Album Notes

For the last four years the Array have been working on developing their music and building on the multi-layered instrumental sound debuted on “On Unknown Soil”. They created a radical and much-praised re-working of U2’s Sunday Bloody Sunday featured on the Asian Tsunami Relief Fund CD Even Better Than The Real Thing Vol. 3, sung by Lisa Bresnan. More recently they re-worked several tracks for Simon Fisher Turner for his latest release Lana Lara Lata (Mute) and plan to release an album developed from the collaboration entitled “1001 Other Spaces” later in the year. They have also been continuing their work with film and documentary makers in Ireland, the U.K. and the U.S.A.

The new album features guest vocals by Nina Hynes (Creation, Staros) and Sinéad O’Carroll (ex-Bewitched).

Merging synthetic elements, field recordings and computer manipulations with traditional instruments, such as guitar, bass, clarinet, trumpet and melodica, the music has an organic feel set against a progressive electronic backdrop. The Array incorporate elements of Electronica, Dub, New Wave, Techno, Avant-Garde, and Ambient to create their own hybrid sound, one that has pleased and surprised Irish audiences. The incorporation of guest vocalists for the first time has given an additional emotional depth to the songs and points the way to future directions.

“Some of the material on this album dates back to even before the first album, but it didn’t fit that release. In many ways this album grew organically out of the first one and it was great to see the music develop into a slightly new take on things, a better take really. It was great collaborating with Nina, Sinéad and the other guest vocalists, it’s taking things to the next level really for us, and we hope to explore that further in the next release”, says Karl.

“We have a backlog of great material that we want to release over the next year, including several live EPs, while we’re well advanced on the next album. Certainly we don’t plan on having another four years’ wait for the next release! We also plan on continuing to collaborate with other artists like Simon, it was very interesting working with him”, according to Giles.