60388 Frankfurt
Laibach's iconic album Opus Dei (featuring songs like Life is Life, Leben heißt Leben and Geburt einer Nation), released in 1987 on the Mute label, will now, after 26 years, finally be remastered and re-released on vinyl and CD. The release is expected to take place in May 2024 and Laibach will promote it with a conceptual OPUS DEI TOUR, reprising some of the tracks from the album for the first time in many years. In addition to the Opus Dei material, the band will perform some of the important songs from its catalogue that preceded Opus Dei, with a few new surprises thrown in. As always with Laibach, expect the unexpected this time too.
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LAIBACH have released a two-track single, ‘Opus Dei Live 1987 - 1989 pt.1’ featuring two unreleased live recordings: ‘Leben heisst Leben (Opus Dei)’ Live from London, Queen Elizabeth Hall, 1987 and ‘F.I.A.T. (Let It Be)’ Live from Paris, Espace Ornano, 1992. Both tracks are from the expanded edition of their 1987 album, Opus Dei, which is set to be released on Mute on 10 May 2024 on vinyl and as a 2CD box set – the CD features 16 unreleased live tracks from 1987-1989 and 3 bonus tracks (which includes two previously unreleased.
Listen to the single, which features their infamous interpretation of Opus’ ‘Live is Life’ recorded live at the Royal Elizabeth Hall, London, in 1987 along with an epic live rendering of ‘F.I.A.T. (Let It Be)’, a stark comment on the human cost of war, HERE.
The two-track single is accompanied by the newly remastered version of ‘Opus Dei (Life is Life)’, cut to evocative live footage of the band taken from Goran Gajić’s 1988 film 'Pobeda pod suncem' (Victory under the Sun)’, filmed in Belgrade, Münich, and Ljubljana. Watch the video HERE.
Opus Dei, the band’s first album for Mute, was mixed by Rico Conning (Wire, Pere Ubu, Swans, William Orbit). The band’s Laibachian interpretations of Opus’ ‘Live Is Life’ (here presented in English as ‘Opus Dei’ and in German as ‘Leben heisst Leben’) and Queen’s ‘One Vision’ (reworked as ‘Geburt Einer Nation’) soon saw them garner support from the likes of MTV and ITV’s The Chart Show. This mainstream spotlight, coupled with memorable features in the music press, opened up opportunities for the Slovenian collective that included their first world tour. Performances from the tour from London’s Queen Elizabeth Hall, San Francisco, Berlin, Paris and “somewhere in Europe” make up the second CD of the expanded remastered edition.
A redesigned cover (further refining the original’s artwork), plus an extensive booklet with photographs, artwork inspired by the German anti-fascist visual artist John Heartfield, and new sleeve notes by the cultural theorist and author Alexei Monroe make this an essential edition of the band’s third studio album.
Laibach formed in the industrial town Trbovlje (in what was then Yugoslavia). Founded in the year that the country’s founding father Tito died, the band rose to fame to become one of the most internationally acclaimed bands to have come out of the former Communist countries of Eastern and Central Europe. Before the release of their third studio album, Opus Dei, the band had been censored and banned in Yugoslavia, had embarked on the Occupied Europe Tour (which included 16 dates in 8 Eastern and Western Bloc countries), appeared as extras in Kubrick’s Full Metal Jacket, recorded a Peel Session for the BBC and performed in Michael Clark’s dance company production, No Fire Escape from Hell. With no compromise, the band have continued to carve a singular presence with performances, albums, scores and, in 2017, a documentary about their ground-breaking performances in North Korea in 2015 was released. In 2019 they launched their interpretation of The Sound of Music, conceived during their trip to North Korea and in 2020 celebrated four decades with Laibach Revisited. An album of music from the acclaimed theatrical production Wir sind das Volk (ein Musical aus Deutschland) based on the writings of Heiner Müller (1929 -1995) followed in 2022 and the band announced recently that diplomatic negotiations are underway for a performance in Tehran of Alamut, an original symphonic work composed in collaboration with Iranian composers and performers. In April 2024 Laibach will perform their score to a new theatrical production of Bertolt Brecht’s Saint Joan of the Stockyards, by ErosAntEros. The performances run from 18-21 April at Emilia Romagna Teatro in Bologna before a performance at the POLIS Teatro Festival in Ravenna on 24 April 2024. The University of Salerno in Italy has recently announced a course, See You in Hell - The Laibachs between three Dissolutions: Yugoslavia, Europe, the World, which will delve into the history of Laibach.
Laibach’s Opus Dei (Remastered), the first in a series of remastered reissues, is out on Mute on vinyl (with 16-page booklet), 2CD box set (with 28-page booklet) and digitally on 10 May 2024: https://mute.ffm.to/laibach-od24
Laibach's iconic album Opus Dei (featuring songs like Life is Life, Leben heißt Leben and Geburt einer Nation), released in 1987 on the Mute label, will now, after 26 years, finally be remastered and re-released on vinyl and CD. The release is expected to take place in May 2024 and Laibach will promote it with a conceptual OPUS DEI TOUR, reprising some of the tracks from the album for the first time in many years. In addition to the Opus Dei material, the band will perform some of the important songs from its catalogue that preceded Opus Dei, with a few new surprises thrown in. As always with Laibach, expect the unexpected this time too.
---------------------------------------------------
LAIBACH have released a two-track single, ‘Opus Dei Live 1987 - 1989 pt.1’ featuring two unreleased live recordings: ‘Leben heisst Leben (Opus Dei)’ Live from London, Queen Elizabeth Hall, 1987 and ‘F.I.A.T. (Let It Be)’ Live from Paris, Espace Ornano, 1992. Both tracks are from the expanded edition of their 1987 album, Opus Dei, which is set to be released on Mute on 10 May 2024 on vinyl and as a 2CD box set – the CD features 16 unreleased live tracks from 1987-1989 and 3 bonus tracks (which includes two previously unreleased.
Listen to the single, which features their infamous interpretation of Opus’ ‘Live is Life’ recorded live at the Royal Elizabeth Hall, London, in 1987 along with an epic live rendering of ‘F.I.A.T. (Let It Be)’, a stark comment on the human cost of war, HERE.
The two-track single is accompanied by the newly remastered version of ‘Opus Dei (Life is Life)’, cut to evocative live footage of the band taken from Goran Gajić’s 1988 film 'Pobeda pod suncem' (Victory under the Sun)’, filmed in Belgrade, Münich, and Ljubljana. Watch the video HERE.
Opus Dei, the band’s first album for Mute, was mixed by Rico Conning (Wire, Pere Ubu, Swans, William Orbit). The band’s Laibachian interpretations of Opus’ ‘Live Is Life’ (here presented in English as ‘Opus Dei’ and in German as ‘Leben heisst Leben’) and Queen’s ‘One Vision’ (reworked as ‘Geburt Einer Nation’) soon saw them garner support from the likes of MTV and ITV’s The Chart Show. This mainstream spotlight, coupled with memorable features in the music press, opened up opportunities for the Slovenian collective that included their first world tour. Performances from the tour from London’s Queen Elizabeth Hall, San Francisco, Berlin, Paris and “somewhere in Europe” make up the second CD of the expanded remastered edition.
A redesigned cover (further refining the original’s artwork), plus an extensive booklet with photographs, artwork inspired by the German anti-fascist visual artist John Heartfield, and new sleeve notes by the cultural theorist and author Alexei Monroe make this an essential edition of the band’s third studio album.
Laibach formed in the industrial town Trbovlje (in what was then Yugoslavia). Founded in the year that the country’s founding father Tito died, the band rose to fame to become one of the most internationally acclaimed bands to have come out of the former Communist countries of Eastern and Central Europe. Before the release of their third studio album, Opus Dei, the band had been censored and banned in Yugoslavia, had embarked on the Occupied Europe Tour (which included 16 dates in 8 Eastern and Western Bloc countries), appeared as extras in Kubrick’s Full Metal Jacket, recorded a Peel Session for the BBC and performed in Michael Clark’s dance company production, No Fire Escape from Hell. With no compromise, the band have continued to carve a singular presence with performances, albums, scores and, in 2017, a documentary about their ground-breaking performances in North Korea in 2015 was released. In 2019 they launched their interpretation of The Sound of Music, conceived during their trip to North Korea and in 2020 celebrated four decades with Laibach Revisited. An album of music from the acclaimed theatrical production Wir sind das Volk (ein Musical aus Deutschland) based on the writings of Heiner Müller (1929 -1995) followed in 2022 and the band announced recently that diplomatic negotiations are underway for a performance in Tehran of Alamut, an original symphonic work composed in collaboration with Iranian composers and performers. In April 2024 Laibach will perform their score to a new theatrical production of Bertolt Brecht’s Saint Joan of the Stockyards, by ErosAntEros. The performances run from 18-21 April at Emilia Romagna Teatro in Bologna before a performance at the POLIS Teatro Festival in Ravenna on 24 April 2024. The University of Salerno in Italy has recently announced a course, See You in Hell - The Laibachs between three Dissolutions: Yugoslavia, Europe, the World, which will delve into the history of Laibach.
Laibach’s Opus Dei (Remastered), the first in a series of remastered reissues, is out on Mute on vinyl (with 16-page booklet), 2CD box set (with 28-page booklet) and digitally on 10 May 2024: https://mute.ffm.to/laibach-od24