Majeure

Taking its name from Tangerine Dream's Force Majeure album, Majeure serves as A.E. Paterra's solo outlet apart from his Zombi work alongside Steve Moore, pursuing a more atmospheric strain of electronic-tinged prog rock. Besides the Zombi touchstones Tangerine Dream, Jean Michel Jarre, and Vangelis, Paterra shaped the project's sound around John Carpenter, Steve Reich, Philip Glass, and Can, along with writers Philip K. Dick and William Gibson. When Moore began issuing his own recordings because of his abundant output while still maintaining Zombi, Paterra chose a parallel path. Once Zombi completed a tour with the kindred Temporary Residence act Maserati, he placed Majeure's first album, 2009's Timespan, with that label. The next year brought Timespan Remixes, containing reinterpretations by Black Strobe, Jesu's Justin Broadrick, and Moore, who also appeared with Paterra on the 2011 EP Synthesizer of the Gods and the 2012 split album Brainstorm. That October, Solar Maximum, Majeure's second album, moved further toward ambience. Paterra continued in that vein on 2014's Termination Shock, a stark, minimalist release issued by the French label Music Fear Satan.

Throughout the remainder of the 2010s, Paterra balanced commitments to Zombi and the duo Contact he formed with filmmaker and musician Paul Lawler against his Majeure activity. After supporting tours with Mogwai and S U R V I V E, he issued the intricate, rhythm-driven Apex EP in 2017. Marking the project's tenth anniversary, he released Timespan Redux in 2018, a remixed and remastered edition of the debut album.