Yann Tiersen shares video for Poull Bojer
Yann Tiersen has shared a mesmerising new video for the latest track to be taken from his forthcoming album, Kerber – out on Mute on 27 August 2021 – and announced details of worldwide tour dates, starting later this year in North America with shows in Europe confirmed for 2022. The dates include a performance at London’s Roundhouse, Glasgow’s Royal Concert Hall and Manchester’s Bridgewater Hall in February 2022.
Directed by Murat Gökmen, the live session video for ‘Poull Bojer’ depicts the interplay between the electronics and the source material on the album, with hypnotic manipulations of Tiersen beamed back on screens throughout The Eskal studio.
Watch it here: https://youtu.be/dwW1bI6epno
Kerber marks a new chapter in the Breton artist’s work, one that begins with his most overtly electronic material to date. True to Tiersen’s nuanced and subtle approach, this isn’t a U-turn-like thumping piece of dance music but instead a beautifully textured, highly immersive and thoughtfully constructed electronic world to step inside of.
It is both an evolution of what has come before, as well as a new space to explore. On the new album, the piano is the source, but electronics are the environment that they exist within. Tiersen explains, “You may get this intuitive thinking of, ‘oh it’s piano stuff’, but actually it’s not. I worked on piano tracks to begin with but that’s not the core of it, they are not important. The context is the most important thing – the piano was a precursor to create something for the electronics to work around.”
Working in The Eskal, the studio he built on Ushant (the island where he lives, located 30 kilometres off the West coast of Brittany in the Celtic Sea), Tiersen’s process for the album’s recording was particularly involved. After spending the spring writing the piano parts, he went on to spend that summer meticulously creating a sample bank for the Elektron Octatrack using these parts as inspiration, following the chord progressions, playing them on instruments such as the Ondes Martenot, mellotron and harpsichord. These were then subsequently transformed, reshaped and processed. What then followed, with producer Gareth Jones (Depeche Mode, Einstürzende Neubauten), was three weeks of working with electronics, sampling, re-sampling and processing sounds to create an engulfing soundscape where the tender tones of piano keys merge with gently pulsing electronics and an intense ambient milieu.
Yann Tiersen is planning a live event to be broadcast worldwide from Ushant and the island is further represented on the graphic artwork by LA-based artist, Katy Ann Gilmore who explains, “Also inspired by landscape, I’m drawn to simple, repeated elements to convey the idea of depth and perspective. I think about lines receding to infinity, and how that helps build up the world around us. Using maps of locations indicated by Yann, I traced shorelines, fences, and other place markers that tie to the specific tracks. I then used these marks to build up shapes that inhabit a new geography as they move through space towards infinity.”
Kerber Tracklisting
Kerlann
Ar Maner Kozh
Kerdrall
Ker Yegu
Ker al Loch
Kerber
Poull Bojer
Yann Tiersen Tour Dates
2021 – North American Tour
9 Nov – Los Angeles, CA The Fonda Theatre
10 Nov – Berkeley, CA The UC Theatre
12 Nov – Portland, OR Crystal Ballroom
13 Nov – Vancouver, BC Vogue Theatre
14 Nov – Seattle, WA Neptune
17 Nov – Chicago, IL Metro
18 Nov – Detroit, MI Crofoot Ballroom
19 Nov – Toronto, ONT Phoenix Concert Hall
20 Nov – Montreal, QUE MTelus
22 Nov – Quebec City, QC Le Capitole
23 Nov – Boston, MA Berklee Performance Center
26 Nov – Brooklyn, NY Brooklyn Steel
27 Nov – Washington, DC 930 Club
2022 – European Tour
29 Jan – Stockholm, SE Filadelfia
30 Jan – Gothenburg, SE Tradgarn
31 Jan – Copenhagen, DK Opera House
1 Feb – Malmo SE Concert House
2 Feb – Hamburg, DE, Laeizhalle
4 Feb – Berlin, DE Tempodrom
7 Feb – Milan, IT Teatro degli Arcimboldi
9 Feb – Dusseldorf, DE Tonhalle
10 Feb – Brussels, BE Cirque Royale
12 Feb – London, UK Roundhouse
14 Feb – Glasgow, UK Royal Concert Hall
15 Feb – Manchester, UK Bridgewater Hall
18 Feb – Roubaix (near Lille), FR Le Colisee
19 Feb – Strasbourg, FR La Laiterie
20 Feb – Dijon, FR La Vapeur
22 Feb – Montpellier, FR Le Corum
23 Feb – Toulouse, FR Le Bikini
24 Feb – Biarritz, FR La Gare du Midi
25 Feb – Bordeaux, FR Krakatoa
26 Feb – La Rochelle, FR La Sirene
28 Feb – Tours, FR Le Grand Theatre
1 March – Clermont-Ferrand, FR Cooperative de Mai
2 March- Rouen, FR Le 106
Kerber’s release will be preceded by a book of sheet music on 20 July. Exclusively published by Hal Leonard, the folio will feature all seven pieces presented for solo piano, with preface by Tiersen.
Kerber is set for release on Mute on 27 August 2021 as a deluxe limited clear vinyl edition with unique artwork, in a PVC sleeve (1000 available worldwide), limited edition white vinyl with a poster, and black vinyl (all come with high definition audio download) as well as on CD and digitally.
A series of limited edition bundles (including t-shirt, tote bag, sheet music and poster) will be available from https://www.yanntiersen.com/
Pre-order: https://mute.ffm.to/kerber
Pre-save: https://mute.ffm.to/kerber-ps
‘Ker al Loch’, directed by Sam Wiehl: https://youtu.be/RHiYco6Sd_k
‘Poull Bojer’ on YouTube: https://youtu.be/dwW1bI6epno
Photograph credit Richard Dumas