En attendant Cousteau explained

En attendant Cousteau
Type:studio
Artist:Jean-Michel Jarre
Cover:En_attendant_Cousteau.jpg
Released:11 June 1990
Studio:Coral Sound studio, Port of Spain, Trinidad and Tobago
Croissy studio, Paris
Length:1:08:57
Label:Disques Dreyfus
Producer:Jean-Michel Jarre
Prev Title:Revolutions
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En attendant Cousteau (English title: Waiting for Cousteau) is the tenth studio album by French electronic musician and composer Jean-Michel Jarre, released on Disques Dreyfus, licensed to Polydor. The title is a reference to the play Waiting for Godot.

Originally, Jarre intended to call it 'Cousteau sur la plage (Cousteau on the beach)', but it was changed at the last moment. A promotional tape contained this title.[1]

The album was dedicated to Jacques-Yves Cousteau and was released on his 80th birthday 11 June 1990. AllMusic described the album as "groundbreaking stuff", due to its stylistic differences from his other albums.The album reached Number 14 in the UK charts.[2]

En attendant Cousteau is divided into two distinct stylistic halves: the first three pieces titled "Calypso" and the title track, an ambient piece which was used in the soundtrack of a 1991 documentary entitled "Palawan: Le dernier refuge" by Cousteau and Jarre. However two tracks from that documentary did not appear on the final album.[3]

The title track was also played at Jarre's exposition Concert d'images in Paris, 1989. According to a Jarre fan-magazine,[4] it was created via an app on an Atari Mega-ST,[5] on which Jarre programmed 16 starting notes. He apparently got the idea from the book 'Dirk Gently's Holistic Detective Agency' by Douglas Adams . He denied it in a later interview, claiming all notes are actually played by hand, noting however that the track includes some time-stretched samples mixed into the background.[6]

Jarre performed the album for about 2.5 million people at the Paris La Défense concert on 14 july 1990, featuring The Amoco Renegades, a steel-drum band from Trinidad and Tobago.

Track listing

Vinyl and cassette edition

Personnel

Personnel listed in album liner notes:[7]

Charts

Chart (1990)Peak
position
Finnish Albums (Suomen virallinen lista)[8]
11
Spanish Albums (AFYVE)[9] 37

Certifications and sales

!scope="row"|Worldwide||1,550,000|-

External links

Notes and References

  1. Web site: 2014-03-27 . aerozonejmj . 2023-11-04 . aerozonejmj.fr.
  2. Web site: UK Music charts . EveryHit.com . 2008-02-14.
  3. Web site: 2019-03-03 . Aerozonejmj . 2023-11-04 . aerozonejmj.fr.
  4. Book: Conductor Of The Masses - Issue 5 . Conceptual Publishing . July 1991 . UK . 30 . English.
  5. AMI (Algorithmic Musical Instrument) By Cadenza Software. However, likely the name should be ACT (Algorithmic Compositional Tool), which "generates random musical output, based on user-defined notes, which can be controlled in real time using a GEM interface or a MIDI source", as listed on https://www.ataritoday.com/extra/.
  6. Web site: 2019-01-19 . Aerozonejmj . 2024-04-22 . aeorozonejmj.fr.
  7. Waiting For Cousteau . booklet . Disques Dreyfus/Polyodr . 1990 . 843 614-2.
  8. Finnish charts:
    • Book: Pennanen, Timo . 2006 . Sisältää hitin – levyt ja esittäjät Suomen musiikkilistoilla vuodesta 1972 . 1st . Kustannusosakeyhtiö Otava . Helsinki. 978-951-1-21053-5 . 168. Finnish.
  9. Book: Salaverri, Fernando. Sólo éxitos: año a año, 1959–2002. 1st. September 2005. Fundación Autor-SGAE. Spain. 84-8048-639-2.