News archive 1996

December 20, 1996: The second single from the Enigma 3 album will be T.N.T. For The Brain, with a release on February 3, 1997. Morphing Thru Time was considered as the second single, but it has now been put off for later.
(From Joar Grimstvedt, joarg@hsr.no / Simone Monetti, artui@cdc.it)


December 13, 1996: On this date, Michael Cretu takes part in an exclusive online conference. It is transcibed live at Virgin's Enigma site.


[Le Roi Est Mort, Vive Le Roi! album cover] November 25, 1996: MCMXC a.D., The CROSS Of Changes and now Le Roi Est Mort, Vive Le Roi!. Enigma in it's third incarnation - Enigma 3 - is released. Marked as the child of the two first albums, this release provides a new chapter in the book of Enigma. See the record information page for the details.


November 17, 1996: The November 23 issue of Billboard magazine (US) contains a long article about Enigma. One of the interesting points is that Michael Cretu will make 5 more Enigma albums after this year's Le Roi Est Mort, Vive Le Roi!. The deal with record company Virgin will run until at least 2010, with an album every 3 years. The article also mentions that the first 3.5 million copies of the Enigma 3 album have a translucent PVC cover, which allows the artwork to be seen from both sides.
(From Razvan, mozaic@cruznet2.cruznet.net)


November 8, 1996: The complete track listing of Le Roi Est Mort, Vive Le Roi! is now known. It reveals that Almost Full Moon, one of the extra songs on the Beyond The Invisible single, is on the album as well. See the record page for the details.
(From Jim English, english@galaxy.galstar.com)

In the US, there's a promotional-only EP called In The Beginning. It contains the following tracks, in their album versions:

The catalogue number is DPRO-11575 (7087 6 11575 2 9). The CD is all black, with the title and the cover of the Le Roi Est Mort, Vive Le Roi! album on it.
(From Jeremy Fox, jdf149@email.psu.edu)


[Beyond The Invisible single cover] October 21, 1996: Beyond The Invisible, the first single from the new album and the first Enigma release in two years, is released. This single features no remixes of the title track, but instead two additional songs, of which one is exclusive to this single - it will not appear on the album. See the Beyond The Invisible page for the full information.

Virgin Records launch their Enigma site. This is a comprehensive presentation of the coming album Le Roi Est Mort, Vive Le Roi!, featuring musical and visual samples of the album, complete lyrics, biography, puzzles to solve and other unique productions. The Events section even features an announcement that Michael Cretu will participate in an online conference on December 14.


October 10, 1996: Maria McKee is not involved with the new Enigma album at all, informs her management.
(From Osvaldo Dalzotto, sayago@internet.siscotel.com)


October 7, 1996: The three versions of Beyond The Invisible that will appear on the single are "Radio Edit", "Album Version" and "Short Radio Edit".
(From Osvaldo Dalzotto, sayago@internet.siscotel.com)

Contrary to recent reports, the world-wide release date for the new single will be October 21, a week later than first anticipated. The reason for this delay is apparently problems with the production of the singles; the factory went out of materials or some such.

The video for Beyond The Invisible will be premiered on MTV Europe on October 14 (next Monday), in the program "Hanging Out" that starts at 17:00 (CET). The station will then have it for exclusive showing for a week. The video contains lots of images of ice dancers, performing outdoors in all seasons. There will only by these visuals, and no showing of the performer (the female vocalist).
(From Joar Grimstvedt, joarg@hsr.no)

Both Sandra and Michael Cretu sing on Beyond The Invisible.
(From Andreas Bachmaier, A.Bachi@magnet.at)


October 4, 1996: The Beyond The Invisible single will include 3 versions of the title plus the songs Almost Full Moon and Light Of Your Smile. The US release date for the single is October 15.
(From Osvaldo Dalzotto, sayago@internet.siscotel.com)


October 1, 1996: The release of the first Enigma single has been put out by a week, so October 21 is now the date when it will appear. This is for Norway, and I don't know if it applies to other countries too. For Norwegian listeners, the single will be premiered on the radio channel P4 on October 7, in the evening. The song itself is said to be more vocal-based, nothing like Return To Innocence, and with a female vocalist. Could this be Maria McKee??

The titles of the single and album are now confirmed; "Beyond The Invisible" and "Le Roi Est Mort, Vive Le Roi" respectively.


September 30, 1996: Virgin Records will launch an official Enigma web page next month.
(From Gavin Stok, enigma@connexus.apana.org.au)


September 17, 1996: There will be three formats of the Beyond The Invisible single:

(From Alex Siepman, mail2me@euronet.nl)


August 30, 1996: The release dates for the upcoming Enigma single and album, as per Virgin Records Norway:

There were no title given for the single, but Beyond The Invisible has appeared as a title in some record stores. "Le Roi Est Mort, Vive Le Roi" is still not confirmed as a title for the album, but is the most likely. The releases (at least the album) will occur world-wide simultaneously.


August 8, 1996: A single from Enigma is scheduled for release in October, followed by the album. Currently, nothing is known about the title of this single or any other details, and the title of the album remains unconfirmed.


July 17, 1996: Le Roi Est Mort, Vive Le Roi. This is the rumoured title of the third Enigma album, French for "the King is dead, (long) live the King". According to US record store databases, the album will be out in September.
(From unknown)


May 5, 1996: In the April edition of Euro GQ magazine there's an interview with Maria McKee. Closing the interview is the following paragraph:

Free at last, McKee is hard at it - making this single-free, non-pop album, planning collaboration with Iggy Pop on Johnny Depp's new film and, best of all, considering an offer from Enigma to sing on their next album of medieval trance. "The only other vocalist they wanted on it was Jon Anderson of Yes," she shrieks. "You think I should do it?"
(From Alistair Knight, al@hubris.demon.co.uk)

Is this the first hint of what to be expected from the next Enigma album?? Jon Anderson is an artist who Michael Cretu particularly likes, so it is perhaps not surprising that Cretu wants to bring him on, but Maria McKee appears more as a surprise.


March 30, 1996: Reported by CBC (Canada), Lee Foengo (sp?) was the vocalist who was never credited for his chants on Return To Innocence (see January 31, 1996 news entry). Apparently Enigma has already sent him $2000 for it but does not agree that the copyrights are to him.
(From Neil Cutler, ncutler@island.net)


January 31, 1996: According to Norwegian music channel ZTV, Enigma has been sued by the 76-year old peasant from Taiwan who is the source of the main chant in Return To Innocence. The reason is that he has not received any compensation for this use. The chant is the first track of the album Polyphonies Vocales Des Aborigines De Taiwan.
(From Geir Friestad, geir-f@hsr.no)

In April 1994, a similar situation occured, when the Norwegian lapp artist Mattis Hetta, on radio channel NRK Petre, accused Enigma of not crediting the Taiwanese chanter (note that at that time the chant was believed to be of lapp origin). This was partially wrong though, as the above album was in fact credited on the first pressing of The CROSS Of Changes in Europe, though strangely not in subsequent pressings.

Back in 1991, the choir Kappelle Antiqua got compensation for the unauthorised usage of their recordings on Sadeness and Mea Culpa, so this isn't the first time there have been legal wranglings over Enigma's samples.

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Updated May 30, 1999 by Joar Grimstvedt joarg@hsr.no