General/Solo
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February 2009 roundup
One more great month has gone by. This one was short so there might not have been as much news as it was the case in the “rocket-charged” January. As the visitors of this website and other similar communities all around the world continued discovering The Empyren; this month was marked by, sadly, no new posts on John’s blog (for everyone who asked: honestly, I can’t give you any information, as I’ve got no clue about it). On the other side, a great movie and a great collaboration saw the light of the day: Ryan Page and Christopher Pomerenke’s documentary The Heart Is A Drum Machine was premiered in Phoenix…
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The Empyrean in charts + a great review by a_doubt
The Empyrean has gotten onto the official charts in Croatia in place 32 as a new entry, wrestling pretty well with well-promoted and popular albums by artists such as Katy Pery and Amy Winehouse. Thanks to Tihana for the heads-up! Now, I assume many people know that I asked people on the board to try and write their own reviews of The Empyrean if they think they could do it well; and a significant number of members responded to the challenge. In the next few weeks, best reviews will be posted here and they’ll gain a permanent place on this website. We’re kicking off with a rather impressive lengthy review…
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The Empyrean gained positions on Billboard top 200 and Top Heatseekers
Last week, The Empyrean surpassed the success of 2004’s Shadows Collide With People by debuting as #190 on Billboard top 200 and #7 on Top Heatseekers. However, that’s not where the surprises end. According to the 14th February 2009 data, it’s now #151 on Billboard and the “greatest gainer” on Top Heatseekers, having jumped from #7 to #4 on only its second week on the list. You can view the list here or below. Now Last Weeks Peak 1 – 1 1 Ready For The Flood – Mark Olson & Gary Louris (New West) 2 2 28 1 Thriving Ivory – Thriving Ivory (Wind-up) 3 1 21 1 Hook Me…
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The Empyrean is on Heatseekers’ List and more…
This is a bunch of interesting curiosities; and though The Empyrean was probably not meant to be super-successful in “commercial” terms, it’s getting more successful than all of the previous John’s solo albums; despite being barely promoted, not yet reviewed by half of the mainstream press and reliable sites for reviews (e.g. Rolling Stone, Pitchfork) and, of course, without any singles and videos. I hope that this list is not offensive in any way, as it’s pretty cool to know these things. The Heatseekers’ list for 07th February 2009 published by Billboard has The Empyrean on 7th place and also marked as a “hot shot”. You can see the list…
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The Empyrean day @ Invisible Movement – part 4
And…here’s the last surprise for today. A wallpaper. I did my best not to make it creepy or strange; yet it’s mystical and psychedelic in its own way. It should fit all screens up to 1280×1024, as those are its dimensions. Click to go to its page and download it! That’s it for this little special, but keep your eye for more exciting things within the next days. P.S. There’s no site URI on the wallpaper one of the images has been licenced with a creative commons licence and I feel like having any “advertisment” over it would be unfair.
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The Empyrean concept partly revealed on John’s blog
John has posted a lengthy clarification of the basic concept behind The Empyrean on his blog. The story is apparently being edited and put together more neatly as I’m posting this; so if the following link does not work, it will probably be accessible through his blog’s main index page.
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The Empyrean – a review
This review is going to be a bit less conventional, a bit more honest, a bit more personal. As a long-term casual listener of the Red Hot Chili Peppers, I discovered John’s solo work earlier in this decade, with “only” three officially released albums and some demos available at that point. Given that those were the good old days of 28.8 Kbps dial-up, I stumbled upon songs’ lyrics weeks before I actually had the albums in my hands. And some of them felt like stunning poetry. Later on, it turned out that such poetry fit perfectly with the harmony of the music. Either way, here I am after more than…
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Lyrics, first magazine feature and Uncut review
This is an improvised update, what’s most important at the moment, as other things can wait, given the server load and the site owner’s work commitments. More to come, as soon as possible. First of all, a reader who’d like to remain anonymous has submitted scans of the whole February 2009 Guitar Magazine Japan feature. Please, once again, if you happen to live in Japan or have a way of getting this magazine, buy it. Support the people who are working hard on creating magazines. And, needless to say, help with translation would be great, so if any of the Japanese or Japanese-speaking Invisible Movement readers would like to give…
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The Empyrean to be physically released in USA a week later – on 27th January
Record Collection Music have asked me to pass this on to everyone, so please do read before you panic. The Empyrean’s US physical release date has been pushed to January 27th. There was an unavoidable manufacturing error at the duplication plant and as a result, American’s are going to have to wait another week to buy the physical version of John Frusciante’s new album (Vinyl and CD). Digitally, you will be able to download The Empyrean worldwide on January 20th, as scheduled. We apologize for any inconvenience. Record Collection
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…and there’s a blog entry, too.
John has posted a new blog entry, after a 40-ish day break and he’s talking about the possible interpretations of the meaning of The Empyrean, dismissing them all as more or less wrong, as it is incomprehensible to someone other than him, yet, in some way, every person with an open mind can find their own meaning in the albums’ lyrics. This excerpt is interesting, in particular: While I could explain the story as I see it,that would detract from the potential multifarious meanings that will come about from people applying their own sense of feeling from their life experience, much as they always do. So, to read some lyrics…
