31.08.2011 / Technology
Touch the Music
It’s called Biophilia and it is not a simple collection of songs; it also a collection of iPhone and iPad Apps. In other words, an “App Album”. That’s what the last album by Iceland’s most famous and eccentric musician, Bjork, is all about.
What should originally have been a science-themed album – something like a “house” with a room for each song, where each room would illustrate one of the topics by mixing science, nature and music – has become an even more complex project with the advent of iPad.
Thus, in its final version, Biophilia presents an App for each song, allowing the user to watch a video dealing with the specific theme of a single song while listening to the music – e.g. in Cosmogony the App shows the origins of the universe and of human existence.
Besides, through the touchscreen, you can also interact with the music turning every single song into a videogame, an animated music score or a musical instrument allowing you to play along with the actual song.
But there’s still more to it. Like some other musicians such as Damon Albarn have been doing lately, Bjork has also composed and played part of the music with the iPad, using technology to explore a brand new opportunity – that of touching the music, of seeing music actually move on the screen with graphic effects, of manipulating sound while playing with it. This, in a few words, is Biophilia.
The album will be released on September 25, but the unveiling process has already began starting from last June, when iTunes started to sell the singles with their corresponding Apps at weekly intervals.
The next new single, Moon, will be available on iTunes along with its App on September 6
