Queen Elizabeth is a British

United Kingdom

The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern IrelandIn the United Kingdom and Dependencies, other languages have been officially recognised as legitimate autochthonous languages under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages...

 band. It is a collaborative experimental

Experimental music

Experimental music refers, in the English-language literature, to a compositional tradition which arose in the mid-20th century, applied particularly in North America to music composed in such a way that its outcome is unforeseeable. Its most famous and influential exponent was John Cage...

 project between Thighpaulsandra

Thighpaulsandra

Thighpaulsandra is a Welsh experimental musician and multi-instrumentalist known mostly for performing on synthesizers and keyboards. As Tim Lewis, he began his career working with Julian Cope. A collaboration with Cope in 1993 followed, as the experimental duo Queen Elizabeth...

 and Julian Cope

Julian Cope

Julian Cope is a British rock musician, author, antiquary, musicologist, poet and cultural commentator...

. The general concept behind Queen Elizabeth was a "sonic ritual" in which sounds, melodies and other sonic properties would combine. Both releases, 1994's Queen Elizabeth and 1997's double-disc Queen Elizabeth 2: Elizabeth Vagina, consist mostly of half-hour long tracks which contrast experimental ambient music

Ambient music

Ambient music is a musical genre that focuses largely on the timbral characteristics of sounds, often organized or performed to evoke an "atmospheric", "visual" or "unobtrusive" quality.- History :...

 with short bursts of Krautrock

Krautrock

Krautrock is a generic name for the experimental music scenes that appeared in Germany in the late 1960s and gained popularity throughout the 1970s, especially in Britain. The term is a result of the English-speaking world's reception of the music at the time and not a reference to any one...

. The three discs (and seven tracks) are the band's only studio output, yet "Beneath the Frozen Lake of Stars", which appeared on Thighpaulsandra's I, Thighpaulsandra

I, Thighpaulsandra

I, Thighpaulsandra is the debut album by Thighpaulsandra. I showcased Thighpaulsandra's interests in krautrock, experimental and industrial music and featured his only single to date, "Michel Publicity Window"...

, was a revamped version of a track destined for a third Queen Elizabeth release. Cope has said that Thighpaulsandra's version went above and beyond the original recording they made together.

In 2009, a recording of the band's only live performance in May 2000 was released as an mp3 download entitled "Hall" through Julian Cope's official website.

Discography

• Queen Elizabeth - (1994)
• Queen Elizabeth 2: Elizabeth Vagina - (1997)
• "Hall" - (2009)

External links

• Thighpaulsandra (official site)
• Head Heritage
• A review of studio both albums