ARJEN LUCASSEN – Ayreon – interview

Arjen Lucassen has announced two special releases for 17 May 2024, via Music Theories Recordings / Mascot Label Group.

One of them is about an Ayreon live event, which, usually, is not just any concert. It’s a monumental occasion where the highest-calibre musicians and an enormous production come together to forge a bombastic spectacle. The rarity of these shows only adds to their uniqueness. In September 2023, Arjen Lucassen’s ‘01011001 – Live Beneath the Waves‘ sold out five performances at Poppodium 013 in Tilburg, The Netherlands. Indulge in a taster with the first live video of “The Sixth Extinction” HERE. Various special guests such as Simone Simons (Epica), Damian Wilson (Threshold), Anneke van Giersbergen, Jonas Renkse (Katatonia) and more.

He will also see the release of Lucassen & Soeterboek’s Plan Nine album ‘The Long-Lost Songs’ via Music Theories Recordings / Mascot Label Group. To go with the album announcement, they have revealed the video for “Before The Morning Comes”, which you can watch HERE.  It was the early nineties, and musical polymath Arjen Lucassen had begun working on several projects: a solo album, a progressive-rock opera and a rock album. Around this time, he watched singer Robert Soeterboek perform live with Bodine, his former early-eighties heavy metal band

We had the chance to steal some of Arjen’s time and ask him questions about the majestic live shows, how Plan Nine resurfaced to life and chat a bit about few other subjects. Below you have the video captured from the zoom meeting and its transcription, for those of you who prefer reading. It was a really fun chat and we hope you enjoy it.

Eternal-Terror: Alright, well, I guess I’ll have to ask you to start with the story of these live albums, for the event that took place in September, so now it’s less than one year and now you release DVD’s, Blu rays, the whole package. So how much was it your doing and how much was is the label and other technical teams that contributed in order to make this happen?

Arjen: Ohh it’s it’s mostly me. I come with the ideas but I’m I’m not good with the logistics at all, so luckily I have a production team. Which is a production leader, Naomi, and then there’s Joost Van Der Broek who is also the keyboard player, and he’s basically the guy that makes it all happen. So I come with the ideas like “I want this. I want this” and he goes “OK, I’ll arrange it”
So yeah, it’s this whole thing of about four or five people, and we meet up every month a year in advance of the show. So arranging a show that takes us about a year because this is the third time we did it, while the first time it took us two years to set it up, you know, because it’s so complicated. But now we have gained experience, yet you still have to start a year before.
And you have to start a year before because you have to plan the singers, you have to book them. If you’re too late, then maybe they have other tours or other shows booked, so you gotta be there a year in advance and say “can you do it in September?”

It’s because also the songs I pick, are based on the singers. If a singer can’t do it at the last moment, I’m and lost, you know, and have to find another singer. So yeah, it’s this production team really that arranges this. And of course, the record company is is really helpful and they contribute wherever they can.

‘01011001 – Live Beneath the Waves’ Photo (C) Matthias Kirsch-

ET: It sounds like a small team for such a big production
Arjen: I know. But Joost Van Der Broek is a whole force. He’s incredible. He’s he’s almost like a robot. Really, without him this would not happen because I’m not good at all that stuff. I have my skills. I come with the music, I pick the singers and I come with the effects that I want. Like the way the stage should be and the way the lights should be and the way that the the visuals should be, so it it’s the perfect team. That’s the third time now we worked together and we know each other so well and everyone has his own thing, and that really works.
ET: You said it’s only one year of production, but at the end of the day this is your baby. So in your brains, how long before have you started pitching the idea to to this team? Have you dreamed about lights and production?
Arjen: Do you mean the very first time or this last time? It’s two different answers. But yeah, for the first show we started two years in the thought, but it was so complicated.
ET:But was that the moment you actually started dreaming of it? Or is it something like you had in your mind even longer than those two years prior to the show?
Arjen: Well, the thing is, I started Ayreon because I didn’t wanna play live anymore. I had toured the world for for many years but really it was not my my sort of life. I wanted create, you know, I wanna be in my studio and touring is not creative. It’s just waiting and traveling, and it’s not for me. So I started Ayreon and said I’m never gonna play live again
ET: Ops
Arjen: Ops, yeah. And then after I think 20 or 25 years, my manager at the time, she worked at the theater and she had experience with that and told me she’d like to do something and why not a heater production of one of the Ayreon albums, “The Human Equation”. She did that, and even if it was arranged really bad, it was a big success. All shows were sold out and Joost was already involved, but just in the music. So then I could see that it would be possible to play live with Ayreon. I always thought it’s way too complicated, too many singers, too many layers in the music, and this theater production showed me that it could be done.
So then I went to Joost and I was like “hey, you know, why don’t we do this? The two of us, and do it well, you know, do really well.” So that was the first time. That was the Ayreon Universe.
ET: And then based on that experience you leveled up, right?
Arjen: Yeah, indeed. And then, for the second show, we were already like, we want more. We wanted a bigger stage. We wanted a whole castle on stage
ET: Were you scared when you decided to step up the show?
Arjen: Yes, extremely scared. I have the horrible stage fright and it’s terrible. However, thinking about it and making the plans is lovely. When the week comes closer, I start sleeping really bad and I start getting very nervous. I told you, I’m good at creating, at being in my studio all alone and being the mastermind control freak in there. But then I’m not good at performing. It’s not my good side. So that’s terrible for me. The week itself is horrible. I shouldn’t say this,
ET: You are human a being, right, you have to accept such sides of yourself
Arjen: That’s right. Yeah. But, but you know people, I’m sure they don’t want to come to to the show and see me stand on stage and notice “this guy hates to be here”.
I have to say when I’m on stage and I see fifteen thousand people, happy faces and it’s like a warm welcome. So when I see that, it makes it all worthwhile.
ET: You feed on that energy
Arjen: Totally. And the nerves disappear. Once I’m on stage, it’s all ok.
ET: I haven’t had a chance myself to attend the shows, but I have friends who went to all of them and none of them have mentioned that they’ve seen you shaking up. I know that everybody had the same big smile and was very happy to be there.
Arjen: I hide it well. And it’s mostly before I have to go on stage. It’s like, ohh my God, I’m always on the side of the stage thinking if this will go well. If you see me, you think “who’s that idiot?”

ET: The actual show took around hours, give or take. You have the production, which is probably like a clockwork program. Singer A steps on stage at minute 2.01 and the singer B and then guitar, right? And that’s been something that you baked for one or two years. And during the show, you no longer have control over that which must feel very strange. Which I guess is probably very stressful for you because you have to be on stage. You can’t just look and see if everything has gone according to plan.
Arjen: Well, it’s been planned so well, you know, everyone has their in-ears and they get click, click click one two three go on stage and then you go on stage and you go off stage and you go on stage left and we have people here showing people around if they’re lost. Especially for these last shows, there were songs where we had 12 singers so they have to go on stage and off stage again and they needed to know when and where do they go. We have had people on both sides of the stage who showed them how to get on stage and they all have in-ears with instructions.
ET: Did you all fit in 013?
Arjen: Barely, barely. But we did. We had to make restrictions like “only band members”. No girlfriends!
ET: I can’t imagine. How many people were there in total? Hundreds?
Arjen: Yeah, that’s the number of people involved. The first time though, we didn’t do that. Girlfriends had backstage access and it got too chaotic.
ET: Actually I had one of the questions wondering what were the lessons learned from these events and that’s probably one of them.
Arjen: Oh, yeah. After each show there is a whole list of things that I felt went wrong. You only know that when you do it and then you think “ohh, how could I’ve done that”. And you make this whole list and then you think it now we’re we’re OK for the next show and then totally different things go wrong again.
ET: Was the list long after the concerts last year?
Arjen: It gets shorter and shorter. But there’s stuff like, for example, we had a pop up store for the merchandise and the fans are so excited about it. They are so amazing that there all long lines for the pop up store and they went in and bought everything. The first day everything was gone, so that’s that’s a lesson learned: let’s not be too careful and underestimate the Ayreon fans because they’re crazy.
ET: That’s very kind feedback from the fans, I guess.
Arjen: Yeah, yeah, totally amazing. I mean, not only do they come from like Russia or or Brazil, from far away countries. There were fans from 64 countries at these shows.,which is already amazing, and then still they buy all these merch and it’s – I’m sure every musician says it – but these have to be the best fans in the world. It’s it’s truly amazing.
And then it it’s worth all the all the nerves and all the not sleeping when you see how happy you make the fans. And not just the fans, but also the musicians, and even the whole crew. It’s such a cliche all the time “We’re like a family, you know”, but it’s true. That’s how I picked the people that I work together with. If I have the feeling that this musician will only do it for the money or it’s not really his style, I don’t want it. Will be one rotten apple that makes it all go wrong.
And I know that,because I have had experience with that in my bands in the 70s. 80s, yeah, more the 80s.
ET: I feel this when I am in the crowd. I know what you mean. I paid my money but I don’t feel like I’m getting any passion back
Arjen: Totally! I I’m so sure people see on stage that all these guys are having fun together, one of them comes on stage and, you know high five the other. And that that just comes across
ET: And that’s and that’s way more important than perfection in my opinion, in a live show. Make as many mistakes as you can, as long as you’re giving us your passion.
Arjen: Yes! Between you an me, we could fix the mistakes with the DVD. But people won’t mind, you know, they love mistakes. Stuff like computer doesn’t start and we have to be like “Sorry guys, we fked up” and people love it as they see that we’re only human too.
ET: That’s that’s actually what makes a good artist. Knowing how to handle the negative and not just the positive and know how to make it fun experience at the end of the day.

ET: How do you have time to rehearse or how do people rehearse for such a production? You put stuff on paper but how about the tons of artists involved into this show?
Arjen: Well, with the instrumentalists, we have sessions in the studio, for example the guitar players we all get together and I show them on the guitar which parts each of them play. Then we record this and they take it home so they can reverse it at home.
ET: Sorry to interrupt you. But do you rewrite the guitar parts for this concert or?
Arjen: I have to adapt them, because maybe on the album I have six guitars and it’s not possible to do the same live because we only have two guitar players. You have to adjust stuff and the same with the backing singers. We have like two days with the backing singers and that’s when we decide who takes the mid voice, the high voice, the low voice and so on. Again, we record, they take it home to rehearse it.
The bass is a little bit easier. I just send the bass player all my bass parts, cause I played the bass on my albums, and so these are your bass parts and this way you know it’s easy for him. I can’t read music so I can’t send music. For the classical musicians, like the violin and the flute and the cello, they get a musical score, cause a Joest keyboard player, he can transcribe them.
And then for the singers, it’s very scary because there’s just one day of rehearsal
ET: NO WAY! Really?
Arjen: They come on Wednesday, they sleep and then Thursday we have an afternoon and that’s it. So they have to really prepare at home and you have to come and it has to be good. That’s it. The first time we did it was very scary, but it works out every time, you know? And so far it went really well. I mean, sure, they still make mistakes which will get better as you get along, but the good thing about this is there’s no routine. I think that comes across too in the shows. It’s not like “I’ve played this song for six hundred times in two years now”. That’s not the case. It’s only the 1st or the 3nd, 3rd or the 4th time that they play these songs. So it’s all very spontaneous.
ET: I see your point.
Arjen: That was my problem with playing live. When I toured the world years ago, same songs over and over, and it was a routine. And I felt like an actor on stage and it wasn’t my thing.

ET: As far as I know, a lot of the musicians you work with they’re all so professional and know how to catch up. They have stage experience and you don’t really work with somebody who just put their first step on a stage and have no idea where the microphone cable is or something.
Arjen: Totally. They are experienced, I know I can trust them to to do a good job. I never worry about other people. I only worry about myself, but never about other people
ET: That’s such a nice feeling for such a big production
Arjen: That’s amazing, right? It happens that there’s a singer with whom you find out during the rehearsals that they didn’t prepare something. Then I’m very difficult. Then I we take them apart and have a chat “listen man, this is a big production, we all worked on this for a year and you better prepare well”. And have them o their best, as this is not Ok. Otherwise we have to find a stand-in singer. So it has happened or a singer has underestimated it. Luckily it didn’t happen many times. That’s when I am not happy. But usually it’s solved, you have a good talk with this person, you go through the songs together, you give it a positive spin and it’s all worked out ok.

ET: Given the amount of voices and instruments that you have to plan for, you said it took you one year, but still, how do you focus and how do you know when you’re done? I planned guitar one. I plan guitar two. I planned Anneke. I planned this. How do you know when you’re done planning one item and move to another? How how do you focus on getting everything?
Arjen: It’s really the storyboard we make and it lasts the length of the show, two and a half hours, and it shows exactly what will happen what will happen on the LEDs, it shows what the lights do, when the singers come on stage and so on.
ET: What do you begin with? What’s the first thing that goes on the storyboard?
Arjen: Good question. I think it’s the entrance, going off and on stage for the singers. From that, you can work on the lights. And once you have the songs and the singers you can work on the visuals, which is a lot of work as well. Someone has to make all these visuals fit the songs. Everything is on the computer, everything is on a time code. You might think it’s scary but it’s not, so far we haven’t made mistakes there.
ET: Experience lessens the scary factor. For me it’s scary, as I have never done it. But if I do it a couple of times, I’d believe you that it’s not scary.
Arjen: But already the first time, maybe during the rehearsal something went wrong, an error and the computer didn’t start or whatever, but so far we haven’t had any problems with that. But we have spares and spares for spares. If something goes wrong with such a big production, you can’t risk anything.

ET: You can’t lose the PA all of a sudden. That would be very disastrous I imagine. I guess we kind of touched this, but maybe I should summarize it with a question. What’s your proudest moment regarding this event?
Arjen: Hmm, just one proud moment. Well, of course I don’t wanna single out singers. You know that that will be sh*y. But proudest, of course, overcoming my stage freight, and not only it but since I don’ see myself as a singer, still, I’m on stage there amongst all these amazing singers you mentioned. I mean, who is better than Anneke? No one! So I’m standing there with all these amazing singers and I’m the non singer. So that is always a scary moment.
So if if I pulled that one off in the end, I’m pretty proud of that.
ET: Good one. I can only imagine how it would be to be among those people with voices made in whatever heaven.
Arjen: But the really proud moment, I think, comes way later when I’m working on the on the Blu-ray. When I’m working on the editing of the the songs. Up to that point, I’m still nervous and wonder “Will it all be good enough and and Oh my God, can I get everything together, can I mix it well and and then use all the the cameras? Did they do well?
And then finally, I mixed all the sounds and you get the edits of the camera people and suddenly you see that “THIS is good”. And I think that’s the first moment where where I’m proud.
Especially the intro of this show. I’m very proud of that. I’m doing music related stuff all the time, but the intro is when when all the and the eight instrumentalists come on stage, in long black coats, and it’s all dark. But I won’t spoil what happens. I’m really proud of coming up with that and how it worked out.

ET: You’re also releasing your Plan Nine collaboration on the same day as the live album. So you’ve been busy lately, right? Besides making the DVD and the Blu-ray and everything.
Arjen: For the live show, you don’t have to write music, which is what takes the most time. You just have to make the storyboard, but it wasn’t me doing it as I am bad with computers.
With Plan Nine, it was 30 years old songs so I didn’t have to write new music either. So I could easily do that at the same time. I even had a third project going where I had to write songs.
ET: So what made Plan Nine surface after thirty years then?
Arjen: Basically, the singer, he was a good friend of mine and thirty years ago we we wrote all these songs together. We recorded a few in the early 90s and the whole 80s hair metal stuff was gone. We couldn’t get a deal anymore. It was all grunge then. Which was a good thing. But it meant we couldn’t get a deal anymore even if we tried. And at some point I gave up and started to work on my real dream which is Ayreon. And the singer, who’s still a good friend of mine, came to me said, well, I wanna do a solo album. Can we rerecord one of the old song and I offered to do it as soon as I had some time.
And we did and that worked out so great that it was like let’s do another one, maybe another one, let’s do four. And before you know it, we had a whole album full of songs. That’s the way it goes for me. I sometimes plan ahead, but that makes no sense anymore. Things just happen and I’ll let them happen. That’s what happened with Plan Nine.
ET: That sounds like a fun way of approaching things
Arjen: It’s fun. It’s not always commercially successful. Sometimes you just feel like doing this and then and it it doesn’t work as well as you were hoping. You know if I would wanna be commercially successful I should just do Ayreon shows in a row.

ET: When you write music, do you have a recipe for it? I guess it’s different process from Ayreon songs versus your other project. Do you write a lyrical story first or and add music to it or?
Arjan: The weird thing is it’s the other way around. I still think the music is more important than the story. So if I would first have a story, I would be limited. I’d have to find music to fit that and I would be limited musically, so I always start with the music. I just start recording little ideas on my phone, mainly guitar, but it can also be voice, singing a bit and then I put all these little ideas into a computer and I listen to it and I think what that would be. Would this be an Ayreon or a solo album? Star One Album, etc.
I often do think I wanna do solo albums, just on my own, because being the recluse I am, that’s just great, I don’t have to deal with any singers after all. But then I work on the songs, and then it’s suddenly “ohh I can hear this singer and this song” and “this singer, this song”. And it turns into an Ayreon album.
So then I I put all the songs in the computer, I think which singer goes where and stuff like that and then only once I have the music and I have the singers, I start thinking what could the story be and what the concept be. I let the music tell me what could the story be and what could the concept be?
I let the music and even the singers inspire me to to come up with the lyrics and with the story.
A good example is, for instance, on my Electric Castle, which is one of my most successful albums, I have Fish, the Scottish singer and he plays the Highlander. It’s not that I have wanted to write a story about the Highlands. It was just OK, I have Fish and asked him what part he wanted to play on the album. He comes up with the idea “Well, yeah, I would like to be a Highlander, you know?”

ET: Some of the singers you work with, like Anneke and maybe some of their bands are so famous that you know the singers, but how do you build your database of singers? How do you know that voice fits there? Do you listen to a lot of music?
Arjen: Totally. Totally. I make lists and as soon as I’m on YouTube and I see a singer I like, I write it down and I contact them
ET: Do you go to concerts? Do you have time?
Arjen: No, no, I haven’t gone to concerts in a long time and I don’t have to. I only have to hear it. On YouTube, once I hear one sentence, I can already tell if I like it the singer. Basically all the singers that I like, I immediately contact them. And ask if they’d be interested to maybe one day collaborate.
ET: So you’re the one doing the stalking. And not they asking you if they can sing on your album
Arjen: It helped a lot to get successful with Ayreon and now that’s happening more. Singers come to me, which is a luxury position. I hate to stalk. And I had to stalk for people like Bruce Dickinson. I had to stalk for like half a year and keep asking “did you listen to the album?”, “are you interested now?”. And I hated it. I hate bothering people, and you feel like such a bother and the but then again, when it works out, you feel it was worth it.

ET: Are there any fixed future plans for you, either Ayreon or any side projects, besides the currently announced releases?
Arjen: As I said earlier, during this time I worked on a new project which is a solo album for a well known singer. I’m not allowed to talk about. I accidentally said something about it and I got into trouble with the management. That’s what I’ve been basically working on for the last year and that’s finished. Pretty soon the first song will will come out and we can talk about it.
And again, I’m going to try and let’s see if I succeed making a solo album. Let’s see where it leads. By now I made so many albums for other people. That also means a little bit doing concessions and I’m not good at doing concessions. That’s why I started Ayreon. In the 80s there were so many concessions and now maybe it’s time to say “no more concessions for this guy”.

ET: We have few minutes left. One last question, how do you feel about AI in your field of work these days?
Arjen: I’m open for it, you know? And it’s stupid to be against it, cause it’s gonna happen anyway. It’s like being against streaming or being against downloading or whatever, stuff that was gonna happen anyway.
ET: Do you use it for anything?
Arjen: Not me, but people around me are, and I’m fine with it as long as you don’t notice it. That’s my rule. There are so many clips AI clips nowadays, these weird faces, and I hate that. It’s terrible. But if people use AI to maybe help them with lyrics or a video and you don’t see it and it can make things better, why not.
ET: But if you realize that an entity starts using your music, how would you react? If your label say “we noticed that 20 seconds of this song are actually form one of yours and have been taken by an AI that made a composition…
Arjen: It’s gonna be very complex but there should be rules against it. Let me first say that I hate it. I hate the whole AI thing. I hate everything modern, everything, not analog. I hate it, you know, but I don’t wanna fight it because it’s no use. So you might as well better embrace and use it to your advantage.
ET: Thank you. That’s some honest feedback. Thanks so much for your time and your honest answers. This was really fun
Arjen: Yeah, it was fun!

If you’ve made it this far, here’s some more info about the two releases:

‘01011001 – Live Beneath the Waves‘

This live production, based on the critically acclaimed 2008 concept album ‘01011001,’ was performed in its entirety, followed by a number of encore songs. The stage came alive with an imposing backdrop, LED screens showcasing fantastic visuals, lasers, pyrotechnics, special effects, and a unique live surround sound experience – a setup that would be at home on Broadway or London’s West End.

Ayreon mastermind Arjen Lucassen, alongside keyboardist Joost van den Broek, assembled a remarkable lineup, featuring many original cast members from the 01011001 album and various special guests such as Simone Simons (Epica), Damian Wilson (Threshold), Anneke van Giersbergen, Jonas Renkse (Katatonia), Tom Englund (Evergrey), Daniel Gildenlow (Pain of Salvation), Marcela Bovio (MaYan), Brittney Slayes (Unleash the Archers), Hansi Kürsch (Blind Guardian), John Jaycee Cuijpers (Praying Mantis), Maggy Luyten (Beautiful Sin), Michael Mills (Toehider) and Wudstik, among other incredible musicians. 

The band featured top instrumentalists from the genre – Ed Warby (Drums), Johan van Stratum (Bass), Timo Somers (Guitar), Marcel Coenen (Guitar), Joost Van Den Broek (Keyboards) and more. The enigmatic Lucassen himself made an appearance, marking this as the largest cast in Ayreon’s live show history, which is no mean feat. ‘Live Beneath the Waves‘ vividly brings to life the water planet Y, immersing audiences in this technological underwater world.

The opening song “The Age of Shadows” showcases eight incredible singers, perfectly introducing the show and setting the tone for the musical journey to come. What follows is a mesmerising ride, so buckle up and enjoy your stay on Planet Y!

Lucassen & Soeterboek’s Plan Nine – ‘The Long-Lost Songs’

It was the early nineties, and musical polymath Arjen Lucassen had begun working on several projects: a solo album, a progressive-rock opera and a rock album. Around this time, he watched singer Robert Soeterboek perform live with Bodine, his former early-eighties heavy metal band. “His vocals truly impressed me, a rarity!” Lucassen recalls. “He had the charisma and power of singers like David Coverdale and Robert Plant. Discovering that we really got along personally, we decided to collaborate on some songs, just for fun.”

  
They would meet daily in Lucassen’s small ‘studio’ – a bedroom with a mattress and an old 8-track tape recorder. There, they recorded around 20 basic ideas. They brought in Peter Vink on bass, Cleem Determeijer on Hammond, and Rob van der List on drums, who has since passed away, and attracted interest from producers and labels. In the early-nineties Grunge landscape, landing a record deal was challenging. Some labels were interested but hesitated due to fears about being able to sell albums in the era dominated by bands like Nirvana and Pearl Jam. Eventually, the repeated rejections wore them down. “I decided to start working on my rock opera project, expecting it to be the last musical thing I would ever do. My Final Experiment, so to speak!” Lucassen adds.
 
Soeterboek joined the German band Wicked Sensation and worked with Lucassen on the first Ayreon album and throughout the years in the studio and live, as well as being the frontman for The Cotton Soeterboek Band.
 
Fast forward to 2022, and they revisited those recordings. “For the song Annie Moore we involved Peter and Cleem on bass and Hammond, and Peter’s wife Mirjam van Doorn on backing vocals, with my current go-to drummer, Koen Herfst, adding his magic,” Lucassen explains. “Everyone involved was excited by the result, and I found it so inspiring that I re-wrote and re-recorded several other Songs. Soon, I couldn’t stop! Robert and I spent weeks digging through our old cassettes and DAT tapes, discovering many potential gems we hadn’t yet developed. Before we knew it, we had enough songs for a full album and more.”
 
The album encapsulates a glorious treasure trove of 11 original songs with a loving 70s and 80s nod. It’s a blistering romp through the good time rolling rocker of “Let It Ride”, the Beatles-esque “Doctor Robert’s Medicine Show,” the bluesy groove of “Annie Moore,” the chugging glam stomp of “High-Speed Chase” to the 80s metal of “Ice on Fire”, whilst “The Preacher” would fit on a number of Arjen’s back catalogue records. The bonus disc features all the demos and some more newly recorded tracks. 
 
Lucassen continues, “We wanted the best and most suitable musicians for this album who could tour with Robert. Koen handled the powerful drums. Rob van der Loo (Epica) laid down a solid bass foundation. The talented Irene Jansen delivered amazing backing vocals, as always. And, one of the world’s best guitarists, Marcel Singor, played the virtuoso solos with his immediately recognizable style.” 
 
The Long-Lost Songs are lost no more. Plan Nine is reborn, giving the long-lost songs a second life!