Air

The iPhone music app was created by musician / software designer Peter Chilvers and Irish vocalist Sandra O’Neill. Based on concepts developed by Brian Eno, with whom Chilvers created Bloom, Air assembles vocal and piano samples into an ever changing composition, which will be familiar, but never the same.

Brian Eno’s Air

Air features four “Conduct” modes, which let the user control the composition by tapping different areas on the display, and three “Listen” modes, which provide a choice of arrangement.

For those fortunate enough to have access to multiple iPhones and speakers, an option has been provided to spread the composition over several players. Recommended for headphones and external speakers.

At $1.99, Air was a instant purchase at Synthtopia.

If you give it a try, let me know what you think of it!

Free Music Friday: Air is releasing their latest single, Do The Joy, as a free download for subscribers to the Air newsletter.

via airofficial

This is a classic track from Air, Le soleil est près de moi.

Le soleil est près de moi
Le soleil est près de moi
Le soleil est près de moi
Le soleil est près de moi

Le soleil est près de moi
Le soleil est près de moi
Le soleil est près de moi
Le soleil est près de moi
Anywhere, I want you
Anywhere, I want you

Anywhere I want

Anywhere I want
Le soleil est près de moi
Le soleil est près de moi
Le soleil est près de moi….Le soleil est près de moi

via airofficial

The 12-track followup to 2007’s Pocket Symphony will be headed by the Love 2?s viral single, Do The Joy on July 7th. The first physical single, Sing Sang Sung will be released August 25th. Air is planning a European tour in early 2010, followed by a US tour in the spring.

Love 2 Tracklist:

• Do the Joy
• Love
• So Light Is Her Footfall
• Be a Bee
• Missing the Light of the Day
• Tropical Disease
• Heaven’s Light
• Night Hunter
• Sing Sang Sung
• Eat My Beat
• You Can Tell It to Everybody
• African Velvet

Music video for Air’s La Femme D’Argent, by Guillaume Delaperriere.

Apache My Bitch Up

Air – Kelly Watch The Stars (Moog Cookbook Remix)

Apache Vs Chemical Brothers

Apache vs Voodoo People

Apache – the “Come to Daddy” mix

This gets my vote as the scariest mashup:

It just goes to show – any song can be mashed up with the Apache video. There’s plenty more at the

Originally released in 1998, Moon Safari melded Pink Floyd prog-rock with electronic music and went on to sell over two million copies.

In addition to the original record, the reissue contains a handful of interesting extras including a second disc of b-sides, unreleased tracks and live tracks recorded during the era. It also comes with a book and a documentary DVD about Nicolas Godin and Jean-Benoit Dunckel.

Tracklist:

01 La Femme d’Argent
02 Sexy Boy
03 All I Need
04 Kelly Watch the Stars
05 Talisman
06 Remember
07 You Make It Easy
08 Ce Matin Là
09 New Star in the Sky
10 Le Voyage De Pénélope

Moon Safari Remixes, Rarities and Radio Sessions:

01 Remember (David Whitaker version)
02 Kelly Watch the Stars (live at the BBC 1998)
03 J’ai Dormi Sous L’Eau (live at the BBC 1998)
04 Sexy Boy (live at the BBC 1998)
05 Kelly Watch the Stars (Moog Cookbook remix)
06 Mabrouk (live on KCRW 1998)
07 You Make It Easy (live on KCRW 1998)
08 Bossa 96 (demo)
09 Kelly Watch the Stars (demo)
10 Sexy Boy (Beck ‘Sex Kino’ mix)

DVD

01 Eating, Sleeping, Waiting & Playing
02 Videos: Sexy Boy, Kelly Watch the Stars, All I Need, Le Soleil Est Pres De Moi
03 Album graphics

Following their acclaimed album Talkie Walkie (2004) and a sold-out Hollywood Bowl performance with full orchestra later that year, Air returns with their new album Pocket Symphony released on March 6, 2007.

The line-up for the tour is as follows: JB Dunckel on keyboards and vocals; Nicolas Godin on guitar, bass, synths, and vocals; Vincent Taurelle on keyboards; Steve Jones on guitar; and Earl Harvin returning on the drums.

4/21 Vancouver, BC Richards On Richards
4/22 Portland, OR Crystal Ballroom
4/23 Tacoma, WA Pantages Theatre
4/25 San Francisco, CA Nob Hill Masonic Center
4/26 Las Vegas, NV The Joint
4/27 Phoenix, AZ The Marquee
4/29 Indio, CA Coachella Festival
5/02 Minneapolis, MN First Avenue
5/04 Chicago, IL Riviera Theatre
5/05 Toronto, ON Kool Haus
5/06 Montreal, PQ Metropolis
5/08 Philadelphia, PA Theatre Of Living Arts
5/09 Washington, DC 9:30 Club
5/10 New York, NY Theatre at Madison Square Garden

Their new album is made up of 12 songs that were recorded over the last 18 months and produced by longtime collarorative partner Nigel Godrich, features vocals by Dunckel and Godin themselves but also from Jarvis Cocker and Neil Hannon (Divine Comedy).

While conventional instruments continue to play a great role, Air have fashioned several tracks from the new album with the unexpected addition of Far East classical instruments which Godin learnt to play from an Okinawa master – namely the koto (usually referred to as a Japanese floor harp) and the shamisen, a 3-stringed instrument which is one of Japan’s most popular classical instruments & resembles the banjo.

Working their way throughout the album as musical ricochets, these unearthly sounds of an alien nature add another motif to Air’s sonic architecture. Pocket Symphony shows a band very much on a forward path, smashing expectations while still delivering on their every promise.

Air’s Jean-Benoit Dunckel and Nicolas Godin had a big hit with their previous CD, Moon Safari. Like their previous album, 10,000 Hz Legend sounds like they’ve been listening to a lot of old Pink Floyd and cheesy pop tunes. On Legend, Air uses a sort of ironic persona that, much like Kraftwerk did with songs like “We are the Robots”. The songs are catchy and clever, but their song personas seem to detach the singers from the emotion and content of the songs.

The CD art captures the essence of Air’s music. It’s an illustration that looks a little like the work of Roger Dean for Yes covers. It shows a desolate desert with an ultra-modern building on an outcropping. You can see inside the building, and it looks like it’s half space ship, half recording studio. You can imagine Air’s music coming from a future studio like this.

The CD opener, “Electronic Performers”, sets the tone. The music combines Kraftwerk drums and Pink Floyd guitar riffs and string synth. The vocal is delivered in a robotic voice, filtered so that it sounds inhuman:

“We are the syncronizers
Send messages through time code
Midi clock rings in my mind
Machines gave me some freedom
Synthesizers gave me some wings
They drop me through twelve bit samplers
We are electronic performers
We are electronics”

Air uses this sort of detached robotic persona on many songs on 10,000 Hz Legend. While Kraftwerk’s music sounded like robots trying to make pop music, Air sounds like the same robots after they’ve done a lot of drugs, gotten disillusioned, and had some psychological problems.

“How Does It Make you Feel?” continues with this trippy electronica vibe. The song is sung by a synthesized voice that sounds a little like the text reading software on Macintosh computers. It sings a sort of love song that sounds touching and genuine at first, and then moves into ironic territory:

“At night I will protect you in your dreams
I will be your angel
You worry so much about not having enough time together
It makes no difference to me
I would be happy with just one minute in your arms
Let’s have an extended play together
You’re telling me that we live to far to love each other
But your love can stretch further than you and I can see
So how does it make you feel?”

The chorus of “How does it make you feel?” is the only part that sounds like it’s being sung by humans, and it’s a lightweight pop chorus that contrasts with the irony of the verses.

Beck shows up on a couple of tunes. On “The Vagabond”, he adds vocals and harmonica, giving the song a folk-electronica sound. Beck delivers the lyrics in a straightforward way, leaving behind the irony and distance of the other tracks. He also contributes to “Don’t Be Light”.

10,000 Hz Legend doesn’t seem to be as consistent as Moon Safari. Songs like “Lucky and Unhappy” are a great mix of pop, angst, and psychedelic influences. Some of the songs, though, like “Radio #1″, are pleasant and catchy, but don’t leave as much of an impression. “Wonder Milky Bitch” may even piss off some listeners with its dismissive lyrics:

“This is the story of a country girl
Back in town from her country house
She came to me with her muddy boots
She destroyed all my carpet
You know how to do it
Wonder milky bitch
You never wear cosmetic
You don’t like arithmetic
You know how to do it
Wonder milky bitch”

Air’s 10,000 Hz Legend isn’t a perfect album, but it succeeds in developing the Air sound. Though it’s easy to hear Air’s influences, it would be hard to imagine anyone but Air recording the tracks on this CD.