The final work of the 96 trilogy Les Etoiles Des Filles Mortes was clearly his most serious piece in the contemporary classical mode which derived more from the atonal chamber music of Janacek or the tone clusters of Penderecki than from any of the pop rock experiments of mid twentieth century.

 

The next five years saw the enormous international success of Atari Teenage Riot which kept him touring. While on the road he conceived his magnum opus, but wasn’t in a position to release it until 2002. The second CD of the set confounded the ATR fans but came as no surprise to those who had followed his solo output from the start.

It has something in common with the previous albums but with the insight and mature vision that the crucial decade had brought. As the UK’s premier music paper wryly put it, “For a man so certain that there isn't a future, he looks like one of its most confident architects.” Almost 20 years after recording “Low on Ice” Empire, prompted by a request for music by a film director, delved into his archive and found much more music from the same sessions. He digitized the full Iceland Sessions, 175 minutes of music, which will be released later this year on a 3 CD boxset.

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