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Browse by Artist: BIOSPHERE
Artist:
BIOSPHERE
Title:
Cirque
Label:
TOUCH (UK)
Format:
CD
Price:
$14.50
Catalog #:
TO 046CD
Touch is reissuing the classic
Cirque
by
Biosphere
, originally released in 2000. Quite unlike any other,
Geir Jenssen
's so-called "Arctic Sound" transforms the space in which it is played. Biosphere's music is an intimate reflection of the space and climate of Jenssen's Arctic base in Tromsö, Norway, but made universal. Adjectives like "glacial" and "remote" do no justice to the intense emotion of the music. 1997's
Substrata
showcased a sound whose dimensions evoked the luscious quality of
Brian Eno
's
On Land
,
Arvo Pärt
and even the best of
Ennio Morricone
. Three years later, Biosphere produced
Cirque
. Here, the shifting world of
Substrata
is fused with the liquid electronic rhythms of Biosphere's earlier work in techno. The outcome is almost addictive -- layers of detail reveal themselves as you listen and appreciate the convergences deep within the music, between classical and pop, the soundtrack and its voiceover.
Cirque
is inspired in part by the story of
Chris McCandless
, who, in April 1992, hitchhiked to Alaska and walked alone into the wilderness, only to be found dead four months later having made a tragic error with his food supply. McCandless' quest represented ultimate folly, but to others, rare idealism in his solo rebellion of stepping off the treadmill to go living in the wild.
Cirque
reflects this idealism, but also the danger lurking in paradise. The music plays like a film, one scene dissolving into the next. Codas pinpoint the action like spotlights, and location recordings weave in and out of the sound giving it the dramatic tension of a great documentary. There is nothing old-fashioned, however, in the outcome.
Cirque
is future music. Cinema for the spirit.
Artist:
BIOSPHERE
Title:
Substrata 2
Label:
TOUCH (UK)
Format:
2CD
Price:
$18.00
Catalog #:
TO 050CD
2001 release, repressed! "Biosphere's 2nd release for Touch after
Cirque
is a double CD in digipak designed by Jon Wozencroft. The release consists of: CD1 --
Substrata
: Originally released in 1997 on All Saints Records, this remastered version of
Substrata
contains 11 tracks with a total length of 55:20. '...by many (the undersigned included) considered to be the finest ambient album of the 1990s'. CDTwo --
Man with a Movie Camera
: Contains 9 tracks, total length 53:32. The first 7 tracks consist of the soundtrack to
Man with a Movie Camera
[Verdov, USSR 1929], originally commissioned for the Tromsø International Film Festival in 1996, released here for the first time. The last 2 tracks, 'Endurium' and 'The End of the Cyclone', were originally released on the limited edition Japanese version of
Substrata
in 1997 -- they have never before been released outside Japan."
Artist:
BIOSPHERE
Title:
Shenzhou
Label:
TOUCH (UK)
Format:
CD
Price:
$14.50
Catalog #:
TO 055CD
2002 release, repressed! "12 tracks. Design and photography by Jon Wozencroft. This is Biosphere's 3rd album for Touch, after
Cirque
[2000, TO:46] and
Substrata 2
[2001, TO:50]." Named after the Chinese spacecraft, this is Geir Jenssen's deepest and most recording yet, the first 10 tracks based on the orchestral works of Claude Debussy. Dark Ambient at its most spellbinding (without all the negative connotations one might associate with the words "dark" and "ambient"!).
Artist:
BIOSPHERE
Title:
Autour de la Lune
Label:
TOUCH (UK)
Format:
CD
Price:
$14.50
Catalog #:
TO 062CD
Fourth Biosphere release on Touch. "Widely regarded as one of Norwegian electronic music's most important artists, Biosphere's [Geir Jenssen] career spans nearly two decades, six albums, lots of remixes, various sound installations, commissions, soundtracks and even the odd Himalayan summit. Says Jenssen on his latest commission: '
Radio France Culture contacted me some time ago and proposed a commission that was to be premiered at the Le Festival de Radio France et Montpellier. I was granted access to Radio France's archives and given permission to use this vast source of audio material. I settled on this early '60s dramatization of Jules Verne's
De la Terre ā la Lune
that totally captivated me. The story is quite amazing -- Verne wrote it in the nineteenth century; still he managed to describe a manned space flight in such detail one is stunned. In
De la Terre ā la Lune
Verne describes a space mission that sees the astronauts launched from Florida and returning from space to land in the Pacific Ocean -- exactly the same procedure that the US space program would follow many, many years later. I have sampled bits and pieces of the dramatization's dialogue, coupled it with sounds recorded at the MIR space station and then incorporated it with my own compositions.
' Following the original broadcast, Jenssen continued to work on the recording which now sees the light of day as
Autour de la Lune
, a 74 minute symphony made up of nine 'movements'. The propulsive opening sequence 'Translation' gives way to the crosstalk and scrambled communications of 'Rotation' and 'Modifié', before the listener is enveloped in a dense and seemingly endless space (the sound of zero gravity?). The circular flight of
Autour de la Lune
is Biosphere at his most expansive. Featuring a specially-commissioned painting by Tor-Magnus Lundeby, one of Norway's most prominent visual artists, this new release is set to compete with Brian Eno's 'Apollo' recordings as the definitive homage to the space age."
Artist:
BIOSPHERE
Title:
Dropsonde
Label:
TOUCH (UK)
Format:
CD
Price:
$14.50
Catalog #:
TO 066CD
Biosphere is Norwegian composer and performer
Geir Jenssen
, and this is his fifth release for Touch. In the early 1990s he was a pioneer of so-called "ambient techno," but since then, he has refined his sound into something more magnetic and enduring.
Dropsonde
isn't a soundtrack like the interwoven
Substrata
nor an episodic journey in the way that
Autour de la Lune
is. Here Geir Jenssen is pushing new directions towards the jazz colors of
Miles Davis
and
Jon Hassell
, while re-invigorating the pulse and projection of his signature sound: a hypnotic combination of pleasure and dread. The spatial aspects some have dubbed "Arctic sound" but as
Exclaim
from Canada put it, "
in order to climb higher, you must first go deeper.
"
Jon Savage
adds: "
As with all of the Biosphere albums, the music draws you in and makes you want to listen and feel. Jenssen's work acts on a very emotional level, one that encourages you to drift away into a haze of images and scenes brought to you by the music, where spectacular beauty hides unseen danger. Intense and moving, but comforting and soothing at the same time.
" Just as a
dropsonde
(weather balloon) measures pressure, humidity, and temperature, this is synaesthetic, carefully-measured music. Liquid beats, samples as snapshots, and faraway speeches combine to produce a surprisingly deep human warmth.
Artist:
BIOSPHERE
Title:
Dropsonde
Label:
TOUCH (UK)
Format:
LP
Price:
$12.50
Catalog #:
TO 066LP
Biosphere is Norwegian composer and performer
Geir Jenssen
, and this is his fifth release for Touch. In the early 1990s he was a pioneer of so-called "ambient techno," but since then, he has refined his sound into something more magnetic and enduring.
Dropsonde
isn't a soundtrack like the interwoven
Substrata
nor an episodic journey in the way that
Autour de la Lune
is. Here Geir Jenssen is pushing new directions towards the jazz colors of
Miles Davis
and
Jon Hassell
, while re-invigorating the pulse and projection of his signature sound: a hypnotic combination of pleasure and dread. The spatial aspects some have dubbed "Arctic sound" but as
Exclaim
from Canada put it, "
in order to climb higher, you must first go deeper.
"
Jon Savage
adds: "
As with all of the Biosphere albums, the music draws you in and makes you want to listen and feel. Jenssen's work acts on a very emotional level, one that encourages you to drift away into a haze of images and scenes brought to you by the music, where spectacular beauty hides unseen danger. Intense and moving, but comforting and soothing at the same time.
" Just as a
dropsonde
(weather balloon) measures pressure, humidity, and temperature, this is synaesthetic, carefully-measured music. Liquid beats, samples as snapshots, and faraway speeches combine to produce a surprisingly deep human warmth. Vinyl-only release for now; CD version will follow in 2006. One track, "In the Shape of A Flute", is exclusive to the vinyl edition. Last copies, deleted edition.
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