Ambient News

Acclaimed French band Air will do a Moon Safari tour with stop in Dallas

AIR live in Vienna by Chérie Hansson

Chérie Hansson

Legendary French duo AIR will go on an extensive North American tour to celebrate the 25th anniversary of their debut album Moon Safari, which includes a stop at Music Hall at Fair Park in Dallas on October 29

They'll also stop in Austin at Moody Amphitheatre on October 30.

Tickets will be available for presale on March 7 at 10 am, while general tickets are on sale on March 8 at 10 am. The ticket link is here.

Similar to their recent European tour, which sold out in record time, AIR will be playing their widely celebrated album in its entirety for the first time ever. The band released the demo version of "New Star In The Sky" ahead of the digital release of the 25th anniversary deluxe album on March 15, featuring over 10 cherry-picked Moon Safari audio rarities.

Since Nicolas Godin and Jean-Benoit Dunckel formed the band in 1995, the prolific duo has released six albums in addition to their acclaimed EP Premiers Symptômes, which was followed by the release of the aforementioned classic Moon Safari along with two soundtracks that all together sold millions of copies.

AIR garnered an extensive list of worldwide accolades for their unique brand of downtempo electronic music that not only sculpted the sound for the next generation of electronic-influenced pop music but also was able to withstand the test of time in its own right.

On January 16th 1998, AIR released Moon Safari, an album which catapulted Nicolas Godin and Jean-Benoit Dunckel to the uppermost rung of electronic music's ladder. Their sound - Fender Rhodes trills, loping basslines, and sensual-yet-playful vocal hooks, all woven into a texture as fine and luxe as chiffon — conjured the sensation of a space-age cocktail designed to be sipped at a leisurely pace. It's not challenging to see how this curious little record became a global sensation.

While AIR's precise alchemy and absence of geographical anchoring placed Moon Safari outside the grip of temporality or trend, the album happened to be an orbiting satellite which intersected with the world below's revolutions at precisely the right moment.

Through Moon Safari, AIR transfixed some of the great visionaries of the late 20th century — David Bowie, Madonna, Beck — as well as influencing preeminent aesthetes of the incoming age - including Charlotte Gainsbourg Kevin Parker, and Sofia Coppola, whose creative relationship with AIR became as synergetic as that of Angelo Badalamenti and David Lynch. AIR helped fan the flames of a rare Francophilia which surging through the typically nativist British charts in 1998.

Moon Safari birthed three hit singles in "Kelly Watch The Stars," "All I Need" and "Sexy Boy," shifted over half a million copies in the UK, and pushed AIR into headline contention at banner festivals such as Glastonbury. This in turn brought American, European and even hesitant French audiences and critics in line, a ripple effect which continued into the mid-2000s, with a string of successive top 10 albums for AIR, at home and abroad.

North American tour dates are as follows:
*Not a Live Nation Date

9/25 - Vancouver, BC @ Queen Elizabeth Theatre
9/27 - Seattle, WA @ Benaroya Hall
9/29 - Los Angeles, CA @ Orpheum
9/30 - Los Angeles, CA @ Orpheum
10/2 - San Francisco, CA @ The Masonic
10/4 - Denver, CO @ Bellco Theater
10/6 - Minneapolis, MN @ State Theatre
10/8 - Chicago, IL @ Auditorium Theatre
10/10 - Detroit, MI @ Fox Theatre
10/12 - Toronto, ON @ Massey Hall
10/13 - Montreal, QC @ Place Bell
10/15 - Boston, MA @ MGM Music Hall at Fenway
10/17 - Philadelphia, PA @ The Met
10/18 Washington DC @ The Anthem*
10/21 - New York, NY @ Beacon Theatre
10/24 - Atlanta, GA @ Tabernacle
10/26 - Miami Beach, FL @ Fillmore Miami Beach
10/29 - Dallas, TX @ Music Hall at Fair Park
10/30 - Austin, TX @ Moody Amphitheatre

music concerts

Movie Review

Tom Cruise mines for Oscar gold in dark satire Digger

Photo courtesy of Warner Bros. Pictures

Tom Cruise in Digger.

For most of the 21st century, and especially the last 15 years, Tom Cruise has been a “movie star” rather than an “actor.” That’s not to say he’s a bad actor, but rather that his focus has been on making blockbuster movies where his unique ability to go all-in on action supersedes any need for introspection. Now perhaps past his action movie days, he’s giving full-on acting another try in Digger.

Cruise plays Digger Rockwell, an eccentric oil baron whose current project is drilling for oil in Greenland. Turns out that’s a bad idea in multiple ways, most significantly when an explosion at the site manages to calve an ice shelf five times the size of Boston. That humongous piece of ice then starts on an inevitable collision course with mainland Europe, where it is predicted that there will be hundreds of thousands of deaths and uncountable property damage from the ensuing tsunami.

That sounds bleak, and it is, but the film plays the scenario for laughs thanks to over-the-top characters like Digger, his sister Emma (Sandra Hüller), U.S. President Compson (John Goodman), and the unnamed Vice President (Michael Stuhlbarg). As those people and others try to spin the disaster of epic proportions, others like the scientist Ganesh (Riz Ahmed) try to get the leaders to see reason or to take responsibility for their actions.

Written and directed by Alejandro Iñárritu and co-written by three others, the film has more than a few surprises in store, including one big one that will go unspoiled here. Suffice it to say that for anyone who might be put off by how Cruise (who seems to be channeling his Les Grossman character from Tropic Thunder) and others are acting in the trailers for the film may change their minds about the performances after actually having seen the complete product.

What can be said is that the film is a wild, wacky, and occasionally disorienting experience that also doubles as a cogent critique of the governments and corporations responsible for climate change and unchecked capitalism. Digger is a motormouth who often cuts off people with relevant information to impart, having already determined that he knows all he needs to know about a certain topic. He’s stuck in his ways in many respects, including trying to keep alive a 20-year-old cat that clearly wants to die.

Once the full scope of the story is revealed, it becomes easier to understand what Iñárritu and Cruise are trying to accomplish with the film. It has some similarities to Stanley Kubrick’s dark satire Dr. Strangelove, but it also tries to stay grounded in certain ways. The push-and-pull between those who only seem to be out for themselves and those who want to get to the truth of the matter is played out on different fronts throughout the film. Not all of it lands, but enough does to not make the film seem completely unhinged.

Cruise has been nominated for three Oscars, and it’s clear he’s aiming for a fourth nod with this performance. He does his best to sell every quirk and aspect of the character, epitomized by a gonzo speech that utilizes every mental and physical skill he can muster. The supporting actors are hit-and-miss, but Ahmed comes off the best as a person serving as Digger’s moral conscience. He’s an antidote to Cruise’s mania, but then turns it up to 11 when needed.

Not everything is as it seems in Digger, and the out-there approach by Iñárritu and his team falls into the love-it-or-hate-it dichotomy that applies to many of his films. The very fact that everyone involved was willing to dedicate their whole selves to such an off-the-wall concept makes it deserving of attention, even if not everything is a success.

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Digger opens in theaters on October 2.

movies film

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Acclaimed French band Air will do a Moon Safari tour with stop in Dallas

Movie Review

Tom Cruise mines for Oscar gold in dark satire Digger

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