Metamatic Forums News and Announcements John Foxx news Forthcoming releases in 2009...

February and March will see the release of two brand new albums...

*****

John Foxx : My Lost City...

01. Imperfect Hymn
02. Holywell Lane
03. Magnetic Fields
04. Just Passing Through
05. Barbican Brakhage
06. Hidden Assembly
07. Hawksmoor Orbital
08. Piranesi Motorcade
09. City of Disappearances
10. Umbra Sumus
11. Scene 27 - Intro to The Voice Behind The Wallpaper, Trellick Tower 3am

My Lost City is an album of instrumental music which John has been quietly assembling for the last few years.

Catalogue Number : META21CD
Release Date : 23rd of February, 2009
Label : Metamatic Records

*****

D'Agostino / Foxx / Jansen : A Secret Life...

01. A Secret Life (Part 1)
02. A Secret Life (Part 2)
03. A Secret Life (Part 3)
04. A Secret Life (Part 4)
05. A Secret Life (Part 5)
06. A Secret Life (Part 6)

Having met during their live performance in Brighton with Harold Budd back in May 2005, John Foxx invited Steve Jansen to record tam-tams (gongs) for a potential collaborative release. The dark tones of the tam-tams created a bed for atmospherics and acoustic piano work to be added. Due to various other commitments the release seemed to be shelved until Steve D'Agostino (keyboardist and recording engineer) took it upon himself to complete the work. The album will be released through Metamatic (distributed by Universal) and will be under the artist names D'Agostino / Foxx / Jansen.

Catalgue Number : META22CD
Release Date : 23rd of March, 2009
Label : Metamatic Records / Universal

An extensive interview with Steve D'Agostino is almost complete and will be published soon on Metamatic.

*****

Rob

Dates and everything.

Thanks Rob!!!!

I LOVE the titles on My Lost City. Very atmospheric - you can almost hear the music already.

Phew! Thank goodness for that .. .thanks Rob.

Looks like it's going to be another 'quiet' year for official releases then. Excellent!...



Thanks for the confirmed information Rob - really very much appreciated.

All the best,


EG

I needed some good news today. This'll do. And like Birdsong, I really like the evocative titles on My Lost City.

WANT COPIES NOW!!

Thanks Rob,

Great news - Looking forward to both already.

Nice to know John has had few things "up his sleeve" for 2009.

Cheers again, B.

News up on The Quiet Man too.

re. titles, I've heard of Piranesi what's a Brakhage?

ME TOO !!!

Thank you Rob, for posting this wonderful news!!

Can't believe I missed spotting this thread since yesterday!

My Lost City, its a great title, I'm looking forward to its release

a homage to Stan perhaps?

I went to Townsend's website but don't see listings or preorder info. I even searched under "Johnny Foxx" but found nothing yet.

I'm afraid that neither album (My Lost City and A Secret Life) is currently available to pre-order!

Rob

Cheers Rob,

Great news.looking forward to getting my ears on these.

Brian

Two instrumental albums to kick the year off with - exciting stuff!

Love the titles....

..but I bet I'm gonna have to redesign my site's discography again!

This is brilliant news. Great start to the year.

Peter

Exciting news! Hope a sample track or two appears on MySpace soon

Exciting news indeed.

From looking at the titles my feeling is the 'Lost City' is specifically London. They read like chapters from Iain Sinclair.

This is amazing news - thanks for the heads-up, Rob!

Looking forward to the accompanying artwork too...

G'day, Rob. How're things? Flat out more than ever I expect! ...

Has META17CD actually been released, or is it still a forthcoming release, as I presume META20CD must be also?


Cheers ...

And then some...

The number 'META17' was assigned to the Dub Terror / Karborn remix of Burning Car, while the number 'META20' was assigned to Cinemascope box set.

Rob

Brilliant, look forward to hearing the cover version of Jean Michel Jarre's 'Magnetic Fields' and Chris Rea's 'Just Passing Through' - will there be a slide guitar solo???
Cheers

Good stuff! Not knowing any more about the making of "A Secret Life" (yet), how good it is to see D'Agostino credited as one of the artists.

It's going to be a good and expensive year for releases. I am having to budget this year so it looks like Springsteen's latest (which sounds limp) is going to be the earliest casualty. It just cannot compete against new ones from Morrissey, Pet Shop Boys, Depeche Mode, Client and U2 which are all on the horizon (no pun intended).

A solid start to the year from one of the most creative minds in modern music.

Thanks again John!

Chris

Thanks for that, Rob, and sorry, I should've realised ... Cinemascope is META20BX, but I completely overlooked the Burning Car Dub Terror/Karborn remix. I was just thinking that I may have missed a couple of the CDs. After all, there have been quite a few!

Cheers ...

Below is the front cover artwork for My Lost City...



Meanwhile, the highly anticipated collaboration between John Foxx and Robin Guthrie (entitled Mirrorball) is due to be released on Monday the 4th of May via Metamatic / Universal.

I'll post further details (artwork / track-listing) just as soon they've been confirmed.

Rob

Bwahahaaaa!
I knew this one would surface one day! I can't wait to see it for real... beautiful photo, and so perfect for this release - I would imagine.

Great news about the Guthrie collab too - at long last.

Wot? Nothing in April? A whole month without a new album?!?!?!

Just kidding..this is all quite overwhelming.

Does "My Lost City" belong in the "Cathedral Oceans" or "Tiny Colour Movies" thread?
Or is it yet another thread entirely?

(I'm using the term "thread" as in multitasking/multithreading)

Samples required!

Rob,
Wasn't this the original artwork for "The Pleasures of Electricity"?

Paul

I assume this was the cover for a CD called "Urban Motets", which you had seen on the old Metamatic site in the past.
So Rob: Is THIS! Urban Motets?

I like this photo a lot. Great cover!

And the Robin Guthrie collaboration in May!!!
How great is that!!!!???

Wow - what a nice start into the year...

Hi,

John's been "repurposing" again by the looks of things, this was originally supposed to be the Urban Motets front cover I think...

(Andreas - you beat me to it.)

Regards,

B.

Paul, although it was originally for "Urban Motets", I've a feeling you are right to say it was also briefly considered for "Pleasures of Electricity" (after the two scientists picture) - I'm sure I've seen a mock-up of this image - on this very site perhaps. No doubt Rob could confirm.

Only 60 seconds, Boris...

I've just heard that My Lost City is available to pre-order from Townsend Records .

The music on My Lost City is different to what's contained on the (so far unreleased) Urban Motets album.

A 'variation' of the front cover image was briefly considered for both The Pleasures of Electricity...



... and Urban Motets.



Rob

The TPOE version is shown on the album's page on my website.

I'd be surprised if this was Urban Motets - I would guess maybe just some elements of it are leftover from that album, maybe...?

Love the (familiar) cover, and yeah, I was wondering if this is Urban Motets, too. And a release date for the Robin Guthrie collaboration!

Meanwhile, I've just preordered My Lost City at Townsend....

One copy for Shadowmandreas, please....!!!

Cheers Alex & Rob,

I'd only ever seen this pic with the "Urban" title
didn't know it was linked to TPOE as well...

Also great news about the Robin Guthrie/JF album
didn't spot this initially..

(April will seem a bit quiet by comparison!!! :p )

BtR.

Enough of the front cover, regarding the contents of My Lost City, JF on myspace had this to say:

Thank you Rob!

Cannot wait!....Is it true - one month until the release...? :rolleyes:

Not quite enough of the front cover. Folk will also recognise buildings and such (especially from the "Urban"/"TPOE" sleeve) from the middle picture on the cover of "Systems of Romance". This latest image seems to be overlain with ghosts of buildings - very appropriate. I hadn't even realised it was different.

Ok, enough of the front cover ...

The new cover looks good with the white light spilling out over the buildings.

Yes, it looks much better than the both earlier versions.

Do anyone know which city we can see on the photo?

Ordered.

I'm a bit surprised by the My Lost City cover, although not yet hearing the music maybe it does fit very well, but I had expected something more Gothic and Historical, more in keeping with The Quiet Man, although those black backlit towers certainly make it a dark and foreboding looking place in a Bladerunner/Minority Report vein

I've always liked that cover - and I think it matches that 50s style imagery that so often pops up in John's work.

me too actually. I LOVE the artwork, but it isn't what I was expecting, which was more of a pastoral, overgrown Quiet Man style of thing.

exciting times

Well done! I wondered if someone was going to recognise this as the stock photo used on the front cover of Systems Of Romance (centre image and cropped to the right side only, although the Systems image contains even more of the right side of the photo). Obviously, John(?) has added in the "lost city" ghost buildings in the background and is going with the black and white look, although the photo is originally in colour.

Hi there, Andreas. It is New York City (Manhattan) and is taken from somewhere to the side of the Brooklyn Bridge (that will actually be the carriageway onto the bridge in the upper foreground). The Woolworth Building is the tall spire on the right with the Transportation Building to its left, although this photo has been vertically 'compressed'. The photo is pre-World Trade Centre as the twin towers would also be visible (in the big space right of centre).

Cheers ...

There's also a lot of work been done on the 'foreground' of the picture. It's a lot darker below the bridge now, with less definition. But the 'man in the pool of light' (The Quiet Man??) has been emphasised.

Altogether very nice indeed

Yes! I've always wanted this CD cover in my collection and I'm a few weeks away from touching it.

I wonder if the "soon to be released" Quiet Man CD will have a version of the photo of the man in a suit from Systems of Romance. I must say there is an art in recycling art.

We all loved Tiny Colour Movies so we are all excited with this new instrumental album.

Chris

Thanks Rodney!
It's a great work on the photo. I saw an add for Systems of Romance in the past , this photo was used for too. Would work fine on the wall in poster format !

You're welcome, Andreas.

Rob: As a matter of interest, would you happen to have a copy of the full colour image, so that the right-side cropping used for Systems Of Romance and the left-side cropping used above, are intact in the one complete image?

Obviously, John has the originals, but I'm wondering if you'd be permitted to put them up on the website at some stage, which I think you may have already explained you intend doing once your attention can return to the website once again.

Cheers ...

Have we all seen the Facebook message from Gem?

"No doubt there will still be people at the back there muttering "This is all very well, but what about the equally long-awaited collaboration with Robin Guthrie?" Whinge no longer, kids - 'Mirrorball' will be out on Monday 4th of May."

..as already mentioned by Rob in this thread..

Hello All. Have posted MLC obs.in Introduce Yourself thread.
Don

Blimey! I naff off for a week and all hell breaks loose! Fantastic! Great news!

Right - I'll be back in a jiffy - I'm off to pre-order My Lost City from Townsend.

Gazza

Ha ha ha! See what happens when you're back's turned guv! You should go away more often. Thought about your Easter holidays yet?

Dear John,

I'm off to Amsterdam for a week in March - I expect Cinemascope 2 and Tiny Colour Movies 2 on my doorstep when I get back.

Ta, Gazza

Right D - let's hope this works!

The D'Agostino / Foxx / Jansen album A Secret Life is now available to pre-order .

What's more, people who buy it using the pre-order link will get an advance taster of the album in the shape of an audio download of A Secret Life (Part 1).

Rob

Thanks Rob!

Great news!
Order will follow...

I've preordered the album and I'm listening to the download. So far, it's reminding me of stuff like Eno's ambient albums. If this track is representative of the album, I'll be happy.

...followed suit

It reminds me of one of the Japan instrumentals. Very elegant in sound.

Chris

I would imagine the mood will fit perfectly with
FSFitzgeralds essay,which he wrote upon returning
to a New York blighted by the Crash of 29.Melancholic reverie being the central theme.Now when have we known JF to present work of such a nature? I urge all to read the essay, particularly in-light of current worldwide
economic woes.FSF hits the mark repeatedly.
If anyone is interested?- I can post a link to
numerous Last Century B+W images of NY which complement the MLC cover perfectly.
2009-Year of the Foxx !

Please do, Don.

Here:

http://www.nyc-architecture.com/SPEC/GAL-BW.htm

Cheers Don,

Having just returned from NYC - this is wonderful to look at.

Here's a few more - http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/7858777.stm

Gazza

brilliant ... love this one

http://www.nyc-architecture.com/SPEC/162.jpg

this city ..oooohhhh!

Some amazing pictures there - including "Live From A Room" cover too I'm sure.

Thanks for posting everyone - I know the architecture is in a different league, but what about archive shots of London?

1950s NYC looks to have been a place of vision and inspiration.

Below is the front cover artwork for A Secret Life...



Rob

oooh...

ahhhhhhhh...

My jaw has just dropped... What stunning artwork!

Thanks Rob!

Great cover!!!

Interesting cover... John's really into his monochrome right now!

Fascinating cover. Well thought!

Chris

Smart!

Looking forward to seeing the real thing.

Is this taken in John's front room,
if so who polishes the floor....

Thanks for the pic Rob.

Cheers -

BtR

By today's CD prices and sites like HMV and Amazon, Townsend are pretty expensive

No problem in paying an extra pound. It's a great feeling to buy his releases from his on-line shop at Townsend. It's even a greater feeling that he is as active and creative as ever.

Chris

It is great, I agree, but I'm even more looking forward to seeing a new John Foxx album in a shop

I see the release date seems to have changed from 23rd (today) to 26th. A midweek release?! A delay at the printers perhaps?

Received my copy from Townsend on Saturday.

Today the extended version of Luminous is available for download to those who pre-ordered...but does anyone know how to get this free download of Luminous at the Townsend website?
Seems I am unable to find it myself :rolleyes:

Just log into the Townsend site with your email and password and it will take you straight to the free download page.
That's what it did for me anyway.

That didn't work for me, so I emailed Townsend and asked. As it turns out, it's the same link I used to get the free Estrellita mp3 when I preordered. Should have looked for that first, I guess.

That's exactly what doesn't seem to work for me