History Saturnia

There are multiple artists with this name:

1) Saturnia is a psychedelic rock band from Portugal, founded in 1996 by multi-instrumentalist Luis Simões. Originally intended to be a communal art project where friends of several artistic professions such as literature, photography, design and music, would come and input. One of these people was Filipe Homem, then a publicity designer, who, with Luis Simões, named the project. The name came from the merge between several sources: the Saturnia butterfly, the planet Saturn and saturnalia, a natural/ecological, spacey/cosmic and hedonistic concept. This relationship was fruitful and the fusion of music with image was symbiotic. This incidental association lasted throughout 1997 and out of it came the first Saturnia demo.

In early 1998 this duo split up friendly due to Simões's interest in pursuing a purely musical direction, that fused psych/prog head music of the seventies with its present day descendant, the electronic drums & bass, jungle and rave culture.

(It was in this period that Simões first cooperated with friend bassist Francisco Rebelo both playing live and recording with Cool Hipnoise)

Saturnia then turned into a genuine two piece group, with Luis Simões on guitar, sitar, theremin, vocals, gong and programming, and old time friend and musical partner Eduardo Vasconcelos (aka M Strange) on keyboards.

This line up brainstormed and out of it came the first proper Saturnia recording in early 1999, unfortunately M Strange's unwillingness to play live made him leave and his replacement was found in the person of Vasco Pereira, a space rock synthesist/organist and full time vinyl maniac. Playing live for the first time on the 8th of April 2000 in Lisbon's Ritz club, the duo continued to play live, jam and improvise while Simões recorded for Saturnia's second sonic effort. (This year, Saturnia also remixed songs for performance rockers Blasted Mechanism).

In the summer of 2000 Luis Simões and Vasco Pereira divorced due to musical differences and he was replaced live on keyboards by Francisco Rebelo due to the hanging presence of confirmed gigs.

Late 2000 and early 2001 were spent finishing Saturnia's second long duration recording.(Throughout 2001 Luis Simões also recorded and played live with Portuguese trip hop group The gift)

Much had happened since the last studio outing and Saturnia reinvented its blend of modern exotic space psychedelia for a truly surprising album. "The glitter Odd". This recording was well received by music critics and head people.

"The Glitter Odd" did well and Simões returned to the studio after some shows to produce the follow up.

One year later, October 2002, after about twelve months of hard work and a profoundly metaphysical year of yoga and meditation, the new album, an inspirational psych tour de force titled "Hydrophonic Gardening" got ready. This spiritual,album confirmed Saturnia's music solidity, refinement and sophistication.

By this time Luis Simões joined the extremely successful Portuguese performance rock trance outfit Blasted Mechanism thus doing three years of life on the road; this reflected on the new Saturnia album (like before, produced and recorded by Simões on his own but this time with a handful of guests, notably Daevid Allen and Nik Turner) that was done during that period.

Laconically titled "Muzak" this album set a new vibe in the Saturnia cosmos going for an effective hi-fi sound production and no nonsense approach to head music. This and the association with cult German label Elektrohasch records resulted in Saturnia's most popular and successful album until then.

"Alpha Omega Alpha" is released in 2012. A milestone double album, with an organic sound that perfectly balances concept and form. Again, performed, recorded, mixed and produced by Simões in his usual reclusive and private manner; with the exception of two songs, wich feature spoken word guests, one of them Stefan Koglek of Colour Haze quoting Goethe. With "Alpha Omega Alpha" Saturnia leaves no turn unstoned in its multi-dimensional exuberance, effortlessly summing up, more than in any previous Saturnia recording, the richness of Saturnia's artistic cosmos.

Official website: http://www.saturniamusic.com

2) Saturnia is a DJ / remixer from San Francisco, USA.

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