Arjen Lucassen’s Ayreon project has just announced the release of live concert, 01011001 – Live Beneath the Waves, on 17 May, through Music Theories Recordings / Mascot Label Group. The first footage from the movie is now out in the form of the track, “The Sixth Extinction.” Watch it in the article below, and find out more.
It’s been twelve years since composer Arjen Lucassen released 2010’s Victims Of The Modern Age under the Star One banner, which in itself was eight years removed from 2002’s Space Metal. Fortunately, the project’s vision remains intact despite its sporadic output with all the tropes that fans have come to expect out in full force on Revel In Time (InsideOut Music). There’s plenty of cheesy Prog goodness to go around informed by Power Metal tempos, crunchy guitars, bombastic keyboards, and a slew of vocalists delivering pop culture Sci-Fi lyrics in over-the-top fashion.
Ghost Cult scribe Lorraine Lysen caught up with the great Arjen Lucassen of Ayreon for a wide-ranging interview a few months ago. They chatted about The Electric Castle Live project, the visuals of Ayreon Universe live, working with John de Lancie, rock operas, concept albums, Vin Diesel, Star Trek TNG, upcoming new music, and much more.
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Ghost Cult scribe Lorraine Lysen caught up with the great Arjen Lucassen of Ayreon for a wide-ranging interview a few months ago. They chatted about The Electric Castle Live project, his entire career, upcoming new music, and much more. Continue reading
“Come with me now; be joyful. It is time to enter The Electric Castle!”
After the wild success of the Ayreon Universe shows in 2017, where an audience of international Ayreonauts was treated to a best-of selection of Ayreon’s most popular songs, the Poppodium 013 once again opened its gates to the gentle hordes in September of 2019. 2018 had seen the twenty-year anniversary and the re-mixed and -mastered version of Into The Electric Castle, and thus it was a logical step that this new live show centered around that album, a favourite of many. To the great thrill of not only the fans but the artists as well, Arjen managed to gather most of the cast members of the original album, and the most admirable substitutes for those who couldn’t make it. Continue reading
If perchance you have never encountered this album before, here’s the concept: way back before the new millennium, the mad genius space hippie Arjen Lucassen brought together a lot of other exceptional instrumentalists and vocalists and made an album. On this album, some unknown entity has kidnapped a bunch of characters from various points in earth’s timeline and brought them together for what seems like the ultimate psychedelic escape room: the Electric Castle. Here, the characters are confronted with their culture’s beliefs around death, self, and the supernatural, all voiced by a phenomenal international cast, among which Sharon den Adel, Damian Wilson, and Fish.Continue reading
Ayreon is preparing a 20th-anniversary re-issue of Into The Electric Castle next month. The set was remixed and remastered by Arjen Lucassen himself and will be available on 3LP, 5-disc Earbook and Limited Edition Box Set on October 26th from Music Theories Recordings / Mascot Label Group. Continue reading
If you are familiar with Ayreon, you will probably know that these collaborative works of music are the brainchild of the somewhat reclusive Arjen Anthony Lucassen, and are rarely – if ever – performed live. September 2015 saw the presentation of The Theater Equation, four shows in which the album The Human Equation (Inside Out) was performed in its entirety in front of a live audience. While this was a successful endeavour, we had been assured for years that there would never be a live ‘best of’ performance of Ayreon.Continue reading
Progressive rock genius Arjen Lucassen, under his guise as Ayreon performed for the first time ever last September in an all-star 3-day event at 013 Club in Tilburg, NL that was a show for the ages. Now that concert documenting one of the most important artists in progressive music is coming out on DVD as Ayreon Universe: The Best Of Ayreon Live on March 30th via Music Theories Recordings / Mascot Label Group. Watch the first video for ‘Everybody Dies’ from the collection now!Continue reading
Arjen Lucassen recently announced that the new Ayreon album, The Source, will be hitting stores on April 27th via Mascot Label Group. Continue reading