 years, in the form of 6 full-length album installments or "stages". On September 22nd, 2016, Kirby released the first installment, describing the project as the end of the Caretaker alias. The series was described as the music the character of The Caretaker would make as he goes through the stages of early onset dementia from start to finish after being diagnosed with the illness. The project would see a release twice a year for the next three years. The final "stage" was released on March 13th, 2019 (album covers shown below).^[1]

In an interview with The Quietus, he stated his reasoning for ending the alias:

“I think I’m coming to the end of The Caretaker. I just can’t see where I can take it after this. My final idea has been to give the whole project dementia. Originally I was going to make one recording and take it down into the abyss over a period of three years. So the idea would have been to do one recording and degrade it, to process it down so you would get a continuation from the start to the end point. But then I thought, “Wouldn’t it be better to give the whole project dementia?” That then forces me to think, “Well, what do I remember from the project myself?” Because it’s nearly 20 years since I started making the first record. And then I developed this idea of doing six releases each with a gap of six months between each one to give a sense of time passing.”

Online History

Upon the release of its final installment, the series received acclaim from critics and internet users alike. The complete series carries a 4.3 average on RateYourMusic^[2] and a 4.5 average on SputnikMusic, with the flagged review being a 5/5.^[3] The most popular upload of the full composition was made by YouTube user vvmtest in March of 2019 (shown below), which to date has over 3.5 million views.

Later that year, on October 20th, 2019 YouTuber Pad Chennington released a video list titled "Top 13 Disturbing Albums on the Internet"(shown below). In that video, he listed Everywhere At The End of Time as his #1 pick. This video to date has over 240,000 views.

The following year, the album began to get major attention from internet users. One of the earliest examples of internet notoriety was a video by YouTube user HancKK, which used footage of music reviewer Anthony Fantano crying in reaction to Mac Miller's "Good Things" juxtaposed with music from the record (shown below). As of October 20th, 2020, the video had over 330,000 views.

Through 2020, the album gained major traction on YouTube. On June 11th, 2020 YouTuber A Bucket of Jake made a video detailing his thoughts on the album, calling it "the darkest album I have ever heard" (shown below, top left), gaining over 970,000 views in five months. On May 24th, user Sobadsosad made a 7-minute abridged version of the album, focusing on the album's theme of degradation as it occurred to the album's first track "It's Just a Burning Memory"(shown below, top right), gaining over 182,000 views. On March 15th, YouTube user boltun made a Penis Music video using the piece's music titled "dementia music". The video gained over 40,000 views prior to being unlisted (shown below, bottom left). On May 17th, 2020, user Clock uploaded a video titled "A song plays in a store, however it's the end of the world", which featured one of the songs from the piece, accompanied with atmospheric background noise (shown below, right), gaining over 97,000 views in six months.

In addition, the series has become a popular online challenge on platforms like TikTok, where people are dared to listen to the record in full. As of October 20th, the TikTok hashtag #everywhereattheendoftime had over 5.2 million views (examples shown below).

This, along with the meme status of the record in general, has triggered a backlash amongst some who find the idea to be disrespectful to victims of dementia (examples shown below)

The popularity of the composition on TikTok was covered by Junkee,^[4]The Quietus^[5] and other outlets.

Various Examples

Search Interest

External References