2018 marks the 20th Anniversary of the phenomenal ‘Into The Electric Castle’ by AYREON and to celebrate this Arjen Lucassen has remixed the entire album, which will be released on various formats on 26th October 2018, via Music Theories Recordings/Mascot Label Group.
Watch the EPK here:
After The Final Experiment and Actual Fantasy (Revisited), it’s time for part 3 in the Ayreon-on-vinyl saga. The stunning 20th Anniversary Limited Edition Box Set of ‘Into The Electric Castle’ will include a framed 3D-sculptured version of the cover, 4 CDs (20th Anniversary Remix + 20th Anniversary Remix Instrumentals), 1 DVD (5.1 Remix + Documentaries) and 3 LPs on exclusive gold marbled vinyl (original mix) + download card for the 20th Anniversary Remix plus a certificate of authenticity, signed by Arjen Lucassen.
Also watch the lyric video for “Across The Rainbow Bridge” here:
2018 marks the 20th Anniversary of the phenomenal ‘Into The Electric Castle’ by AYREON and to celebrate this Arjen Lucassen has remixed the entire album, which will be released on various formats on 26th October 2018, via Music Theories Recordings/Mascot Label Group.
Watch the lyric video for “Across The Rainbow Bridge” here:
Arjen Lucassen on the video:
”In honor of the 20th anniversary re-release of ‘Into The Electric Castle’ we proudly present you this cool lyric video for the newly mixed version of ‘Across the Rainbow Bridge’! It’s created once again by the amazing Wayne Joyner, I think it really captures the right mood. Hope you enjoy it too, despite that weird Hippie-dude :-)”
After The Final Experiment and Actual Fantasy (Revisited), it’s time for part 3 in the Ayreon-on-vinyl saga. The stunning 20th Anniversary Limited Edition Box Set of ‘Into The Electric Castle’ will include a framed 3D-sculptured version of the cover, 4 CDs (20th Anniversary Remix + 20th Anniversary Remix Instrumentals), 1 DVD (5.1 Remix + Documentaries) and 3 LPs on exclusive gold marbled vinyl (original mix) + download card for the 20th Anniversary Remix plus a certificate of authenticity, signed by Arjen Lucassen.
Music Theories Recordings/Mascot Label Group will be releasing ‘Ayreon Universe – The Best of Ayreon Live’ on 30 March and will be available to pre-order from 30th January.
On 15, 16, 17 September 2017, Ayreon played live for the first time ever, bringing together 16 guest singers and 11 Musicians, playing 28 songs with performances by Floor Jansen (Nightwish), Damian Wilson (Headspace), Hansi Kursch (Blind Guardian), Tommy Karevik (Kamelot), Anneke Van Giersbergen (Vuur), Marco Hietala (Nightwish), Jonas Renkse (Katatonia), Edward Reekers (Kayak) and many more.
Watch the album trailer here:
Arjen Lucassen is thrilled to reveal the first taste of the show from the spectacular performance of ‘Everybody Dies’ featuring a staggering cast of Ed Warby (Drums), Johan van Stratum (Bass), Marcel Coenen (Lead guitar), Ferry Duijsens (Guitar), Joost van den Broek (Keyboards) and singers, Floor Jansen (Nightwish), Hansi Kürsch (Blind Guardian), Tommy Karevik (Kamelot), Mike Mills (Toehider), Marcela Bovio (MaYan), Irene Jansen (The Human Equation), Maggy Luyten (Nightmare) and Lisette van den Berg (Scarlet Stories).
Talking about the song he says. “I’m extremely proud to present you the first full live video track of the upcoming Ayreon Universe DVD/BD. I picked ‘Everybody Dies’, which is not only a personal favourite, it also features many of the amazing singers and a lot of mayhem and commotion on stage! This is a total bitch of a track to play, but I must say the band totally nailed it! Hope you like it.”
‘Ayreon Universe – The Best of Ayreon Live’ will be available on 3LP + MP3, 3LP + MP3 (Limited Colored Vinyl), 2CD, 5 disc Earbook, plus 2DVD and Blu-ray with 90 minutes of exclusive behind the scenes footage and interviews with the whole cast.
It takes a special kind of talent to bring together 16 of the finest singers from the world of progressive and power metal whilst staking your own reputation on a show that will highlight the best of a 23-year career as one of the leading lights of the progressive music world. And on top of all that, you know you will also have to overcome your own crippling stage fright. But Arjen Lucassen is a special kind of talent.
The daunting task of coordinating 16 singers — all with their own bands and busy schedules — is just the beginning. There’s also Lucassen’s live band; the core line-up of Ed Warby (drums), Johan van Stratum (bass), Marcel Coenen and Ferry Duijsens (guitars) and Joost van den Broek (keyboards) augmented by a violinist, flautist and cellist. To top it off there’s a stage set up that boasts one of the world’s biggest HD screens spanning the entire width of the 013 stage. It’s a spectacular backdrop for a set that comprises of 28 songs over two hours, filmed by 30 cameras in front of 9000 fans who have flocked in from all over the world. Little wonder the three shows in Tilburg, Netherlands sold out within a day.
“I get absolutely crippling stage fright,” he explains. “Up to the night before the Tilburg shows I was having dreadful panic attacks. I honestly didn’t know if I was going to make it on stage.”
“We worked on Ayreon Universe for two years,” he says of the event. “There were literally hundreds of things that had to fall into place to make the shows a success.”
And, as you will see from ‘Ayreon Universe: The Best Of Ayreon Live’, it turned out pretty special indeed. A crowning achievement, to date, for Lucassen’s remarkable career.
“Ayreon Universe – The Best of Ayreon Live” Track List:
Prologue
Dreamtime
Abbey Of Synn
River Of Time
The Blackboard
The Theory Of Everything
Merlins Will
Waking Dreams
Dawn Of A Million Souls
Valley Of The Queens
Ride The Comet
Star Of Sirrah
Comatose
Day Sixteen Loser
And The Druids Turned To Stone
The Two Gates
Into The Black Hole
Actual Fantasy
Computer Eyes
Magnetism
Age Of Shadows
Intergalactic Space Crusaders
Collision
Everybody Dies
The Castle Hall0
Amazing Flight In Space
Day Eleven Love
The Eye Of Ra
Arjen Lucassen‘s AYREON Universe have revealed the release date, cover art and album trailer for “Ayreon Universe – The Best of Ayreon Live”, set to be released on March 30th, via Music Theories Recordings / Mascot Label Group.
Watch the album trailer here:
It takes a special kind of talent to bring together 16 of the finest singers from the world of progressive and power metal whilst staking your own reputation on a show that will highlight the best of a 23-year career as one of the leading lights of the progressive music world. And on top of all that, you know you will also have to overcome your own crippling stage fright. But Arjen Lucassen is a special kind of talent.
The daunting task of co-ordinating 16 singers — all with their own bands and busy schedules — is just the beginning. There’s also Lucassen’s live band; the core line-up of Ed Warby (drums), Johan van Stratum (bass), Marcel Coenen and Ferry Duijsens (guitars) and Joost van den Broek (keyboards) augmented by a violinist, flautist and cellist. To top it off there’s a stage set up that boasts one of the world’s biggest HD screens spanning the entire width of the 013 stage. It’s a spectacular backdrop for a set that comprises of 28 songs over two hours, filmed by 30 cameras in front of 9000 fans who have flocked in from all over the world. Little wonder the three shows in Tilburg sold out within a day.
It’s hardly a surprise that someone with Lucassen’s vision and sense of adventure managed to pull off a spectacle such as Ayreon Universe with apparent ease. Since 1995, when he released ‘Ayreon: The Final Experiment’, Lucassen’s imagination and ambition have flourished unfettered by convention.
Like many people of his era, it was hearing The Beatles and Pink Floyd that sparked Lucassen’s youthful musical imagination. And in turn it was hearing Ritchie Blackmore’s incendiary performance on Deep Purple’s ‘Made In Japan’ album that made him want to pick up the guitar. From then, there were several early musical forays before his first big break came in 1980 when he joined Dutch metal band Bodine. Four years later he was poached by fellow metallers Vengeance, where he stayed for eight years and four studio albums, before deciding to try things his own way.
It was the Ayreon albums, centered around a conceptual theme from their creator’s vast imagination, that began to attract the attention of a burgeoning audience interested in new progressive sounds. For 1998’s ‘Into The Electric Castle’, Lucassen began what is now his standard MO of working with an array of popular artists from the prog and metal worlds, namely Fish, Anneke van Giersbergen, Sharon den Adel, Edward Reekers, Damian Wilson, Thijs van Leer, Ton Scherpenzeel and Clive Nolan. This was the masterstroke that would bring his musical vision the wider acclaim he so clearly sought.
“Writing and producing”, he says, “is what I love doing, coming up with the stories and putting it all together.”
Since then, Lucassen has hardly looked back. The two part ‘Universal Migrator’ albums, released in 2000, saw the likes of Bruce Dickinson, Floor Jansen, Russell Allen and Neal Morse join the ever-impressive list of musicians featured on Ayreon albums. Later on he would add such luminaries as Mikael Akerfeldt, Devin Townsend, Steve Hackett, Keith Emerson and Rick Wakeman on albums like ‘The Human Equation’ (2004), ‘01011001’ (2008) and ‘The Theory Of Everything’ (2012).
Not even the impressive scope of Ayreon’s rock dramatics was enough to contain Lucassen’s irrepressible spirit. He launched the more reflective, Celtic flavoured Ambeon project with the album ‘Fate Of A Dreamer’ in 2001. The prog metal meets space rock of Star One saw the light of day in 2002 with ‘Space Metal’. His next side project was putting together Stream Of Passion, who released ‘Embrace The Storm’ in 2005. In 2009 Lucassen’s Guilt Machine released their sole album, ‘On This Perfect Day.’ He even found time in 2012 to release a second solo album, ‘Lost In The New Real’, and his Gentle Storm project with Anneke van Giersbergen released ‘The Diary’ in 2015.
But it is Ayreon that has raised Lucassen to the greatest heights of his career so far. 2017’s ‘The Source’ was another star-studded conceptual affair, this time boasting Dream Theater’s James LaBrie, Marillion’s Mark Kelly and Epica’s Simone Simons. Yet despite being one of prog and metal’s most prolific writers and performers, there is one area where Lucassen does not feel at ease: on stage, in front of an audience.
“I get absolutely crippling stage fright,” he explains. “Up to the night before the Tilburg shows I was having dreadful panic attacks. I honestly didn’t know if I was going to make it on stage.”
When the album ‘The Human Equation’ was brought to the stage as a theater production with many of its original vocalists in 2015, Lucassen did make a brief appearance at the end of each show. This let him experience first-hand the wildly enthusiastic response of the fans. Seeing the “sea of happy faces,” as he describes it was the main driver that pushed him to undertake Ayreon Universe.
“We worked on Ayreon Universe for two years,” he says of the event. “We basically started planning right after ‘The Theater Equation’ was done. There were literally hundreds of things that had to fall into place to make the shows a success.”
And, as you will see from ‘Ayreon Universe: The Best Of Ayreon Live’, it turned out pretty special indeed. A crowning achievement, to date, for Lucassen’s remarkable career.
“I just love recording my various projects in the studio,” he states. “To me, it’s another way of performing. But I’m not a live performer. I’m the guy who comes up with the ideas, sees the big picture, and puts it all together. So I’m glad that so many incredible musicians helped me bring my music to the stage.”
Track List:
Prologue
Dreamtime
Abbey Of Synn
River Of Time
The Blackboard
The Theory Of Everything
Merlins Will
Waking Dreams
Dawn Of A Million Souls
Valley Of The Queens
Ride The Comet
Star Of Sirrah
Comatose
Day Sixteen Loser
And The Druids Turned To Stone
The Two Gates
Into The Black Hole
Actual Fantasy
Computer Eyes
Magnetism
Age Of Shadows
Intergalactic Space Crusaders
Collision
Everybody Dies
The Castle Hall0
Amazing Flight In Space
Day Eleven Love
The Eye Of Ra
Earlier this month AYREON mastermind Arjen Lucassen brought “Ayreon Universe” on stage at Poppodium 013 in Tilburg, Netherlands, choosing the best songs from the AYREON albums and Star One to create these three exclusive live shows ( 15th, 16th and 17th September).
The 15th September show was performed by the very best original Ayreon vocalists and instrumentalists including Floor Jansen and Marco Hietala from Nightwish, Praying Mantis’ John ‘Jaycee’ Cuijpers (who replaced Russell Allen), Damian Wilson (Threshold), Hansi Kürsch (Blind Guardian), Tommy Karevik (Kamelot), Jonas Renkse (Katatonia), Anneke van Giersbergen (The Gentle Storm), and many other original Ayreon singers on stage, as well as an appearance by Arjen Lucassen himself.
Arjen Lucassen has the following recap:
“I don’t even know how to begin to thank you for the warm welcome you gave us at the first official Ayreon shows in 22 years. As I said on stage, it truly was an emotional rollercoaster for me. It was a huge transition from my simple, nerdy, reclusive life to this huge warm shower of love that you poured over us.
I have to admit it’s sort of a double feeling for me. Firstly I’m having difficulties dealing with all the attention, simply because I don’t think I deserve it. But at the same time it’s an amazingly satisfying feeling to be able to make so many thousands of people so happy.
Right now I’m totally exhausted. Would you believe I lost over 4 kilos in these last sleepless weeks? But I have to admit I’m quite proud of myself for having conquered (at least for a few days) my two biggest fears: playing live and talking in public. But I swear… it’s all totally been worth it.
Sorry for this dramatic sappy message, but it comes from the heart. So… no silly jokes this time, no exclamation marks or smileys… just a lot of love to all of you. And special hugs to those who couldn’t be there, I’m so sorry for not playing live more often. We’ll make it up to you with a great DVD/Bluray.
As melodramatic as it sounds, having been face to face with you again I REALLY think you’re the best audience in the world. Please give me some time to answer your hundreds of sweet messages… I’ll get to them all, I promise! Look, there’s an exclamation mark after all 🙂 And a smiley!”
The setlist was as follows:
“Dreamtime”
“Abbey of Synn”
“River of Time”
“Prologue: The Blackboard”
“The Theory of Everything, Part 1”
“Merlin’s Will”
“Waking Dreams”
“Dawn of a Million Souls”
“Valley of the Queens”
“Ride the Comet”
“Star of Sirrah”
“Comatose”
“Day Sixteen: Loser”
“And the Druids Turn to Stone”
“The Two Gates”
“Into the Black Hole”
“Actual Fantasy”
“Computer Eyes”
“Magnetism”
“Age of Shadows”
“Intergalactic Space Crusaders (Star One cover)
“Collision”
“Everybody Dies”
“The Castle Hall”
– Arjen’s Speech –
“Amazing Flight”
“Day Eleven: Love”
“The Eye of Ra” (Star One cover)
Ayreon Universe was fully organized and arranged by Arjen Lucassen personally, assisted by Joost van den Broek.
Photo by Cristel Brouwer
Prior to the release of “The Source”(out April 28th via Mascot Label group/Music Theories Recordings), Metal Shock Finland‘s Tarja Virmakari had a huge honor to interview Arjen, talking about his new masterpiece “The Source”, in detail, as well as Ayreon Universe show. Join the chat below. Enjoy!
AYREON mastermind Arjen Lucassen chose the best songs from the AYREON albums and Star One to create an exclusive live Ayreon show: Ayreon Universe, issues Bravewords.com. The show was performed over three nights at the 013 venue in Tilburg by the very best original Ayreon vocalists and instrumentalists including Floor Jansen and Marco Hietala from Nightwish, Praying Mantis’ John ‘Jaycee’ Cuijpers(who replaced Russell Allen), Damian Wilson (Threshold), Hansi Kürsch (Blind Guardian), Tommy Karevik (Kamelot), Jonas Renkse (Katatonia), Anneke van Giersbergen (The Gentle Storm), and many other original Ayreon singers on stage, as well as an appearance by Arjen Lucassen himself.
Fan-filmed video from the show is available below.
The setlist was as follows:
“Dreamtime”
“Abbey of Synn”
“River of Time”
“Prologue: The Blackboard”
“The Theory of Everything, Part 1”
“Merlin’s Will”
“Waking Dreams”
“Dawn of a Million Souls”
“Valley of the Queens”
“Ride the Comet”
“Star of Sirrah”
“Comatose”
“Day Sixteen: Loser”
“And the Druids Turn to Stone”
“The Two Gates”
“Into the Black Hole”
“Actual Fantasy”
“Computer Eyes”
“Magnetism
“Age of Shadows”
“Intergalactic Space Crusaders (Star One cover)
“Collision”
“Everybody Dies”
“The Castle Hall”
– Arjen’s Speech –
“Amazing Flight”
“Day Eleven: Love”
In contrast to The Theater Equation, Ayreon Universe was fully organized and arranged by Arjen Lucassen personally, assisted by Joost van den Broek.
“After the huge success of the four sold-out Ayreon theater shows in 2015, Joost and I decided to boldly go even bigger,” says Arjen. “This is a full-on ‘best of Ayreon’ rock show in a big venue with as many original Ayreon singers and musicians as possible. We’re calling it Ayreon Universe, and as you might guess, it’s a huge undertaking. We’ve had an entire team working on it for over a year already. Ayreon fans have high expectations, and we want to be sure to give them an once-in-a-lifetime experience that they’ll never forget.”
There were 16 original Ayreon singers: Floor Jansen (Nightwish), Russell Allen (Symphony X), Damian Wilson (Threshold), Hansi Kursch (Blind Guardian), Tommy Karevik (Kamelot), Marco Hietala (Nightwish), Jonas Renkse (Katatonia), Mike Mills (Toehider), Anneke van Giersbergen (The Gentle Storm), Marcela Bovio (Stream of Passion), Irene Jansen, Robert Soeterboek (Star One), Edward Reekers (Kayak), Jan van Feggelen, Magali Luyten (Nightmare) and Lisette Marije (Scarlet Stories). The hand-picked band of 8 of Arjen’s favorite Ayreon instrumentalists includes Ed Warby (drums), Johan van Stratum (bass), Marcel Coenen (lead guitar), Ferry Duijsens (guitar), Joost van den Broek (keyboards), Ben Mathot (violin), Jeroen Goossens (flutes, woodwinds) and Maaike Peterse (cello).
2018 marks the 20th Anniversary of the phenomenal ‘Into The Electric Castle’ by AYREON and to celebrate this Arjen Lucassen has remixed the entire album, which will be released on various formats on 26th October 2018, via Music Theories Recordings/Mascot Label Group.
