Bio

1980'S

In  1983, Mike started playing guitar, he was influenced by Angus &  Malcolm Young of AC/DC. After hearing Another Brick In The Wall Part 2  by Pink Floyd on the radio, you could always hear Mike singing "We don't  need no education..." Mike hated going to school and he decided he  wanted to create music for a living. He bought his first real guitar a  Gibson SG-62 Reissue around 1988. Mike was in a few high school bands  which never went anywhere. He was also lead singer in one band for 2  weeks until the original singer returned. Mike listened to mostly metal,  blues, hardcore, crossover music throughout the 80's.

1990’s

In  the summer of 1991, Mike first heard Godflesh, the album was  Streetcleaner. The moment Like Rats started Mike's mouth dropped to the  floor and he was blown away. Mike joined the US Navy and wore out his  copy of the Streetcleaner cassette tape he bought and then bought the  CD. Mike stationed on the Pacific Northwest in the US, Mike started to  listen to Grunge, mostly Alice in Chains, Soundgarden, and Pearl Jam.  Mike listened to Seattle's KNDD, The End, and discovered Tool and  Portishead. Mike expanded the styles of music he listened to. He started  to listen to The Prodigy as well as other electronic music.

When he returned home from the Navy, Mike discovered Bolt Thrower's ...For Victory, which is still in heavy rotation today.

2000'S

Mike  moved around the US, bought a Kurzweil K2000 and started to learned how  to play the keyboard. On the K2000, Mike created the Original Sea  Breeze, the versions that are available today were based on the original  Sea Breeze. 

Around 2004, Mike  purchased Reason 2.5/3 and starting working with MIDI and soft synths  for the first time.  Mike wrote a few tracks and actually thought they  were good. With no clue how to mix, he released the songs he wrote on  CD-R and gave it to his friends.  Those songs can be found here:  https://archive.org/details/Tracks-From-2005 

SYNTHETIC MIND DECAY & SECONDS BEFORE AWAKENING

Mike  was told that the music he was creating sounded like Ambient/Breakbeat.  Frustrated with trying to get the drums sounds we wanted, he removed  the drums from the equation and started to work on Ambient and Dark  Ambient and Synthetic Mind Decay (SMD) was born. 

Around  2008, a co-worker of Mike's said the music of Synthetic Mind Decay was  good music to sleep to. Mike then had the idea to create ambient music  to sleep to. Mike was thinking of a new name for the sleep music project  and in homage of Salvador Dalí, he came up with Seconds Before  Awakening. While living in the Tampa Bay area, Mike became a big fan of  Salvador Dalí and visited The Dalí, a museum in St Petersburg, FL https://thedali.org/. If you haven't ever visited it, is a must. 

Mike created 12 SMD albums and/or EPs which can be downloaded for free at: https://archive.org/search.php?query=creator%3A%22Synthetic+Mind+Decay%22 

Mike Created 14 SBA albums and/or EPs which can be downloaded for free at:  https://archive.org/search.php?query=creator%3A%22Seconds+Before+Awakening%22 

While  creating the 26 albums/EPs for both SMD & SBA, Mike started to feel  like each new release sounded very similar to the previous release.  Still creating ambient but in other styles, Mike started a few side  projects, created new names, in order not to confuse fans (which  probably confused them more). He started "The Ghost of an Alien", which  was space ambient, "Vacant Twelve", which was ambient based on field  recordings and heavily processed. Mike also created "and the forest will  breathe", which was a tribute ambient project. 

Mike  also created a few other projects Sonitus Belli (Latin for the sounds  of war) which was supposed to be a project Mike worked with someone else  under a different name which never got off the ground.The Giraffe &  The Tree was other non-ambient project Mike has worked on. The Giraffe  & The Tree was based on a photo Mike and is the album cover for that  release and the goal was to release a new track every month.

All these releases were can be downloaded here under Vacant Twelve Recordings:   https://archive.org/details/vacant-twelve 

THE.SYNTHETIC.AWAKENING

After  realizing having so many different side projects, Mike decided to take  the names and elements of the name of most of the different projects he  worked on to create one super group. That is how he came up with  The.Synthetic.Awakening. "The" is from The Ghost of an Alien.  The"." is  from Hex.guibin. "Synthetic" is from Synthetic Mind Decay. The 2nd "."  is for something but the reason isn't available at the time of writing  this. Lastly, the Awakening is from Seconds Before Awakening. 

All releases can be downloaded for free at:  https://archive.org/details/thesyntheticawakening 

Mike  still plays guitar and it can be heard on a few songs that he has  released. Mike also is learning how to play bass and his bass playing is  on more than a few songs he has released.

Mike  is a photographer and a graphic designer; he also tries to paint  traditionally and digitally. Mike takes all the photos and creates all  the artwork for his album covers. His art can be found at:  https://www.deviantart.com/thsyntheticawakening/gallery 

To  add to the influences, which will always be a expanding list of artist.  Mike has been very inspired by Puscifer, Katatonia, Crumbsuckers,  Behemoth, Techno Animal, Ice, God, The Bug, Public Enemy, The Sisters of  Mercy, Bloodbath, The Cure, Judge, Killing Time, Agnostic Front,  Ludichri$t, Mucky Pup, Cypress Hill, Soundgarden, Alice In Chains, Pearl  Jam, Rush, Iron Maiden, Bill Laswell...