city of vermilion
South Dakota residents take note: This is a work of fancy. Any resemblance to municipalities living or deadsville is purely unintentional
Vermilion: the extraordinary, dimensionless metropolis inhabited by formless colors. (Fans of Flatland — Edwin Abbott Abbott's classic of math and Victorian-era mores — will immediately perceive a certain sister-city simpatico between the two.)
Just as Flatland had its perils, the residents of Vermilion will tell you as well that the Frog was right when he lamented "It aint easy being green" –– or Arylide yellow, or Cadet or what have you. Life in Vermilion is a tumultuous affair.
"Vermilionaires" (as they are known) are highly social, or at least socially rather high. Many of them enjoy being the kind of dazzling, glittering sorts who hang out as much as anybody. Certain combinations prove less than harmonious however, and all who dwell in Vermilion are acutely aware that unchecked over-blending will quickly turn their world to mud.
It's a continual struggle between the compelling urge to mix on the one hand, and their civic duty to prevent a complete visual crap-out on the other. Kind of like as if paying your taxes was a color seminar exercise. For ages untold, the citizens of Vermilion have maintained a balance between the putrid and the pure.
Now as any veteran of an Exploding Plastic Inevitable event will tell you, every color needs a sound. Vermilionaires are no exception: they make music, argue about it, publish a "Hot 100"… the whole nine. And so we have City Of Vermilion — formed, so the story goes, from a burst of (purple?) envy prompted by the mistaken notion that every city has an eponymous band to champion its existence. (Apparently CoV's members were unaware that only a handful of places such as Boston, Chicago, or Garrison, NY actually exposed their reputations to the danger of inextricable linkage with whatever claptrap the bands named for them were dishing out.)
Nevertheless, a band was formed and whether or not we're fortunate about it, the tension headache studio has happened upon an association with this rather baffling entity. Through circumstances we can not comfortably reveal, we've become a conduit for the sounds of colors hailing from this strange and wonderful place.
Editor's Note: Some of you who are familiar with Fellow Traveler might be guessing that he had something to do with what might be called the "ambassadorial" side of this hook-up. Our lips are sealed on that, but… well, you know how he rolls.