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Arcana

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Sweden (1993 – present)

(there are four artists with this name)

I. Arcana is a / band from Sweden, formed in 1993. They merge classically- and medievally-inspired instrumental music with occasional vocals to arrive at a richly atmospheric and dark musical tapestry. Previously signed to the Cold Meat Industry label, the original line-up consisted of Peter Bjärgö and Ida Bengtsson, but since 2002 it changed line-up and now consists of Peter Bjärgö, Ann-Mari Thim, Stefan Eriksson, Cecilia Bjärgö and Mattias Borgh. Due to personal issues with Cold Meat Industry Peter dropped from the label and created his own label and mailorder called Erebus Odora. The label no longer exists, but the same Erebus Odora still exists as the studio where he is still active making his own music.
Official website: www.erebusodora.net/arcana

II. Arcana was a side project of bassist Bill Laswell’s. On The Last Wave Laswell joins his deep-bass to free music pioneer and guitar legend Derek Bailey together with drumming demigod Tony Williams to create the ultimate freely improvising power trio. The other album put out under this group name as a Laswell project was Arc Of The Testimony, one of the last projects drummer Tony Williams would record before his untimely death. Instead of the trio format, Laswell adds guitarists Buckethead and Nicky Skopelitis, Graham Haynes on cornet, and saxophonists Byard Lancaster and Pharoah Sanders. Where The Last Wave harkens to Laswell’s work in Last Exit, Arc of the Testimony is more along the lines of Ekstasis or some of the instrumental Material work, such as Hallucination Engine.
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dark ambient, neoclassical, darkwave, ambient, ethereal
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  • ErebusOdora wrote:
    Friday afternoon
    I am off to Berlin with two of my daughters... I whish you all a great weekend=)

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  • UnholyTancred wrote:
    last week
    "...the Last Embrace" is one of the greatest albums of all time, in my opinion of course <3

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  • Noise_Memories wrote:
    last week
    www.last.fm/music/hathorus

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  • ultrandy wrote:
    last week
    great freeform jazz! Tony williams is just fantastic in whatever he does!

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  • ErebusOdora wrote:
    last month
    Arcana will perform in Nijmegen Holland. And we are very happy to be back again=) When:Saturday, 05 Jun 2010, 19:30 Where:Nijmegen, St Stevenskerkhof 62, Nijmegen, Gelderland, 6503 CE Bands: Arcana + Deleyaman + Faerydae Presale: 17€ (until Jan 16th 2010). After Jan 16th: 19€ Doors: 21€

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  • ErebusOdora wrote:
    last month
    Thank you, Aeternacht=)

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  • aethernacht wrote:
    last month
    "damn all this ambient bands would be so much better without voices.... =/ " - silliest thing I've seen in the Arcana shoutbox yet. The vocals pretty much are the ambience. Take those away and you would get nowhere near as an amazing experience as you do with them. The music is beautiful, the vocals are phenomenal.

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  • mentalcase83 wrote:
    last month
    <3

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  • Trelogy wrote:
    last month
    I love Arcana's voices. I cannot imagine Autumnal without voices. (especially) I don't mind about lyrics so much. Because I listen to voices as tones. (English is not my mother tongue. :P)

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  • ErebusOdora wrote:
    last month
    Hm, I don't think opera would be that nice withut the voices... I love a beautiful vice in music... Listen to Arvo Pärt's choirs, Verdi's operas, Brendan Perry's smoothing voice or why not Diamanda Galas repertoir. Damn, I'm getting excited;)

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  • shinji03 wrote:
    October 2009
    damn all this ambient bands would be so much better without voices.... =/

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  • ErebusOdora wrote:
    October 2009
    Big thanks to all people who came to see us last Saturday in Prague=) We had a wonderful time, both off stage and on. Hope to back one day=)

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  • Henkka93 wrote:
    October 2009
    Buckethead Arcana FTW!

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  • daughterofnyx wrote:
    October 2009
    I absolutely adore Arcana. I hope I'll one day have the privilege of seeing them live.

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  • ELITEAEON wrote:
    October 2009
    vaya que puedo decir, que es de las mejores agrupaciones en su estilo y su música es merecedora de la eternidad...

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  • ErebusOdora wrote:
    October 2009
    Dark_tower: As I said earlier, people should have their own view about Arcana. But i do agree; Peter is not making music to sound like DcD, he writes music out of his own emotions and thoughts. If people say it sounds like DcD, they say it... but that doesn't concern Peter.. he will continue in his own way=) Italy would be fantastic=)

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  • dark_tower wrote:
    October 2009
    @ErebusOdora: I was just being melodramatic :D But seriously, you guys playing in Italy would make me really happy! @ people bitching about Arcana being a DCD copy: you all should just shut the hell up. Dead Can Dance have influenced a LOT of bands, and one might say without a doubt that they have brought to life an entirely new genre of music. All these bands are just bringing the DCD lesson to a new level, and Arcana are one of the best in doing this in my opinion. Yes, it's true that the neoclassical and ethereal scene does not lack copycats and unoriginal bands, but this is certainly not the case of Arcana: the strong personal identity and the message they carry is unlike anything I've ever seen, and not only in the neoclassical genre, because their music trascends genres. ErebusOdora, you can correct me yourself if you don't agree with something I said, but these are the feelings your music conveys into me :)

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  • Shinku-kun wrote:
    October 2009
    @antitype: well, I'm pretty tactless in many ways. Sorry for that.

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  • Shinku-kun wrote:
    October 2009
    @ErebusOdora: It's not me who started that. My shout was about Arcana's music, not about someone who listens to it or about musicians. It's not my fault that Trystane prefer to discuss my personal music taste instead. Well, I predicted that the reaction will be negative, but I didn't want to argue with someone. Still, Trystane's post was so stupid, I just couldn't stand it. @Trystane: offensing your opponent's music taste - is what you call "defense"? Man, you really are the only one here who needs to wory about immaturity.

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  • antitype wrote:
    October 2009
    Shinku, you're welcome to your opinion -- I think Trystane is just getting a little bent out of shape because your way of expressing your distaste comes off as pretty tactless and obnoxious when a member of Arcana has been pretty active in this shoutbox as of late (if you hadn't noticed). This is probably why your maturity is in question.

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CD's for sale... again!

28 Jul 2009 | from blog.myspace.com/peterbjargo

We have a few albums for sale. If you find anything you like, just e-mail us and we will ship the order. Prices are marked below. The costs for shipping differ depending where you live in the world an. …

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