Z² (album)
| Z² | |||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
 |
|||||
|
Studio album by Devin Townsend and Devin Townsend Project |
|||||
| Released | October 27, 2014 | ||||
| Recorded | May 2014 | ||||
| Genre | Progressive metal, industrial metal, progressive rock, experimental rock, new-age | ||||
| Length | 117:00 | ||||
| Label | HevyDevy | ||||
| Producer | Devin Townsend | ||||
| Devin Townsend chronology | |||||
|
|||||
| Devin Townsend Project chronology | |||||
|
|||||
| Sky Blue | |||||
.jpg) |
|||||
| Dark Matters | |||||
.jpg) |
|||||
| Professional ratings | |
|---|---|
| Review scores | |
| Source | Rating |
| About.com |   |
| Allmusic |  |
| The Guardian | |
| Sputnikmusic | 3.8/5 |
Z² (short for Ziltoid 2; pronounced "zed squared" or alternately "zee two") is a double album by Canadian musician Devin Townsend and his musical project Devin Townsend Project, released on October 27, 2014. It consists of two albums released together: the sixth album in the Devin Townsend Project series, Sky Blue, and Dark Matters, a solo concept album acting as a sequel to Townsend's 2007 album Ziltoid the Omniscient. The main theme of Dark Matters is, according to Townsend, "Ziltoid against the world".
Z² has been a long-running project, with Townsend announcing it in 2009. Later he stated that he "may have just written the heaviest thing he's ever done" for the album. Townsend also mentioned there is a surprising lack of Ziltoid himself appearing on the album, and that it "will be interesting to see how it all pans out". The project took its first steps on August 24, 2013, when a London-based radio station TeamRock Radio aired the first one-hour episode of Ziltoid Radio, a satirical radio show hosted solely by Ziltoid. Later, Townsend stated that "Z Radio is just one little element of the Z² project". After several Ziltoid Radio episodes aired, Townsend said he found the project hard to schedule and work with amidst touring and writing, because he doesn't want to just "phone it in", and "it takes a lot of effort" to keep the content with tongue-in-cheek humour entertaining. A total of seven Ziltoid Radio episodes aired between August 2013 and January 2014, and since then there has been no discussion or activity considering the series or its affiliation with the Z² project. The episodes have since been removed from TeamRock Radio's website. Townsend has also discussed a "ZTV" or "Ziltoid TV", being a part of the Z² project and preceding the album.
In October 2013, Townsend said that he had "more ideas than time", but that it was "almost time to start demoing" the album. Later Townsend stated that since June 2013 he had written ideas for over 70 songs, and revealed that the album was "taking shape". Townsend also stated he was going to finish the whole project in two years. In February 2014, Townsend announced the recording process of Z² started on May 2, 2014, in Los Angeles, and also revealed that the project will include the Ziltoid TV program and a live show, with a "big graphic novel comic" and a documentary. On February 26, 2014, Townsend posted that Z² will be a double album, with disc one being the main album and disc two featuring Devin Townsend Project material. According to Townsend, the album's theme will be "Ziltoid against the world". Townsend revealed his intention of adding audience-participated choir tracks on both discs.
...
Wikipedia