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The Alien Jams - Live At The H.R. Giger Museum


Guest antic

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The Arabesque page just came up and at this time is empty, but you can read about the story of the album - and listen to a sample of the music - on Cosmosis' page:

 

http://cosmosis.co.uk/blog/cosmosis-and-ajja-live-giger-museum

 

Last weekend saw a one-off, improvised live electronic performance by Cosmosis and Ajja at the Giger Museum, Switzerland. The artist HR Giger is probably best known for designing the creatures in the Alien Movies as well as the entire sets for the movies.

 

We were there to improvise a sonic backdrop to the Art-Fusion event: (four visual artists. Paul Booth, Sabine Gaffron,Titine Leu, and Filip Leu painting a large canvas simultaneously in realtime in front of a live audience ) on the opening night of Paul Booth's exhibition in the museum.

Ajja and I kicked off the music just after the international press conference had finished and the painting had begun...

Given that the audience came primarily to see the live painting, most people were watching the live painting not us, which meant that Ajja and I could just concentrate fully on playing instruments, creating sounds and making the music without having to worry too much about what we looked like or putting on a show...

Both of us took turns playing whatever instrument the other wasn't playing - either bass guitar, classical guitar, electric guitar, swapping over instruments sometimes several times during one track . Additionally we were recording live loops of those instruments on the fly - as well as tweaking cutoff on acid sequences, playing the dub fx sends and the kaoss pad. Occasionally both Ajja and I ended up playing electric guitar.

Actually "taking turns" sounds a lot more organised than it was, it was more chaotic than that - we really just went with playing whatever instrument the music required at that moment - attempting to improvise the music we were creating in realtime to catch the vibe present in the room during the "PJ" set.

We recorded a multitrack of the instruments seperately and are currently working in the studio, mixing down some of the material for a live album - tentatively titled, yes, you've guessed it: "Live at The Giger Museum"

The music runs from trippy-ambient to rock-edged, trancy electronic funk (With tempos maxing out at 112bpm)

 

I'm happy it will finally get released! :wub:

 

Now, it's time for a new Cosmosis album ...

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  • 2 weeks later...

Samples are up!

 

Looks like they've taken the live material they recorded there and then tweaked it in the studio. Sounds a lot like Cosmosis' guitar tracks on "Contact" or "Trancendance" albums, which is great!

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  • 2 weeks later...

pr022.jpg

 

Info http://peakrec.com/releases/all/release_id/25.html

 

Previews http://tinyurl.com/thealienjams

 

Peak Records is proud to present THE ALIEN JAMS, the eagerly anticipated live guitar chill album by AJJA & COSMOSIS.

Recorded in 2011, during an Art Fusion Experiment in the HR Giger Museum in Switzerland, "THE ALIEN JAMS" is the live recording of a free-style improvised concert by AJJA & COSMOSIS.While renowned artists Paul Booth, Filip Leu, Titine K-Leu and Sabine Gaffron painted simultaneously on a canvas for several hours before a live audience, AJJA & COSMOSIS played music inspired by this unique artistic event unfolding before their eyes.Using acoustic, electric and electronic instruments, combined with laptops and live looping techniques, AJJA & COSMOSIS allowed their imaginations to guide them on this epic, funky, chill voyage.

Packed full of psychedelic electronica, hypnotic beats, deep ambient sections, irresistible grooves and superb guitars. "THE ALIEN JAMS" is an impromptu trip to another world, captained by two of todays finest talents.

Featuring nine selected tracks from the original concert recording, "THE ALIEN JAMS" is a collection of beautifully produced chill, funk and dance beats intuitively interwoven with the unique guitars and psychedelic sounds of AJJA & COSMOSIS.Get into the groove, relax and float downstream to where "THE ALIEN JAMS"!

 

Track List :

01 Into The Deep - 100bpm - 7:26

02 Aquamarine - 81bpm - 8:35

03 Rhodes To Nowhere - 100bpm - 10:41

04 Desert Dawn - 112bpm - 7:46

05 Around The Bend - 84bpm - 8:04

06 Open Horizon - 100bpm - 10:08

07 Marimbad - 88bpm - 9:36

08 Cactus Shack - 69bpm - 5:16

09 Alien Jam - 71bpm - 10:20

 

 

Recorded live in November 2011 at the The HR Giger Museum in Switzerland

 

All original backing tracks (except #8) composed by Ajja S.F. Leu

Live performance, overdubs, post-production, mixing and mastering by Ajja S.F. Leu & William Halsey

 

Original guitar artwork by Filip Leu - www.leufamilyiron.com

Digital artwork and graphics by Ajja & Tanina Munchkina - www.peakrec.com

Photos by Bobby C. Alkabes - www.bobbyalkabes.com

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  • 3 weeks later...
  • 2 weeks later...
Guest antic

omg this album is amazing

and a must listen/purchase!

 

I'm quite disappointed myself :( True it is different from 90% of psy-chill / down tempo stuff, but I can't get rid of the feeling that they've put minimal effort in it, except for maybe 2-3 tunes. In short it's guitar "noodling" over a repetitive drum / bass loop with some FX added later on. There's little variation, very rarely you can find an "idea" in any of those songs, a main theme that drives it and that you could memorize as a lead motif. Don't get me wrong - I'm a die hard fan of guitar music and Bill has all the skills and musical expertise to play catchy riffs, various styles and sounds and there are some genuinely awesome hooks here and there; but compared to any of the chill-out tunes on his full-length trance albums (e.g. "Tim's Trip" from Trancendance) this sounds a lot less involved, much simpler and raw.

 

Apparently, with this being a "live" album this was to be expected, but in retrospect I'd prefer a live versions of old tunes instead, like Ott or Shpongle are doing. Improvisation in itself is great, if ALL parts of the music - leads, bass, drums, chord progressions - evolve and react live to what's happening, creating something unique. Otherwise it becomes very boring, very quickly :(

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at first listen i got realy bored with it,but played this on a friday

afternoon at friends house and it was so good,not complicated or interesting

but realy set's good mood while playing at the background.

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Guest antic

at first listen i got realy bored with it,but played this on a friday

afternoon at friends house and it was so good,not complicated or interesting

but realy set's good mood while playing at the background.

 

 

It's a bit less involving than I expected, but pretty damn good all the same, IMO.

 

My thoughts exactly...

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  • 11 months later...

at first listen i got realy bored with it,but played this on a friday

afternoon at friends house and it was so good,not complicated or interesting

but realy set's good mood while playing at the background.

 

In short, it's really good museum music, probably perfect for watching the four artists draw up their live painting, probably quite good while looking at other displays in the Geiger. It is not a bad release but on its own it is not a great one, either.

 

Incidentally, Plastikman released a similar, but techno-based, recording that he did at the Guggenheim in 2013. Same result, nice background music but not meant to be the main exhibit.

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  • 1 year later...

Yeah, I came back to listening this last weekend and - after some time off - this sounds really awesome! Perhaps I had too high expectations for this in the beginning, but it really holds its own now as a great background music. I'd still appreciate some more variety within the tunes themselves, like some more sophisticated transitions, key-note changes, etc. but what's there is already pretty great. I know the tunes by heart now and love almost all of them, maybe except "Around the bend" which has this dark, menacing atmosphere that somehow doesn't click with me.

 

I hope Cosmosis comes back with some new music soon - he's been silent since this release in late 2013 and since 2009 for a up-tempo trancey stuff.

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