The Opiates - Hollywood Under the Knife (2011)

This album is more important to me than most things i've done. It is a collection of, to my mind, beautiful and well crafted songs and it took so much work to finish). When you don't have large budgets everything to attempt to do takes a lot of juggling, to put it mildy, before you get to a point where even one song gets done, let alone ten. The process of making this album, getting so much support from lovely people like Wolfgang as well as Philip Marshall, the graphic designer, all the remixers who delivered a multitude of gifts with their remixes..... to see something come together after a long process, is a gift in itself. Video maker Joern Hartmann, who made three videos, basically for no pay, Michael Huber giving me a promotional budget to work with and being the first person to hear the songs and giving me positive feedback, all these people deserve more thanks than i could ever give.
Here's more about the album.
The Opiates started with the intention of being an ambient project. Soon bored, they abandoned any genre restrictions in favour of music that inspired them in cerebral as well as booty shaking ways.
Dubbed by the press as ‘The Carpenters of Electro’, their album ‘Hollywood Under The Knife’ explores paths pioneered by the Chicago house and Detroit techno heroes, (not least Electribe 101), with the aim of taking things forward a step or two.
Although Kraftwerk and Yazoo have been mentioned as influences, The Opiates’ unique brand of electronic music is not readily categorised. Theirs is a pursuit without compromise; a rare match of songwriting and cutting-edge beats and bleeps.
Turner Price winning artist Wolfgang Tilmanns opened his entire archive and granted a free choice of images for The Opiates to choose from, resulting in nine previously unseen and unpublished images making up the artwork of the album cover and booklet.
The Opiates will boldly go where the best electronic duo crossover albums have gone before, and will appeal to charts and underground alike.