''A Posteriori'' is the sixth studio album by German musical project Enigma, released on 22 September 2006 by

Virgin Records Virgin Records is a British record label owned by Universal Music Group. They were originally founded as a British independent record label in 1972 by entrepreneurs Richard Branson, Simon Draper, Nik Powell, and musician Tom Newman (musician), ...

. In December 2006, the album was nominated for Best New Age Album at the

2007 Grammy Awards The 49th Annual Grammy Awards was a ceremony honoring the best in music for the recording year beginning October 1, 2005, and ending September 30, 2006, in the United States. The awards were handed out on Sunday, February 11, 2007, at the Stapl ...

. While the previous album, ''

Voyageur Voyageurs (; ) were 18th- and 19th-century French people, French and later French Canadians and others who transported furs by canoe at the peak of the North American fur trade. The emblematic meaning of the term applies to places (New France, i ...

'', contained minimal amounts of the project's signature sounds, ''A Posteriori'' only contains the signature "Enigma horn" (a foghorn) during the opening minute of the album, and even then it is a fleeting glimpse. Coupled with the album's subject matter of the collision of the Milky Way and Andromeda galaxies, ''A Posteriori'' is, compared to earlier releases, stark and foreboding.

Background

News about the album's title and track list were first made public on 18 July 2006 through the Crocodile-Music.de website and EnigmaMusic.com's forums, while the album cover was made public ten days later. The first track to be made public was " Hello and Welcome", released as a standalone single in 2006. Enigma's management subsequently stated that a new version would be included on the record, while the

lead single A lead single (or first single) is the first single to be released from a studio album by an artist or a band, usually before the album itself is released and also occasionally on the same day of the album's release date. A similar term, "debut ...

off the album proper would be " Goodbye Milky Way".

Recording

''A Posteriori'' became the first Enigma album to be recorded using Michael Cretu's new 5.1 fully computerized mobile music studio, "Alchemist", a machine of relatively small size with a main keyboard and a number of hardware

MIDI Musical Instrument Digital Interface (; MIDI) is an American-Japanese technical standard that describes a communication protocol, digital interface, and electrical connectors that connect a wide variety of electronic musical instruments, ...

controllers with some "special" expansions and a central computer with LCD screen. The device was designed for Cretu privately.

Etymology

A posteriori ('from the earlier') and ('from the later') are Latin phrases used in philosophy to distinguish types of knowledge, justification, or argument by their reliance on experience. knowledge is independent from any experience. Examples include ...

", a Latin phrase translated as "after the fact", refers to empirical knowledge, the

epistemological Epistemology is the branch of philosophy that examines the nature, origin, and limits of knowledge. Also called "the theory of knowledge", it explores different types of knowledge, such as propositional knowledge about facts, practical knowled ...

concept of deriving knowledge from past experience. "

Eppur si muove ''And Yet It Moves'' is a puzzle-platform game developed by independent developer Broken Rules. The game was released for Microsoft Windows, Mac OS X, and Linux on April 2, 2009, and for Wii as a WiiWare title in August 2010. ''And Yet It Moves ...

", alternately spelled "E pur si muove!", is an Italian phrase translated to "And yet it moves", attributed to

Galileo Galilei Galileo di Vincenzo Bonaiuti de' Galilei (15 February 1564 – 8 January 1642), commonly referred to as Galileo Galilei ( , , ) or mononymously as Galileo, was an Italian astronomer, physicist and engineer, sometimes described as a poly ...

after he was sentenced by the

Roman Inquisition The Roman Inquisition, formally , was a system of partisan tribunals developed by the Holy See of the Catholic Church, during the second half of the 16th century, responsible for prosecuting individuals accused of a wide array of crimes according ...

to recant his belief in

heliocentrism Heliocentrism (also known as the heliocentric model) is a superseded astronomical model in which the Earth and planets orbit around the Sun at the center of the universe. Historically, heliocentrism was opposed to geocentrism, which placed t ...

Reception

Thom Jurek of

AllMusic AllMusic (previously known as All-Music Guide and AMG) is an American online database, online music database. It catalogs more than three million album entries and 30 million tracks, as well as information on Musical artist, musicians and Mus ...

wrote, " you like the Enigma sound, this will be up your alley, full of the things you may seek out in a recording, but there is little new here."

Track listing

All songs written, arranged, and produced by Michael Cretu.

Credits

;Enigma * Michael Cretu – music, lyrics, vocals (tracks 6, 10, 12), performance, production, programming, engineering ;Additional musicians * Narration – Louisa Stanley (tracks 4, 12) * Voice –

Andru Donalds Andru Donalds (born 16 November 1974) is a Jamaican musician and vocalist, who also worked in collaboration with the Enigma project. Donalds had a hit single in America in 1995 with " Mishale", which reached No. 38 on the ''Billboard'' Hot 10 ...

(track 8) Apart from the album, some additional remixes were released exclusively through the iTunes Store. They are: * "Eppur si muove" (

Tocadisco Roman Böer (; born 9 June 1974), better known as DJ Tocadisco, formerly Tocadisco (, Spanish for "turntable"), is a German DJ and record producer. Biography Born in Berlin, the son of the photographer and media designer Gerry Böer. He grew up ...

Remix) – 6:39 * "Dreaming of Andromeda" ( Jean F. Cochois Remix) – 7:28 * "20.000 Miles over the Sea" (Boca Junior Remix) – 7:07 * "The Alchemist" (The Alchemist's Vision by Ralf Hildenbeutel) – 7:17

''A Posteriori'' Private Lounge Remix

The Private Lounge Remix album version of ''A Posteriori'' was released via iTunes on 18 March 2007 in Germany and on 26 March in the rest of Europe.

Charts

Weekly charts

Year-end charts

Certifications

Release history

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Posteriori (Album), A 2006 albums Albums produced by Michael Cretu 2000s concept albums Enigma (German band) albums Virgin Records albums