And so it begins...

Ayreon mastermind and multi-instrumentalist was born Arjen AnthonyLucassen April 3rd, 1960 in The Hague. Both Arjen and his older brotherGjalt were good students, but unlike Gjalt, Arjen wasn't interestedmuch in studying. A notorious trouble-maker in class, Arjen decided topersue a career in the music business after graduating highschool.During his teens, Gjalt always teased Arjen a lot, and ever since theAyreon albums were released, Arjen has been paying him back by playingjokes on his brother in the credits of his CDs. If you look carefully,you'll find a Gjalt 'joke' in every booklet of CDs released after 1995.

School's out!

Arjen's love for music was sparked in the 60s, when he became a bigfan of the Beatles. He started buying albums in the early seventieswhen the glam rock era started and bands such as T-Rex, Alice Cooper,The Sweet, David Bowie were rising stars. Arjen really wanted to be ina band but he was too lazy to learn to play an instrument so he starteda play-back band mimicing his heroes Alice Cooper, Slade, The Sweet. Heactually did get a lot of gigs in schools and already then he was abusy guy.

Then one day one of the older pupils came up to him and said:You have to listen to this. Handing him a copy of Deep Purple's 'Madein Japan'. "Glam rock is ok, but this is really great." When Arjenlistened to it and heard Ritchie Blackmore play, he knew that is whathe wanted: to play guitar! So he learned to play guitar and wentthrough a stage where he had a lot of different bands until 1980. Oneof these bands was called 'Mover'.

Bodine

Arjen had heard that the Dutch band Bodine had been looking for anew singer, and though he didn't consider himself a great or giftedvocalist, it was his favorite band, so he wanted to get involved. The first album with Jay van Feggelen on vocals was one of his favoritealbums. He figured that he would audition as a vocalist, and bring hisguitar, hoping they would give him the position of second guitarist inthe band. And they told him that he had good ideas, good lyrics andgood melodies but his voice was not what they were looking for. SoArjen told them he had brought his guitar. Those were the days ofguitar tandems in bands such as Judas Priest, Iron Maiden, Thin Lizzy.Arjen pulled out his guitar and his amps and just began to play someBodine songs that he had been working on for a month. And they said:Ok, you're in! Arjen stayed in Bodine from 1980 to 1984 and did twoalbums with them: 'Bold as Brass' and 'Three Time Running'.

Vengeance

Then Arjen got a call from a young and fresh band named Vengeanceasking him if he knew a guitarplayer. Arjen thought just a moment,thinking about how great Bodine was, and what amazing things he hadlearned from the older much more experienced musicians, but also howlimited he felt about expressing his own musical ideas. He couldn'tdevelop himself as a composer and realized that there was a lot ofspirit in Vengeance. So Arjen answered: "Yes, I know a guitarplayer...me!" Vengeance was surprised and very happy, but wondered about hiscommitment to Bodine. Arjen told them that it was time for a change. Hejoined Vengeance shortly after that phonecall and considers the time with them great, wild and quite enjoyable. Hehad more freedom to do what he wanted and to compose songs. But still,he had to make concessions since he was in a band and also had to dealwith record companies demands. Not every band member agreed on hisideas, which made sense given the fact that they all hailed fromdifferent musical backgrounds. In 1989 the band replaced singer LeonGoewie with English native Ian Parry, but the band had a hard timegetting a new style off the ground. In the early nineties the grungeand alternative rock genre exploded on to the scene. Arjen wished to gointo a Rainbow direction with keyboards and bombastic sounds, and otherguys wanted to explore Bad Company or Thin Lizzy styles. Because ofthis they wondered what the audience wanted to hear and started towrite songs to please the fans. That was a bad decision. After a verysuccessful farewell tour in 1992 Arjen parted ways with Vengeance.

Striking out alone!

He was looking for a way to make a life-long dream come true of creating a rock opera.

Ayreon

The Final Experiment (1995)
'The Final Experiment' is Arjen Lucassen's first rock opera. The fulltitle is 'Ayreon: The Final Experiment' with no band-name given. Lateron the label suggested the name Ayreon would be used for any similarprojects by Arjen.

Actual Fantasy (1996)
The second CD released under the Ayreon name is 'Actual Fantasy'. Ithas no continuous story with a beginning and an end, but the CD'sentire concept is fantasy. The songs are based on fantasy and sci-fimovies, or on stories Arjen wrote himself.

The first ten thousand copies of Actual Fantasy featured a bonusCD-rom track; a full-length animated video clip for 'Stranger FromWithin'. The second version of the CD featured two bonus tracks: 'TheDawn of Man' and the single version for 'Stranger From Within'replacing the video.

Into the Electric Castle (1998)
The third Ayreon release is a 100+ minute double CD and like 'The FinalExperiment' it tells a story. Eight stereotypical characters fromdifferent eras in time suddenly find themselves in another dimension assubjects of an experiment conducted by an alien race.

The characters on 'Into the Electric Castle' are blown out ofproportion. Arjen rented a few old B-movies for inspiration to see howRomans, Barbarians and Egyptians were stereotyped in those years. "Ilike this tongue in cheek-thing, although I take the music itself veryseriously."

"Into The Electric Castle' is the most pleasant sounding album I'vemade so far', says Arjen. "And that is mainly due to the analogequipment I used. Like vintage synthesizers from the 70's, which stillhave that warm, instantly recognizable sound. I had enough of triggereddrums, samples and prefab digital sounds. I'm a sucker forcontradictions. 'Into The Electric Castle' is one to start with. But Ialso like the idea of telling a sci-fi story and using equipment that -in some cases - people might find out-dated."

Universal Migrator Part One: The Dream Sequencer &
Universal Migrator Part Two: The Flight of the Migrator (2000)
The Universal Migrator parts I & II were released at the same time,but were for sale independently. Part I: 'The Dream Sequencer' mainlyfeatures laid-back, atmospheric material with songs focussing onmelody. Initially the album was meant to only feature female singers,but not enough singers were available so Arjen changed his plans.

Whereas 'Into the Electric Castle' has an opera-like set up, in whichmain characters sing dialogues in one song, on 'The Dream Sequencer'Arjen chose to have only one vocalist sing each song. As a result eachnew incarnation of the last Colonist on Mars, the main character of thestory, has its own distinct personality.

Ayreonauts Only (2000)
'Ayreonauts Only' is a collection of previously unreleased Ayreon andAyreon-related material. It is sold at a low price and meant to appealspecifically to die-hard fans of Ayreon. Some Ayreon tracks featuredifferent singers, and others tracks are completely different (demo)versions of songs. The CD also features a preview of Ambeon, a newproject that Arjen had started after finishing The Universal Migratoralbums.

The Human Equation (2004)
In May 2003 Arjen managed to wrap up all Star One business, andretreated into his Electric Castle studio to work on the 6th Ayreonalbum called 'The Human Equation'.

"Initially I wanted to create something mellow as a reaction to theheavy Star One project, but as always� these things never really allowthemselves to be planned. The musical direction of the new Ayreon isvery diverse. As usual I take you from one extreme to another, but thistime the quiet parts are even more quiet, the folky parts more folky,the proggy parts more proggy and the heavy parts more heavy! There area few more major differences compared to the other Ayreon albumsthough..."

"First of all I decided to only work with musicians who had neverguested on Ayreon before. The one exception to this rule was the use ofdrummer Ed Warby, for he had truly become a part of my sound and music.I chose a wide variety of singers from different styles of music andfrom all corners of the world, most of them quite original andsurprising choices, I think. For details on how the recording sessionswent, please take a look at the studio reports available on thewebsite. I will tell you one thing: just as on 'Into the ElectricCastle' there is a lot of 'dialogue singing' again; sometimes one songfeatures up to ten different singers!"

"Secondly, I wanted to get away from the usual science fiction andfantasy concept in order to keep things fresh and original for bothmyself and the fans. Since 1995, when I released my first Ayreon album,a lot of other Sci-Fi and Fantasy projects have surfaced. So being the'pig-headed git' I am, I decided to go against the grain once again anddo something very different this time. Instead of venturing out inspace, as most would have expected, I took a look inside man himselfand explored the realm of emotions hidden within. So this time: nocastles and aliens. Or..."

The Ayreon Re-Issues
After Arjen departed the Transmission label prior to The Human Equationrelease, Ayreon got a new home at InsideOut Germany. All albums hadbeen sold out for quite some time, and InsideOut had to repress alleditions. For this occasion Arjen created special editions.

Strange Hobby

(taken from 'De Telegraaf)

What do you mean, 'Strange Hobby'? Is it strange for amusician to record the music that once influenced his music and thatstill has a place in his heart? Still, Arjen Lucassen named his sideproject 'Strange Hobby' and to make it even more strange; the bookletdidn't say who was responsible for the disc. The album mastered atAbbey Road Studios was a comply mystery, with the crčme of rock andsurprising arrangements.

In the end former Vengeance-guitar player Arjen Lucassen appeared tobe responsible for this album. After the break-up of his once verysuccesful hardrock band he came up with the Ayreon project,rock-opera's ('The Final Experiment' and 'Actual Fantasy') in theirpurest form.

"Ayreon proves to be extremely successful. In Japan, in Europe, justincredible." I'm talking to a grinning Lucassen. He has reason to grin.The success he has with his fantastic Ayreon albums is unusual for aDutch project. The profit from the first Ayreon album enabled him tobuild a complete studio. "I'm living in a fairy-tale." he says. "Abeautiful home, my own studio, the music that I want to make...itreally is incredible."
The 'Strange Hobby' album was meant to freakout for a change. But on his own way. "I might have been a bit toodriven, also in creating this album. All those vocal lines, all thosechoirs, I did them myself. It has to be recorded perfectly, so I neverstop until it is."

DRIVEN
The guitar player has been so driven,that he didn't realise that he might have overdone it. Song after songhas been recorded perfectly, and that 18 times! "This might be my onlydisadvantage," he confesses, "when I'm making music I don't know how toslow down. Besides, you shouldn't forget that songs in those daysnormally had a duration of about two minutes. I couldn't make an albumwith only ten songs in this case....".

About 'Strange Hobby' as a side project:
"After I finished thesecond Ayreon album I really felt like freaking out. On the Ayreondiscs everything is produced superbly. Every detail, no matter howminor, has been designed, has been thought about. I wanted to breakfree from that for a while. I wanted to run and dance through the roomwhile recording. That's what I did."

"From the start I intended to keep it a secret, who made this album.I just wanted to do that; it seemed fun. I heard names man, Prince,Status Quo, Barry Hay, even Paul McCartney. Well, it may not be smartfrom a commercial point of view, but it was fun."

DREAM
"That I was able to master this disc atthe Abbey Road Studios, actually was a gift from the director of myrecord company. A great guy. When I told him what my dream was, he goton the phone and immediately booked the studio. That was magic. Howmany times do you think I crossed that famous cross-over? Half of thesongs I recorded there, were originally recorded there once. The manwho did the mastering even worked on the 'Beatles Anthology'-series. Hedidn't know that I made this stuff, but he liked it. Though I hadwarned him that the songs were really distorted." (grin)

"I really like doing the things I do now. I don't feel a need tobecome bigger. I think Ayreon holds everything that defines me; allmusicality within me is united in Ayreon. As long as I keep sellingenough copies to be able to make another one, I'm more than happy."

Ambeon

Originally Arjen set out to record an ambient instrumental albumbased on certain electronic patterns, chords and melodies derived fromthe recorded tracks of existing Ayreon songs (to test his new studiohardware system). In the process some new songs evolved, and Arjenfigured female vocals on one or two songs would add a warm human touch.

Arjen heard a recording of a 14-year young Dutch singer named Astridvan der Veen. This was exactly the voice he was looking for, and so heasked her to write lyrics and melodies to go over some of thesere-constructed ambient tracks and then sing them. This arrangementworked out extremely well. So before he realized it the album haddeveloped from an instrumental album with two vocal songs to a vocalalbum with two instrumentals.

To get as much outside input as Arjen could in order to not make itsound too much like an Ayreon album, he decided to involve severalmusicians who could bring in their own ideas, just like Astrid did.Stephen van Haestregt, who helped Arjen out with the technical issuesof his new hard disk recording system, turned out to be a very good andversatile drummer.

The experienced Walter Latupeirissa (Snowy White, Steve Lukather,Pat Travers) played some great bass and fretless bass. And two guysfrom the band Celtus, John and Pat McManus, added to the folkatmosphere by playing flute, pipes and fiddle.

Name
The name Ambeon is a combination of the words ambient and Ayreon.

Single
The Cold Metal single was released to support therelease of Fate of a Dreamer and contains one new, spontaneouslyrecorded song based on 'The Dawn of Man'- Merry-Go-Round.

1. Cold Metal (3:46) Remix single version
2. Merry-Go-Round (4:43) Previously unreleased track
3. High (3:26) Remix
4. Cold Metal (7:05) Album version

More Ambeon?
Although Arjen is not ready to retire this project, there are no plans yet for a follow- up to 'Fate of a Dreamer'.

Star One

When Arjen makes a new CD, it is often a reaction to his work on aprevious album. Prior to 'Star One', Arjen created a softer, moreatmospheric album under the name of Ambeon. In response, he went toother extreme to create a completely unbridled heavy metal album.

Arjen Lucassen set a trend with his Ayreon albums. Many laughed whenhe recorded his first rock opera 'Ayreon - The Final Experiment' in1995, and most record companies were hesitant to sign him. Butespecially after the highly successful release of his third Ayreon CD,the rock opera 'Into the Electric Castle', many musicians and producershave followed in his footsteps and new rock operas with multiplesingers are beginning to surface all over the world. Arjen comments:"Yes, I've noticed! I regard it as a compliment. But I have alsonoticed that on some of these operas the singers sound the same, and soyou need the CD booklet to tell them apart.

To ensure that doesn't happen on 'Space Metal', Arjen used verydifferent sounding singers appearing in the same songs -- differentsingers for different moods". Dan Swanö (ex-Edge of Sanity,Nightingale) sings the low parts, Russell Allen (Symphony X) sings thepowerful rough parts, Damian Wilson (ex-Threshold) sings the high clearparts, and to top it off, Floor Jansen (After Forever) sings the reallyhigh choruses. Robert Soeterboek (Ayreon) sang the backing vocals withhis huge smoky voice.

Name
Why not just call it Ayreon? Ayreon is known forhaving many different musical styles. Star One focuses mainly on theheavy side of Arjen's music, and so the songs are more straightforwardand guitar-oriented but still progressive. This album was neverintended to be an Ayreon album, so calling it Ayreon just didn't feelright. The name Star One is based on an episode of Arjen's favoritescience fiction TV series called 'Blakes 7'.

Hawkwind's Dave Brock
Arjen succeeded in gettingHawkwind's Dave Brock to make a guest vocal appearance, something noone has ever managed to do before. Arjen about Brock's guestappearance: "Hawkwind were the inventors of Space Rock, so I thought itwould be a cool idea to record a Hawkwind medley for the album. I askedDave to sing on it, and to my surprise, he did it! This is a dream cometrue as he has been a huge influence on me".

Limited Edition Disc
The Hawkwind medley is available onthe special limited edition version of Space Metal, a beautiful bookthat includes an extra CD with various bonus tracks. A strange versionof David Bowie's 'Space Oddity' sung by Arjen himself is also featuredhere as well as a special Dolby Surround mix of 'Starchild', two otherStar One tracks that didn't fit the album and a surprise hidden track.

Concept
Space Metal isn't a continuous story or a rock opera like the Ayreonalbums. Yet it is still very much a concept album. The individual songsare all based on space films. The album is a journey through Arjen'smind and memory, so the listeners can relive those great sciencefiction space films that made such an impact on him.

Arjen talks about the concept: "I based the songs on films that takeplace entirely in space. It's really hard to write a song based on afilm and then not use names or make the references to the original tooclear. I really wanted to write about my impressions of the films andnot just tell the same story over again.

Stream of Passion

After Dutch guitarist/composer/producer Arjen Anthony Lucassen had finished his latest endeavour,the Ayreon rock opera The Human Equation, he wanted to do two things: showcase the many talents ofMexican singer Marcela Bovio, one of the vocalists on the Ayreon album, and form a band for thefirst time in 10 years.

"The response of critics and fans to Marcela's vocals on the Ayreon album was really great. Peoplewere simply blown away." Arjen explains, "However, already when she was in my studio recording forthe Ayreon project, I realized that she had many more talents that I regretted not being able to useat that time. So, hating to let a good thing go to waste, I decided to construct a project completelycentered on her singing, composing and writing."

Two years ago, Marcela entered a vocalist contest through Lucassen's website. The winner would havea chance to sing on the highly successful Ayreon rock opera series. "When I first heard Marcela'srecordings, it sent shivers down my spine. To find a vocalist who sings with that much passion andpower, is rare. Very rare." And Lucassen should know, he's worked with over a hundred differentvocalists for his many musical projects in the past.

"I refused to start the project with a musical direction in mind, because I wanted Marcela to feelcompletely free to experiment with some simple acoustic guitar demos I had made. She added hermusical ideas, and I went into the studio to work on the songs some more. Then the other bandmembers added their ideas. The music had to develop as naturally as possible, as would happen witha real band, which was an interesting challenge considering that at the moment some band memberslive thousands of miles apart. The whole thing turned into one big world-wide jam session. Whichis very unusual, exciting and a lot of fun."

To form the band, Lucassen used the Internet to tap into the numerous talents that reside all acrossthe globe. A year ago, Dutch drummer Davy Mickers downloaded a special track from Lucassen'swebsite to enter a musicians contest, and used it to showcase his incredible drumming skills. Andjust recently Lucassen discovered Lori Linstruth, an amazingly skilled American female guitaristresiding in Sweden, among the members of the online Ayreon Yahoo group. Completing the band areMexican pianist Alejandro Millán and Dutch bass player Johan van Stratum from the Rock Academyin Tilburg.

The band's creative juices flowed to and fro between computers stationed in all corners ofthe world - recording, writing and matching up musical ideas to form songs. The end result wasas diverse and driven as each individual band member.

Blending mysterious gothic vocals, metal guitars and atmospheric trip-hop, with haunting pianosand live celli- and violin quartets. The album Embrace the Storm was released fall 2005through various labels.