“I spoke to Thorsten after a Marillion show in Berlin on the F.E.A.R. tour in 2018, and we got on really well,” says guitarist Steve Rothery of his collaboration with Tangerine Dream’s Thorsten Quaeschning.
Gentō, released under the name Bioscope, is the resulting album, on sale now via earMusic. “We thought that it would be cool to try something together,” Rothery continues. “But nothing really happened until he played a solo show in London in 2020. He had a day off the next day, so we arranged for him and his roadie to bring his equipment up to [Marillion HQ] The Racket Club, and we jammed for the day.”
The pair bonded instantly. “It was pretty obvious from the first note that we shared a musical vocabulary and influences,” Rothery says. “I had Tangerine Dream albums when I was 16 or 17 – Ricochet and Stratosfear – and it’s a kind of music that I really enjoy. And Thorsten’s a real prog head – Pink Floyd and Genesis are in his DNA.”
Still, it took a few years for the project to fully reach fruition. “It wasn’t going anywhere for a while, and then we said, ‘We’ve really got to finish this; there’s some really cool stuff here.’”
Gentō’s five instrumental tracks bear the imprint of the duo’s separate musical endeavours, from Rothery’s fluid guitar to Quaeschning’s evocative analogue keyboards and electronics. But it also sees them nudging each other out of their respective comfort zones, aided by Elbow drummer Alex Reeves.
“There’s a point in [opening track] Vanishing Point where Thorsten puts the guitar through a mood filter, which creates this really interesting pulsed effect,” says Rothery, who played live with Tangerine Dream in 2022. “It taught me to approach things slightly differently – not just playing an instrument, but sound design as well.
“There wasn’t any plan to make a certain kind of album. Everything was all created in the moment. For me, ideas come when I’m inspired, and I found Thorsten’s approach inspiring.”
The cinematic atmosphere of Gentō is no coincidence. The name Bioscope comes from a pioneering motion picture format developed in Berlin in the late 19th century, while the album title takes its name from a Japanese image projector from the 1800s. This fascination with the visual image extends to the song titles, including, Kinetoscope and first single Kaleidoscope.
“Photography has always been a huge passion of mine; other than music, I think it’s the only thing I’m any good at,” says Rothery, whose 2016 photobook Postcards From The Road captured his life on tour. “Our whole approach seemed very visual and cinematic, so I took that idea and ran with it.”
Although the pair have plans to play live as Bioscope, nothing is confirmed just yet. “There’s definitely potential,” the guitarist says. “But at the moment it’s a bit difficult – the upcoming Marillion album has to take priority.
“There’s loads of great ideas yet to be transformed into fully-formed songs. It’s one of those things – it might take us another year-and-a-half, or it might take us three weeks.”
Bioscope isn’t the only Rothery-related project in the pipeline either. There’s his long- gestating solo album, Revontulet, plus a collaborative album with Steve Hackett, which he estimates to be “75% complete.”
He reflects: “The problem, when you’ve got multiple plates spinning, is that you tend to run from one to another – and they all come crashing down. That’s why it’s great that the Bioscope album is finished.”