Welcome to Earth

Last updated
Welcome to Earth
APBWelcomeToEarth.jpg
Studio album by
ReleasedFebruary 22, 2000
Genre Futurepop
Length74:00
Label Metropolis
Producer Fredrik Darum
Apoptygma Berzerk chronology
APBL98
(1999)
Welcome to Earth
(2000)
APBL2000
(2001)
Singles from Welcome to Earth
  1. "Paranoia"
    Released: 5 May 1998
  2. "Eclipse"
    Released: 11 Aug 1999
  3. "Kathy's Song (Come Lie Next to Me)"
    Released: 11 Dec 2000
Professional ratings
Review scores
SourceRating
AllMusic Star full.svgStar full.svgStar full.svgStar full.svgStar empty.svg [1]

Welcome to Earth is the third studio album by Norwegian futurepop band Apoptygma Berzerk. It was released on February 22, 2000, on Metropolis Records but was earlier released on Tatra Records.

Contents

The general themes of the album are those of extraterrestrials contacting Earth and of moving on. The songs themselves contain samples of reports of alien sightings, and crop circle designs feature prominently in the cover and liner notes. Several tracks have been staples in live concerts ever since, especially the single "Kathy's Song", which became one of the band's biggest hits, being remixed by high-profile artists such as VNV Nation and Ferry Corsten.

Themes

The album deals mainly with the modern mythology of extraterrestrial aliens and a hope that one day the truth will be revealed to us. Generally the tracks convey a feeling of alienation as well.

Stylistically, the album drew criticism upon its release for incorporating elements of vocal trance music on tracks such as "Eclipse" and "Kathy's Song", and overall being geared towards being a pop album. There are some tributes to the Commodore 64 home computer as well, hidden in the "64k" track which is based heavily on a sample of Chris Hülsbeck's Commodore 64 version of "Axel F", and the track Untitled 4 is essentially a Commodore 64 chiptune.

The track "Moment of Tranquility" is a reimagined version of "Falling", the theme song to the television series Twin Peaks , with new lyrics. The beginning of the song contains a sample of dialogue from a Season 2 episode.

Track listing

No.TitleWriter(s)Length
1."Everything We Know Is Wrong" Stephan Groth 1:28
2."Starsign"S. Groth5:35
3."Eclipse"S. Groth5:57
4."Help Me!"Vegard Blomberg, S. Groth5:47
5."Kathy's Song (Come Lie Next to Me)"S. Groth6:34
6."Untitled 3"S. Groth2:38
7."Moment of Tranquility"Jonas Groth, S. Groth7:36
8."Fade to Black" (Metallica cover) Cliff Burton, Kirk Hammett, James Hetfield, Lars Ulrich 5:27
9."64k"S. Groth1:44
10."Paranoia"Blomberg, S. Groth7:48
11."Soultaker"S. Groth7:00
12."LNDP3"Blomberg, Frederik Ball, S. Groth5:20
13."Time to Move On" (The song "Time to Move On" ends at 2:30. After 6:30 of silence, at 9:00 begins a hidden track, called "Untitled 4".)S. Groth11:06

2007 remastered release

No.TitleWriter(s)Length
13."Time to Move On"S. Groth2:30
14."Untitled 4" (bonus track; in other versions, "Untitled 4" is the hidden track after "Time to Move On".)S. Groth2:08
15."Eclipse" (Black Sun Version)S. Groth5:17
16."64k" (Sweep Remix)S. Groth6:46

Charts

Chart performance for Welcome to Earth
Chart (2000)Peak
position
German Albums (Offizielle Top 100) [2] 59
DAC Top 50 Albums [3] 4
CMJ RPM Charts (U.S.) [4] 5
CMJ Radio 200 (U.S.) [5] 134

The single "Eclipse" ranked #41 on the German Alternative Charts (DAC) 1999 Top 50 Singles chart. [6] "Kathy's Song" peaked at #16 on the CMJ RPM Charts in the U.S. [7]

Trivia

"Untitled 4" features a hidden-message which can only be heard by isolating either the left or right channel (converting the track directly to mono will not work). The message begins (post isolation) at around 42 seconds into the track and begins "If you can hear me, you are listening in mono" [8] , followed by a brief musical-interlude, after which the track-listing from the original-release then read out, finishing at track 13 ("Untitled 4" is not named).

In the read-out, track 7, "Moment of Tranquillity", is read-aloud as "The Tranquillity Song", which may have been an earlier-title. "LNDP3" is also read-out as "Love Never Dies, Part 3", not in its acronym form. In the 2007 remaster, the hidden-message in "Untitled 4" is the same as the 2000 release, and does not correct these titles, nor references the two extra-tracks added in that release.

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Velvet Acid Christ</span> American electro-industrial band

Velvet Acid Christ (VAC) is an electro-industrial band based in Denver, Colorado. The band was formed in 1990 by its leader vocalist, musician, and producer Bryan Erickson, and later featured various ex-members of Toxic Coma. The project gained limited popularity in Europe's underground nightclub scenes during the mid-1990s with the compilation Church of Acid (1996) before expanding into other markets in the goth and industrial subcultures. The band's discography includes 14 albums, the latest being Ora Oblivionis (2019).

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Covenant (band)</span> Swedish electronic band

Covenant is a Swedish electronic band formed in Helsingborg in 1986. The band is currently composed of Eskil Simonsson and Joakim Montelius in the studio, while live shows consist of Simonsson along with touring members Chad Hauger, Daniel Jonasson of Dupont, Andreas Catjar and Daniel Myer of Haujobb.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Suicide Commando</span> Belgian electro-industrial music act

Suicide Commando is a Belgian electro-industrial music act formed by Johan Van Roy in 1986. For live shows, it consists of Van Roy himself on vocals, Torben Schmidt on keyboards, and Mario Vaerewijck on drums.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Funker Vogt</span> German electronic-industrial music project

Funker Vogt is a German electronic-industrial music project with an aggressive style, formed by vocalist Jens Kästel and programmer Gerrit Thomas in 1995. Other members of the band are keyboardist/manager Björn Böttcher, live guitarist Frank Schweigert and lyricist Kai Schmidt. The name of the band translates from German to English as "Radio Operator Vogt", this being the surname of a friend of the band who was a military radio operator.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Das Ich</span> German dark wave/gothic-industrial band

Das Ich is a German dark wave/gothic-industrial band formed in 1989. The group, fronted by Stefan Ackermann and Bruno Kramm, were one of the prominent founders of and contributors to "Neue Deutsche Todeskunst" a musical movement in the early 1990s. The band is known for having a classically-inspired gothic-industrial style, for their on-stage theatrics, and their almost exclusive use of German-language lyrics. The German term Das Ich makes reference to the Freudian concept James Strachey translated as "ego".

DJ? Acucrack is an electronic music duo based in Chicago, Illinois. DJ? Acucrack was formed by Jason Novak and Jamie Duffy as an Acumen Nation drum n' bass side project. The duo initially created the side project to "kill time" between releases for Acumen Nation, but their releases as Acucrack were so well received that the side project ended up taking precedence. Their first two releases — Nation State and Mutants of Sound — appeared on the CMJ RPM year end charts for 1998.

<i>United States of Mind</i> (album) 2000 studio album by Covenant

United States of Mind is Covenant's fourth full-length album, released in March 2000. Travelogue was a bonus disc for United States of Mind. The track "You Can Make Your Own Music" is a silent track, in reference to John Cage's song "4′33″". "Like Tears in Rain" was re-recorded in German and released as the single "Der Leiermann", which also included the original version.

PlatEAU is an electronic music project featuring cEvin Key and Phil Western. The project resembles a very loose approach to the Download project featuring the same members. The song names and album titles refer to the coffeeshop culture of Amsterdam in The Netherlands implying a "trip" through their musical voyages. The album art also reflects this concept with imagery on their first release on Hypnotic Records in 1997, Music for Grass Bars. This release had a special CD jewel case in order to create a holographic-motion effect with the cover art insert. The genre is most closely related to IDM, experimental, techno and trip hop.

Echo Image is a Norwegian synthpop band from Fredrikstad. The band started in the summer of 1997 when Pål Magnus Rybom and Jon-Ivar Berg started experimenting with electronic music. That summer the two of them recorded a demo. Berg left the group after they failed attract the attention of record labels and went to focus on his music project Biozide. Later that year Fredrik Hansen joined and Echo Image was officially formed with Trine Bilet joining towards the end of the year providing backing vocals, keyboards, and synthesizers.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Haujobb</span> German electronic musical project

Haujobb is a German electronic musical project whose output has ranged drastically within the electronic music spectrum, from electro-industrial to ambient and techno. They have become a staple crossover act, bringing several forms of electro into the mainstream industrial music world.

Cleaner is the name of a German project specializing in electronic music. Formerly known as Cleen, Myer released several albums on the American industrial music record label, Metropolis Records, as well as the labels Zoth Ommog and Accession Records.

<i>Boeses Junges Fleisch</i> 1999 studio album by Wumpscut

Boeses Junges Fleisch is an album recorded by the German industrial act Wumpscut. It was released in Compact Disc format on Beton Kopf Media in 1999, under the catalogue number ETAH 9.

<i>7</i> (Apoptygma Berzerk album) 1996 studio album by Apoptygma Berzerk

7 is the second studio album from Norwegian futurepop group Apoptygma Berzerk. The album was released in 1996 following frontman Stephan Groth's work on several side projects. It has been remastered and re-released in 2003, 2008 and 2014 respectively. While each remaster included bonus songs, the samples of Carl Orff's "O Fortuna" present on "Love Never Dies – Part 1" were replaced with a choir keyboard patch playing an entirely different melody, due to copyright issues over the original pressings by Tatra and Metropolis Records. The album peaked at #18 on the CMJ RPM Charts in the U.S.

<i>Empires</i> (VNV Nation album) 1999 studio album by VNV Nation

Empires is the third studio album by the alternative electronic band VNV Nation. It was released in 1999 in the EU and 2000 in the United States jointly under the Metropolis and Dependent labels. The album combines trance, synthpop, and electronic body music (EBM).

<i>Mindstrip</i> 2000 studio album by Suicide Commando

Mindstrip is the fourth album by the Belgian electro-industrial act Suicide Commando. The album was ranked #19 on the German Alternative Chart's (DAC) Top 50 albums of 2000 and peaked at #12 on the CMJ RPM Charts in the U.S.

<i>Contempt</i> (album) 1999 studio album by Assemblage 23

Contempt is the first album by Assemblage 23. In 1998, the Canadian label Gashed Records signed Assemblage 23 and released Contempt in 1999. Shortly afterwards it was re-released by Metropolis Records International. The album peaked at #8 on the CMJ RPM Charts in the U.S. and ranked #42 on the German Alternative Charts (DAC) Top Albums of 2000.

<i>Blutkind</i> 2000 studio album by Wumpscut

Blutkind is a double album released in 2000 by the German industrial group Wumpscut. The album is mostly a collection of Wumpscut's earliest material, save the new tracks 'Hang Him Higher' and 'Praise Your Fears'. Some tracks are taken from Wumpscut's original demo tapes in 1991 and 1992 and some are remixes from "Music for a Slaughtering Tribe". There are also 17 or so previously unreleased old tracks. The original tapes are: 'Defcon' and 'Small Chambermusicians'. Remixes from "Music for a Slaughtering Tribe" are: 'Koslow', 'Soylent Green' and 'Default'.

Flesh Field is an American electronic / industrial band formed in 1996 by Ian Ross in Columbus, Ohio, United States. The name Flesh Field is an unofficial term Ian Ross came up with to describe the psychological defense mechanisms of rape victims.

<i>The Apopcalyptic Manifesto</i> 1998 studio album by Apoptygma Berzerk

The Apopcalyptic Manifesto is a compilation album by Norwegian futurepop group Apoptygma Berzerk. The album is mostly a compilation of tracks from Soli Deo Gloria and with other early single tracks added. A lot of tracks are exclusive to this release, such as the original version of "Arp", "APB Goes C-64" and "Lidelsens Mening". Also, the "Crisp version" of "Burnin' Heretic" included on the limited edition of this release hadn't been released since it appeared on the "Sex, Drugs & EBM" sampler in 1992. This was also the first time the original vinyl version of "Ashes to Ashes" was released on a CD along with its b-side "Wrack 'Em to Pieces". The album reached #18 on the CMJ RPM charts in the U.S.

The comprehensive discography of Wumpscut, a Germany-based electro-industrial artist, consists of eighteen studio albums, seven EPs, thirteen compilation albums, and eighteen singles.

References

  1. https://www.allmusic.com/album/r466769
  2. "Offiziellecharts.de – Apoptygma Berzerk – Welcome to Earth" (in German). GfK Entertainment Charts. Retrieved 2 September 2021.
  3. "DAC Top 50 2000". Trendcharts oHG. AMC Alster Musik Consulting GmbH. 2001. Archived from the original on 11 February 2001. Retrieved 20 January 2022.
  4. Comer, M. Tye (1 May 2000). "RPM" (PDF). CMJ New Music Report . Great Neck, NY: College Media, Inc. 62 (664): 28. ISSN   0890-0795 . Retrieved 13 January 2022.
  5. Sansone, Glen, ed. (3 April 2000). "CMJ Radio 200" (PDF). CMJ New Music Report . Great Neck, NY: College Media, Inc. 62 (660): 12–16. ISSN   0890-0795 . Retrieved 13 January 2022.
  6. "DAC Top 50 Singles 1999". Trendcharts oHG. AMC Alster Musik Consulting GmbH. 2000. Archived from the original on 10 February 2001. Retrieved 20 January 2022.
  7. Comer, M. Tye (9 April 2001). "RPM" (PDF). CMJ New Music Report . New York, NY: College Media, Inc. 67 (709): 19. ISSN   0890-0795 . Retrieved 24 January 2022.
  8. "Welcome to Earth (Apoptygma Berzerk) Easter Egg - Hidden Track". eeggs.com. Retrieved 2023-12-29.