Photo by Mike Dann
Perth's premier electro power pop sensation VOYAGER will be releasing 2021's 'A Voyage Through Time' virtual performance on Blu-ray and LP on August 26, 2022 via Season of Mist! The performance was originally recorded on August 10, 2021 at Magnet House in Perth (AU) and aired on September 5, 2021 in celebration of the anniversary of the Voyager 1 Spacecraft that was launched by NASA. To celebrate the forthcoming release, the band is now sharing the live clip of "White Shadow," which can be seen and heard at THIS LOCATION.
'A Voyage Through Time' presents a one-of-a-kind visual and aural performance that outlines the progression of VOYAGER's musical career. The virtual live experience with full production is a journey across two decades and seven albums with a fan-voted set list, exploring a new and enhanced approach to the band's live show.
VOYAGER's Danny Estrin comments: "It’s time to immortalize "A Voyage through Time!" After much demand we’re so happy to bring you our lockdown production on Bluray and vinyl - where we celebrate over two decades of Voyager."
Pre-orders are will be live today and can be found HERE while you can pre-save the album and singles across your favourite streaming services HERE.
In addition, the band will be hitting the road in Europe and the UK for the 'Witness Tour Europe 2022,' supporting the mighty VOLA. The tour will be kicking off in Munich (DE) at Feierwerk on the September 9 and will be traveling through 12 different countries, delivering 21 energetic shows before the final curtain, which will end at Euroblast Fest in Cologne (DE). The full run of dates can be found below! Tickets are available now HERE.
ICYMI: In February of 2022, VOYAGER won the hearts of 'Eurovision - Australia Decides!' viewers, winning the fan vote by a landslide and coming in second place by a mere three points via the official jury vote for their song "Dreamer!"
The cover artwork and tracklisting for 'A Voyager Through Time' can be found below!
Since their 1999 formation, whatever genre norms, boundaries and regulations thrust upon Perth, Australia’s Voyager have been smashed. They embrace, if not brandish pop; employ a keytar on stage, and, bring forward a positive, if not uplifting feeling to their music, running head-first into the endless parade of heavy bands who see the world in a different light. It’s perhaps why the title of their seventh full-length and first for Season of Mist, Colours in the Sun, is apropos: Voyager simply prefers to see the bright side of things.
“Observations of the malaises of the modern world and the baffling obsession with purity and difference all make me think,” says frontman and founding member Danny Estrin. “We’ve never had it better and we’ve never had it more colorful. To me that’s progress, it’s adaptation, it’s evolution and it’s astounding.”
The follow-up to 2017’s Ghost Mile, Colours in the Sun finds Voyager enmeshed in rich, melodic, song-first tapestries, led by Estrin’s smooth, capable clean vocal delivery. Estrin is self-aware of his vocals, calling them “unique and ‘80s.” But whatever tag Estrin affixes to his voice, they are the propellent throughout Colours in the Sun, serving up a steady diet of soaring, emotive choruses, where melody is paramount and along the way, even getting some help from another distinctive belter, Leprous’s Einar Solberg on “Entropy.”
“Einar and I became good friends on our tours through Europe and Australia,” notes Estrin. “I couldn’t help but ask him to guest on the album. He is a fantastic musician and vocalist. I sent him a reference track which he swiftly ignored and laid his own tracks down. The result is stunning!”
The kaleidoscope of sounds that comprise the album’s ten cuts is the result of Voyager’s far-reaching influences, many of which go beyond the traditional realms of metal and rock. Estrin calls it “catchy at the top, proggy at the bottom, as if Dream Theater and Depeche Mode had a baby.” It’s almost as if the term “progressive” is too limiting for Voyager, particularly when the guitar tandem of Simone Dow and Scott Kay merge for complex rhythms while doing battle against Estrin’s vaudeville-like keyboards (!) on “Reconnected.”
The “proggy at the bottom” notice is served by way of the rhythm section of bassist Alex Canion and drummer Ashley Doodkorte, who stretch their musical tentacles across busy, active cuts such as “Saccharine Dream” and the syncopated “Water Over the Bridge.” “I think we found our ‘voice’ on V (2014) and have been building on that ever since,” says Estrin. “The synthwave prog sound is really something that has naturally developed and has been refined even more on the new album. Every record is progress — that’s what progressive music is all about!”
According to Estrin, the Colours in the Sun album title encompasses a “vibrant multitude of people coming together under the hot Australian sun to create a beautiful and colorful soundscape.” It’s capped off by artwork courtesy of Doodkorte, who made the piece out of photographs near his house in Perth. A closer inspection reveals there are seven suns on the cover, one for each Voyager album, topped off by an updated version of the band’s logo comprised of five strokes, one for each member. No doubt a fitting visual summation of a band whose progress can be the described in the most literal and figurative of terms.
“It’s been a slow steady growth over the years,” concludes Estrin. “Other bands come and go after a year of fame. I really feel like we’ve built up an incredible fanbase, especially over the last decade, and the deal with Season of Mist seemed the logical step to take it to the next level together.”
Style: Electro Progressive Metal
Line-up
Danny Estrin - Vocals
Simone Dow - Guitars
Alex Canion - Bass
Scott Kay - Guitars
Ash Doodkorte - Drums
Live audio, mixing and mastering:
Aidan Barton at Sovereign Studios
Remastered for vinyl by Simon Struthers at Forensic Audio
Cover design and layout artist:
Ashley Doodkorte
Cover photography:
Keith Mitchell
Bio:
David E. Gehlke
VOYAGER's socials:
FACEBOOK, INSTAGRAM, TWITTER, YOUTUBE, WEBSITE, and BANDCAMP.
