Art-rock progressive outfit Gazpacho is set to release its new albumMolok on Friday, October 23rd through Kscope. The band formed in Oslo in 1996 by childhood friends Jon-Arne Vilbo and Thomas Andersen along with Jan-Henrik Ohme (later joined by Mikael Krømer, Lars Erik Asp and Kristian Torp) and released their debut album Bravo in 2003. Signing to Kscope in 2010, the band released their sixth album Missa Atropos followed by March of Ghosts in 2012 and the acclaimed Demon in 2014.
With new album Molok the band continues to push the boundaries for creating the most complicated and strangest concepts for a record while simultaneously becoming the first band ever who are actively trying to destroy the universe with this new record release.
A small code that sounds like a strange noise at the end of the album will cause the correction software that runs in all CD players to generate a random number every time the CD is played. If that number should correspond to the actual position of all electrons in the universe then technically the universe could be destroyed.
Dr. Adam Washington from the University of Sheffield confirms that this is science fact rather than fiction, 'the random signal produced by the end of the disk contains enough bits of information to express a measurement of the total number of fundamental particles present in the universe. If the noise actually contained such a measurement, and that measurement was performed rapidly enough, the universe's total particle count could be fixed under the Quantum Zeno effect. Locking the total particle count would prevent the pair production that forms a fundamental part of the decay of black holes. Without such decay forces, black holes would remain stable forever, without the need for nearby matter or the cosmic microwave background to keep them fed. This would greatly hasten the practical end of the universe.'
Of course you may wonder why a band would want to destroy the universe but as the band ask, 'If it can be destroyed by such minute creatures within it, if it is just a chemical reaction, then does it have any spiritual value? In this scenario there is no good or bad, just an absence of meaning`
Across the album there are religious themes going head to head with modern day new science ideas and theories, Gazpacho's Thomas Andersen states, 'the album itself is about a man that sometime around 1920 decides that wherever anyone worships a God they always seem to be worshipping stone in some form. Whether it is a grand cathedral, the stone in Mecca or Stonehenge. God seems to have been chased by his worshipers into stone never to return. This harkens back to Norwegian folk myths where if a troll was exposed to sunlight it would turn to stone but it also reflects the way God has been incommunicado for a very long time.'
The band go on to say, 'In a mechanistic view of the universe all events in the universe are a consequence of a previous event. This means that with enough information you should be able to calculate the past and the future and this is what he does. He names the machine 'Molok' after the biblical demon into whose jaws children were sacrificed because his machine crunches numbers.
On solstice day he starts the machine and it quickly gainssome form of intelligence as it races through history undergoing its own evolution.'
Throughout Molok, the band focuses on the idea that without God to guide us, humanity is unsure of the meaning of life, that while we attempt to fill the void with other things we've still not found the answer and without a master to lean on we are very much alone in this universe.
On the record, Gazpacho makes a direct connection with history. Norwegian music archaeologist Gjermund Kolltveit appears on the song "Molok Rising" plays his reconstruction of stone-age instruments making an educated guess at what the early songs of worship must have sounded like. This includes small stones, moose jaws and an assortment of flutes and stringed instruments. He also plays the Skåra stone, a singing stone which has a strong possibility of having been in use since the last ice age ended 10,000 years ago. Technically this means that the album uses the oldest original instrument ever recorded on an album.
The band is also joined by world-renowned Norwegian accordion player Stian Carstensen who is a central member of Balkan-jazz orchestra Farmers Market.
Molok will be released on CD, vinyl and digitally with the CD version featuring an additional instrumental track 'Algorithm'.
CD
1 - Park Bench
2 - The Master's Voice
3 - Bela Kiss
4 - Know Your Time
5 - Choir of Ancestors
6 - ABC
7 - Algorithm
8 - Alarm
9 - Molok Rising
LP
SIDE A
1 Park Bench
2 The Master`s Voice
3 Bela Kiss
4 Know Your Time
SIDE B
1 Choir Of Ancestors
2 ABC
3 Alarm
4 Molok Rising
TOUR DATES:
GAZPACHO w/ IAMTHEMORNING(supporting)
10/24 – Poland – Warsaw - Progresja
10/25 – Poland – Bydgoszcz - Klub Kuznia
10/27 – Germany – Berlin - Maschinenhaus
10/28 – Germany – Essen - Zech Carl
10/30 – Netherlands – Uden - De Pul
10/31 – Netherlands – Zoetermeer - De Boerderij
11/01 – UK – London - O2 Islington Academy
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