En attendant Cousteau | ||||
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Studio album by | ||||
Released | 11 June 1990 | |||
Studio | Coral Sound studio, Port of Spain, Trinidad and Tobago Croissy studio, Paris | |||
Length | 1:08:57 | |||
Label | Disques Dreyfus | |||
Producer | Jean-Michel Jarre | |||
Jean-Michel Jarre chronology | ||||
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Review scores | |
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Source | Rating |
AllMusic | [1] |
En attendant Cousteau (English title: Waiting for Cousteau) is the tenth studio album by French electronic musician and composer Jean-Michel Jarre, released on Disques Dreyfus, licensed to Polydor. The title is a reference to the play Waiting for Godot.
Originally, Jarre intended to call it 'Cousteau sur la plage (Cousteau on the beach)', but it was changed at the last moment. A promotional tape contained this title.[2]
The album was dedicated to Jacques-Yves Cousteau and was released on his 80th birthday 11 June 1990. AllMusic described the album as "groundbreaking stuff", due to its stylistic differences from his other albums.[1] The album reached Number 14 in the UK charts.[3]
En attendant Cousteau is divided into two distinct stylistic halves: the first three pieces titled "Calypso" and the title track, an ambient piece which was used in the soundtrack of a 1991 documentary entitled "Palawan: Le dernier refuge" by Cousteau and Jarre. However two tracks from that documentary did not appear on the final album.[4]
The title track was also played at Jarre's exposition Concert d'images in Paris, 1989. According to a Jarre fan-magazine,[5] it was created via an app on an Atari Mega-ST,[6] on which Jarre programmed 16 starting notes. He apparently got the idea from the book Dirk Gently's Holistic Detective Agency by Douglas Adams. He denied it in a later interview, claiming all notes are actually played by hand, noting however that the track includes some time-stretched samples mixed into the background.[7]
Jarre performed the album for about 2.5 million people at the Paris La Défense concert on 14 july 1990, featuring The Amoco Renegades, a steel-drum band from Trinidad and Tobago.
All music is composed by Jean-Michel Jarre
No. | Title | Length |
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1. | "Calypso Part 1" | 8:24 |
2. | "Calypso Part 2" | 7:10 |
3. | "Calypso Part 3 (Fin de Siècle)" (End of the Century) | 6:28 |
4. | "En attendant Cousteau" (Waiting for Cousteau) | 46:55 |
Total length: | 1:08:57 |
No. | Title | Length |
---|---|---|
1. | "Calypso Part 1" | 8:24 |
2. | "Calypso Part 2" | 7:10 |
3. | "Calypso Part 3 (Fin de Siècle)" | 6:28 |
No. | Title | Length |
---|---|---|
1. | "En attendant Cousteau" | 22:00 |
Total length: | 44:02 |
Personnel listed in album liner notes:[8]
Chart (1990) | Peak position |
---|---|
Austrian Albums (Ö3 Austria)[9] | 19 |
Finnish Albums (Suomen virallinen lista)[10] | 11 |
German Albums (Offizielle Top 100)[11] | 27 |
Spanish Albums (AFYVE)[12] | 37 |
Swedish Albums (Sverigetopplistan)[13] | 22 |
Swiss Albums (Schweizer Hitparade)[14] | 21 |
Dutch Albums (Album Top 100)[15] | 27 |
Norwegian Albums (VG-lista)[16] | 11 |
UK Albums (OCC)[17] | 14 |
Region | Certification | Certified units/sales |
---|---|---|
France (SNEP)[19] | 2× Gold | 550,000[18] |
Spain (PROMUSICAE)[20] | Gold | 50,000^ |
Summaries | ||
Worldwide | 1,550,000[18] | |
^ Shipments figures based on certification alone. |