EMPIRE STATE HUMAN

We did get some die hard League fans in the early days emailing us, saying, "We know you're really the League under a different name and that Aidan is really Phil Oakey!" Which was very odd but funny too. What also amazed us is that ten years down the line, The Human League's current art guy Stig Olsen has designed the artwork to "Audio Gothic". We've gone full circle!"

Your last studio album was "Cycles" in 2005. Is "Audio Gothic" sort of a reunion album?

"It's more a celebration of how tight a creative unit we've become in the ten years we've been around. Myself and Seán write all the songs and I assist Seán with the production and that system is definitely the back bone of Empire State Human. As a band we never really went away, as our songs still popped up on various compilations and remix albums. Actually we've been quite busy since "Cycles" - both individually and as a team. In 2005 we also produced a multi band tribute album to Dead or Alive called "Rocket: a tribute to Dead or Alive" followed by a soundtrack to a film called "Screwback" the next year. Afterwards Lar and I released two albums under the bandname "The Garland Cult", while Seán got involved with a new band called "Lectrosoul" and did a number of brilliant remixes. We also collaborated with Steve Bronski (Bronski Beat) resulting in two singles, and before we started working on "Audio Gothic", I released a digital solo electro album for Ninthwave Media called "I Am Figaro" in 2008. At around the same time we also released several new Empire State Human tracks with Ninthwave Media in digital format. So, you can tell we never really stopped recording and releasing. The experience we gained with all these releases, really provided us with the creative platform to make "Audio Gothic" the best album we've ever done.

"When we announced a new album was forthcoming some journalists saw "Audio Gothic" as a re-birth, which was cool with us. We're still quite a low profile band, even though we've had a #1 in the iTunes dance charts in the US with our version of John Carpenter's "Theme To Halloween". So we still have the ability to produce the music we like without too much interference with regard to the sound and style."

Soundwise "Melancholic Afro" seems different from other Empire State Human tracks.

"It's certainly not the synthpop sound we're known to make. We think it's got a break through quality to it and it's very contemporary sounding as well. It's a wall of sound song that's got a Prodigy feel, as well as a T-Rex feel we think. The lyrics are clever too and we think when they're listened to by the remixers they may give them plenty ideas to build upon.

"If you listen through our albums, from the first one "Pop Robot", through to "Music For Humans", "Alpha & Omega", "Urbanism", "Cycles" through to "Audio Gothic" we've always added songs with different edges and feels - piano/string ballads, a blue grass

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