Carthage Blog 3 - Utique
- Scot Stoddard
- Jun 14
- 8 min read
Updated: 5 days ago
An introduction to Utique
Carthage was not the first Phoenician colony in northern Africa, that distinction goes to the even-more ancient city of Utica, or Utigue, dating back to somewhere after 1,100 BC, although there seems to be some dispute as to the actual date. Let's just say it was there before Carthage. Utique actually means old, so think of it as "The Old City" or "Ancient of Days", whereas Carthage actually means "The New City". Utica is a Latinization of the name derived from the original Phoenician word. I decided to call the track here Utique because of that; it's closer to the original Phoenician word ˁAtiq,
Utique was founded as a port city, lying directly on the route from Phoenicia to the Strait of Gibralter, which leads from the Mediterranean Sea to the Atlantic Ocean, providing a valuable stop for mercantile vessels on trade routes for commodities such as tin or textiles.
Carthage was founded later, in 814 BC, about 40 km west of Utique. As Carthage rose to be a major power, Utique, however remained sovereign, keeping its economic and political autonomy until around 540 BC. Residents from Utique helped to build Carthage. By the 4th century BC, Utique had come under the control of Carthage but remained as a privileged ally. Soon, commercial rivalry between the two city states began to cause problems, however.
The relationship between Utique and Carthage became even worse after the First Punic War fought between Carthage and Rome in 264-241 BC, mainly on the Island of Sicily. Carthage had fought a series of wars against Greek city states, led by Syracuse, in Sicily, also, known as the Sicilian Wars in 580-265 BC. This had weakened Carthage greatly, cost them much money, and they lost a lot of potential trade revenue as a result. Carthage did not have the population of the Greek city states, nor the army of as great a size. Therefore, they relied heavily on hiring mercenaries to fight their wars. Some of those mercenaries came from Utique.
Carthaginian mercenaries also came from the neighboring Libu tribe of Libya, from which the name Libya derives. Problems arose with these mercenaries when the now-depleted coffers of Carthage could not pay the mercenaries for their services, and the Libu began a rebellion. At first, Utique refused to join the rebellion against their Carthaginian brothers, prompting the Libu to lay siege upon Utique. The Carthaginian generals Hamilcar, who was the father of the great Hannibal, and Hanno, came to the aid of Utique to defend against the rebellion and managed to end the siege against Utique. The history here gets a little sketchy, but somehow Utique, who had never previously been hostile to Carthage, defected, forcing a brief but violent war with Carthage. Carthage came out victorious, but the relationship thereafter was never the same.
Utique comes under Roman rule
Utique once again defied Carthage, and this would be the final and lasting time, when just before the Third Punic War (Track 11) in 150 BC it surrendered to the now very powerful Roman Empire, basically switching sides at the last moment. Hit this link if you'd like to know more about the Punic Wars, there's way too much history to go into here, but briefly, it was a series of three wars between Carthage and Rome that led to the eventual destruction of Carthage. As a result of Utique's participation on the Roman side, it was given the territory of Carthage and some surrounding areas as a reward. Who was once the brotherly city state to Carthage became one who helped lead to the end of the Carthaginian empire.
Utique went on to continue as a Roman colony or city state, even becoming the seat of government for the new Roman-created Africa Province, until it finally fell to the Vandals, a Germanic tribe, in 439 AD, and was then conquered a bit later in 534 AD by the Byzantines, eventually leading to its total destruction.
Today, Utique no longer exists. Even in Phoenician times, erosion and silting over of its harbor and port area was giving it troubles, and as a port city, it became difficult to navigate, thus giving it less and less significance as a port and a strategic location as time went by. Today, due to that silting over, plus the effects of agriculture and deforestation, where Utique once was is far inland, the port being totally obscured.
For our purposes, though, Utique seemed an important enough aspect in the historical context to place it in the track list for the album. Speaking of which, let's get to the music now.
So how does all this relate to the music in the track?
First I'd like to give a big Thank You to Catherine Corelli, who I've listed as a featured artist on this track. Cat contributed some fantastic guitar work, as well as helping out with the arrangement for the opening sequence and first two sections.
The first thing you hear in the track is a sample of cymbal with a very long tail, only the sample is reversed and run through a low pass filter. Next is a sample of a guitar part Cat played later in the track, placed here as a signal of what's coming up. Leitmotif, once again; I love it. This sample is also run through various filters and effects processors, making it sound distant at first, then coming closer. There's also other tracks of special effects guitars played by Cat going on here. This sequence is meant to symbolize how things change over time and how the unexpected happens. Thus, the mood here is dark and mysterious.
At :30 we jump right into Section 1, a rather bright, funky and uplifting section, setting a positive tone. But it's still complicated. The meter is 6/4, but the accents in the drums and bass don't seem to fit the meter, intentionally. This makes it actually pretty funky and very syncopated!
I had just finished writing Sections 1 and 2 and was doing a playback on my speakers when Cat walked by. She listened for a minute, and said: Play that again. So I did, naturally. Cat says: If this was my track, I'd play something like what I'm hearing in my head here. I knew what that meant, got up out of the chair, plugged in the pedalboard and handed her my Jackson Dinky JS 32. She practiced the lead in this section like twice, and we recorded it. I love what Cat was hearing in her head, but how that breaks down and relates to what the rhythm section is playing is beyond even my comprehension. Cat is an extraordinary musician, and her guitar style is unique. Unique on Utique, especially. See what I did there?
This section is meant to signify the initial peaceful co-existence of the two Phoenician city states and how they had a mutually-beneficial relationship.
At 1;42 we have a brief drums and bass interlude into Section 2. There's also a descending chord passage in the synth pad. This interlude and Section 2 indicate that the mood was changing between the two city states with the shifting political and economic dynamics. The meter switches to 7/4, so the syncopation intensifies. The drums are more intense, with the double kick drums pounding heavily.
I had already scratch-tracked some rhythm guitars here, and Cat played off what I had already done, adding that repeating theme that you heard at the beginning of the track as the lead in this section, and a "rhythm lead", as well, two tracks. At about 2:10 we reach the bridge of this section, and the meter switches back to 6/4, only this time as a more traditional two bars of three beats feeling. Here I played the harmony lead guitars on the bridge. At 2;29 we go back into a repeat of the opening of this section, only Cat is now intensifying her leads even more. This section ends and flows seamlessly into Section 3.
At 2:50 we go into Section 3, the beautiful and melodic theme that represents the calming once again of the situation between Carthage and Utique. In this section you'll hear mostly a piano and lead guitar passage, with some pad synths and clean/chorus guitars for the rhythm; there's no drums. It's calm, melodic, soothing. I paid extra attention to the pick attack on this lead, not wanting it to be aggressive at all, playing quietly, and I love the tone, with some reverb and delay. I gain stacked my Boss DS-1 and SD-1 to get that tone, into my 1-watt tube amp's clean channel with the gain low on the clean channel and the SD-1. I've experimented a LOT with gain stacking on this album with various gain pedals, and I'll do a blog later on about the gear used so you can see what that's all about. Gain stacking, for those uninitiated in the concept, is chaining or stacking two drive pedals together to get a desired tone, usually with the lowest gain pedal first in the line; but there's no wrong answers here, try everything!
Section 4, at 3;52, all hell breaks loose as Carthage and the Phoenician Empire gets into the series of Sicilian Wars with the Greek city states. Think of this section as a walk through the Utique necropolis to pay tribute to the dead from the war. This section features very heavy guitar tones thanks to a Boss Metal Zone MT-2 stacked with the SD-1 for extra sustain and bite. The drums are pounding and the pad synth plays a dark, mysterious part for added tension. The theme repeats twice, with an intense synth pattern playing over the second half. The meter is a straight 4/4.
Which brings us the Section 5, which is a interpretation of one of Cat's parts from Section 2. Only now, we've stayed in 4/4 and straightened out the rhythm for a more calm and peaceful feeling. This indicates the Carthaginian Phoenician victory of the Greek city states, and shows how things were once again, although briefly, okay between Carthage and Utique. The drums are straight and half time, more subdued, the piano has the melody, there's some clean/chorus guitars going on again, and the flow is rather nice and soothing. In the second repeat of this section, the meter stays the same but the drums and rhythm section switch to straight time while the melodies are carried out in harmony lead guitars.
At 5:25 we arrive at Section 6, which acts as an interlude to get us set up for the end of the track. It's basically a repeat of the opening sequence, this time with drums being syncopated for those unexpected snare drum hits. It's half time, and the second repeat builds to the end section in straight time.
At 5:46 we're back to war again, and this time it's not good. Rome and the Punic wars are coming. The rhythms are intense once again, and the lead guitar is screaming and crying with pain. There's once again yet another interpretation of Cat's lead from Section 2 that helps to tie this whole track together. We fight through the battles here, only to end up at the Utique necropolis once more to bring the track to its fateful and dramatic conclusion.
Conclusion
I hope you've enjoyed this discussion of the history of Utique, as well as the breakdown of the music elements and what they represent. It was a really fun track to write, produce and record, with lots of juicy parts!
I've added a music player, on the Carthage page of this site, which contains the album tracks, in order, minus the last track, Fall of Carthage, which I've just finished recording. That's right, recording is now complete for this album, and we need to mix down the last three tracks and get it out for y'all! Currently, tracks 10 and 11 in the player are still in demo form, so bear with me, the final versions will be up soon! And don't forget to subscribe to the site, you'll be among the first to know everything that's going on with my music. Feel free to check out the other blog posts, as well. I'm trying to made them very entertaining!
I wish everyone the best. Stay calm amidst all the wars, political unrest and confusion in the world, and just sit back and listen to some good music; it will help get you through these tough times.
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