Largely a response to contemporary social, political, and even spiritual realities, Barry Cleveland's Hologramatron may be viewed as a modern-day "protest album" that draws inspiration from a musical continuum spanning art rock, psychedelia, avant-metal, ambient, global fusion, trance, and funk-with two early-'60s pop covers tossed in for kicks. Features bassist Michael Manring, Brazilian drummer and percussionist Celso Alberti (Steve Winwood, Airto Moriera), and pedal-steel iconoclast Robert Powell (Peter Gabriel, Jackson Browne), along with "avant-cabaret" vocalist Amy X Neuburg, and guest vocalists Harry Manx and Deborah Holland (Animal Logic). Additional musicians include Turkish electric/acoustic guitarist Erdem Helvacioglu, percussionists Gino Robair and Rick Walker, and the infamous Artist General. Besides playing acoustic and electric 6 and 12 string guitars, Cleveland employed a prototype of the revolutionary Moog guitar and both acoustic and electric guitar viols-hybrid bowed instruments tuned like a guitar along with myriad effects processors and alternative playing devices such as a Chinese erhu bow, Masley Bowhammers, and the ebow.