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| The Final Experiment | ||||
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| Studio album by | ||||
| Released | 27 October 1995 | |||
| Recorded | 1995 | |||
| Studio | Studio "RS 29" (Waalwijk, Netherlands) | |||
| Genre | ||||
| Length | 71:17 | |||
| Label |
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| Producer | Arjen Anthony Lucassen | |||
| Ayreon chronology | ||||
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| Arjen Anthony Lucassen chronology | ||||
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The Final Experiment is the debut studio album by the Dutch progressive metal project Ayreon, released in 1995. Originally released with no artist noted as Ayreon: The Final Experiment, the unexpected success of the album lead project leader Arjen Anthony Lucassen to detach the "Ayreon" name and use it as the project's name for subsequent releases at the suggestion of the record label.[2]
The album focuses on the character of Ayreon, a blind minstrel in 6th century Britain who receives visions of the end of the world and attempts to warn King Arthur's court of the threat; unlike future Ayreon releases, characters are not each voiced by a single singer, with several alternating as Ayreon and other characters over the course of the story. The Final Experiment introduces several concepts which appear in future Ayreon albums, such as humanity's propensity for war, pollution, and the gratuitous use of technology in human society.[3] The end of the world witnessed by the character of Ayreon plays a key role in the overall storyline featured in following albums, and the character himself is referenced multiple times in later albums.
In 2004, after Lucassen moved to a new record label, Inside Out, he re-released The Final Experimentwith a bonus disk featuring nine new versions of songs from the original version with different singers and mostly acoustic instrumentation.[2]
- ^ Howey, Ann F.; Reimer, Stephen R. (2006). A Bibliography of Modern Arthuriana (1500-2000). Boydell & Brewer. p. 532. ISBN 9781843840688.
- ^ a b Ayreon Chronology
- ^ The Final Experiment at Ayreon.com Archived 2008-05-01 at the Wayback Machine, features lyrics, album personnel, and storyline.