The official artistic output of the Habitable Exomusics project is 3 albums with 3 different line-ups, released over the summer of 2015:

Kinetics (the Path) – Habitable Exomusics Volume I

… ILK244CD. Jacob Anderskov, piano – Adam Pultz Melbye, bass – Anders Vestergaard, drums. Recorded in The Village, Copenhagen January 2015. All music composed by Jacob Anderskov. Release date:  26 June 2015.

Statics (the Map) – Habitable Exomusics Volume II

… ILK245CD. Jacob Anderskov, piano solo. All music by Jacob Anderskov. Recorded in Rainbow Studio, Oslo, December 2014. Release date 21 August 2015.

Dynamics (the Terrain) – Habitable Exomusics Volume III

… ILK246CD. Jacob Anderskov – piano. Nils Davidsen – bass. Gerald Cleaver – drums. Recorded in Rainbow Studio, Oslo, May 2015. Music by Anderskov, Davidsen & Cleaver. Release date 25 September 2015.

MY OFFICIAL STATEMENT CONCERNING THE TRILOGY RELEASE GOES AS FOLLOWS:

"The Habitable Exomusics project is intended as an artistically radicalized summary of my musical language so far, and at the same time, hopefully a kind of transcendence of my sound up until now.

The "Exo" term points to the creative element in this music - that this music operates with other, less familiar types of unifying forces than for example tonality, definable harmonies and familiar rhythmic patterns. The metaphor of the music’s “habitability” concerns the music’s openness to improvisation and co-creation from the musicians, and in the end the listener’s chances of “inhabiting” the music. 

The artwork on the three album covers relates freely to the question of the habitable places that the trilogy title is concerned with; If mankind finally found a habitable planet somewhere else, would it contain, for instance, complex protein-like molecules? Or rather, do the covers depict that the new planet's surface contains network structures similar to our highways or fibre cables? Would we find traces of gone civilizations on a habitable planet? And, would such traces be similar to ancient symbols from our own planet’s past?”

SOME EXPLANATIONS ABOUT THE INDIVIDUAL ALBUMS, AND ESPECIALLY THEIR TITLES:

Volume I: KINETICS (the Path) is the first album in the trilogy. It contains 8 new pieces by Anderskov, all composed in a strictly Habitable Exomusics way. For many years, Anderskov has primarily worked with artists from his own generation and above, but in this case he turned to two young musicians (then students of his at RMC): Adam Pultz Melbye on bass, and Anders Vestergaard on drums.

(The title) “Kinetics”, which is a branch of classical mechanics, is concerned with forces on bodies in motion, no matter if these bodies be drones, drum sticks or planets. It also relates to movement through a terrain, as well as through outer space.

(The subtitle) “the Path” - which also relates to movement - opens the possibility of a more spiritual understanding of the body-in-motion metaphor; That a movement may be a journey, inner or outer.

The music on the whole album is concerned with movement, pulse, forces in motion, relations and flow.

Volume II: STATICS (the Map). This time, Anderskov is alone on the piano at Rainbow Studio in Oslo, with Jan Erik Kongshaug behind the console.

(The title:) “Statics”, is a branch of physics dealing with forces and torques on physical systems in static equilibrium. Whether it comes to orbiting satellites, apples on branches, or tuned strings on an instrument.

(The subtitle:) “the Map” normally concerns an overview of an area. However, “mapping” may also address an activity, or a way of thinking, or a range of possible future actions.

The "static" term on Volume II can of course be understood as the antithesis of the "kinetic" term of Volume I. And as a simple observation - that the constant exchange of energy between musicians, a focal point of the Kinetics album, is significantly different from what can happen on a recording with only one musician. Perhaps here, solo, we instead experience a contemplation on our position and possibilities in the Cosmos (as opposed to the journey in Kinetics). Maybe Statics is mainly an introspective distillation of the entire Habitable Exomusics universe.

Volume III: DYNAMICS (the Terrain). In the trilogy’s final volume, Anderskov is in dynamic interplay with Nils Davidsen on bass & Gerald Cleaver on drums. The whole album is recorded in one take at Rainbow Studio, Oslo, by Jan Erik Kongshaug.

(The title:) ”Dynamics” is in classical mechanics almost a synonym of kinetics, that is, concerned with the study of forces and their effect on motion. But the word “dynamics”, originating from the Greek word for ”power”, has an extensive range of other meanings, including its usage in aero-dynamics, thermodynamics, group dynamics, and not the least, musical dynamics.

(The subtitle:) “the Terrain” is in a similar way thought of as a transcendence of the metaphors “path” and “map” on Volume I & II. It borrows from the idea that freely improvised music might be similar to going for a walk in a terrain, where you will make footprints (=music), not because you intended to, but because it is a result of you walking. The terrain also symbolises the total experience, beyond our plans (the path) and our knowledge (the map). And, again: is this terrain habitable? Could I stay here? Live here?

“Dynamics” is thought of as the synthesis of “Kinetics” – Statics dialectic. It concerns the encounter with the “other” or the “others”, with the unpredictable, the unknown, and in the end, with the world.

It is the application of the Habitable Exomusics approach in a musical and social context, in an intuitive totality.

To sum it up in short, I imagine some of the metaphysical relations between the three albums like this: