- 12
- Tracks
- 46 min
- Runtime
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12 tracks · 46 min
Le Roi est mort, vive le Roi ! (French for "The King is dead. Long live the King.") is a 1996 album created by the music project Enigma. It is Enigma's third album, following The Cross of Changes, released three years earlier. Released on 25 November 1996, the album reached to the top spot in Norway's top 40 charts and third in the whole of Europe. Two singles from the album, "Beyond the Invisible" and "T.N.T. for the Brain" were also released at around the same time of its parent album. A planned third single, "The Roundabout" was scrapped at the last minute for unclear reasons, even though a remix had already been created by DJ Quicksilver This album continued Enigma's trend, giving it a slightly more modern, futuristic sound by combining the elements of Enigma's first album, MCMXC a.D., and their second album, The Cross of Changes. Michael Cretu, producer of the project, considered Le Roi Est Mort, Vive Le Roi ! to be the child of the previous two albums, with the first being the father and the second being the mother, as indicated by the 19-second track, "Third of its Kind".
There are two editions of the packaging; one with standard paper artwork, and another with translucent tray and booklet artwork printed on a heavier plastic. Le Roi est mort, vive le Roi ! was nominated in the 1998 Grammy Awards for Best New Age Album and Johann Zambryski's album art design earned him a nomination for Best Recording Package. The intro track begins with a sample of mission control contacting the Discovery from the movie 2001: A Space Odyssey. The intro, including the famed "Enigma horn", is played in reverse for the closing track, "Odyssey of the Mind". The track "T.N.T. for the Brain" contains samples taken from Jeff Wayne's Musical Version of The War of the Worlds. The samples are just audible, underlying the main music. They can be most clearly heard at the start and the end of the track, but are just noticeable throughout.
