AIR To Release New Soundtrack Album ‘Le Voyage Dans La Lune’

French duo AIR are set to release their new album, ‘Le Voyage Dans La Lune’ (A Trip To The Moon) on 2 February 2012. The album is inspired by a project the duo took part in last year, in which they composed an original modern soundtrack for the legendary 16-minute film created by George Méliés, released in 1902 and widely considered one of the most important works in film history.

The only hand coloured print of the film was rediscovered back in 1993. However, it was decomposed so badly it had to be put through a digital re-mastering process that wasn’t completed until 2010. Part of this process was to create a new score, so the team behind the project, Fondation Groupama Gan and Fondation Technicolor, approached AIR’s Nicolas Godin and Jean-Benoit Dunckel to compose the new contemporary soundtrack.

‘Le Voyage Dans La Lune’ debuted at the Cannes Film Festival on May 11 2011 to immediate and unanimous acclaim, spurring the band on to develop the project into a full length album inspired by the film showcasing the vocal talents of Au Revoir Simone and Victoria Legrand (Beach House).

Nicolas explains: “A Trip to the Moon is undoubtedly more organic than most of our past projects. We wanted it to sound ‘handmade,’ knocked together,’ a bit like Méliès’ special effects. Everything is played live. Like Méliès’ film, our soundtrack is nourished by living art.”

The three producers of the restored version have agreed to let EMI release a special Limited Edition version of the AIR album Le Voyage Dans La Lune, which will be released on Astralwerks. This will consist of the album plus a bonus DVD or digital download of the restored colorized film with AIR’s original film score, strictly limited to 70,000 global copies.

Check out the video for the first track from the album, ‘Sonic Armada,’ HERE

By Connor O’Brien