Karman Line Collective unveil debut release ‘PORTAL’ featuring a choir of 40,000 bees

Artist Wolfgang Buttress and Kevin Bales and Tony Foster of Spiritualized take listeners on an ethereal journey into the world of bees alongside groundbreaking new museum experience.

‘PORTAL’ is the first release from Karman Line Collective (FKA BE) The track is taken from their forthcoming album TO BE which will be released in Autumn 2024. Wolfgang Buttress curates a musical collective consisting of Kevin Bales, Justin Goodyer and Tony Foster recorded with the help of 40,000 bees, Camille Christel (Voice and words) Deirdre Bencsik (Cello) and Robert Howard (Guitar) They have created a new soundscape for Buttress’ latest artistic project, Bees: A Story of Survival, a new multi-sensory experience which opens at World Museum, Liverpool on 4th May 2024. This immersive exhibition highlights the essential role these ingenious pollinators play within the planet’s ecosystems, as well as the existential threat faced by both bees and humanity alike due to our mistreatment of the planet.

Eight years ago, award-winning artist and musician Wolfgang Buttress worked with 40,000 bees to soundtrack his immersive art installation The Hive at Kew Gardens, London. Now, Buttress has again enlisted the help of these tiny creatures to create ‘PORTAL,’ the debut release from musical collective The Kármán Line.

An evolution of his work on The Hive, the soundscape for the Bees experience also functions as one of its main narrative devices. The artist likens moving through the exhibition to following the contours of a song: verse, chorus, verse, chorus, middle eight, drop, chorus, chorus – eight installations which meld into and inform one other. The music, along with light, sound, projection and scent take the visitor on an emotional and sensorial journey into the secret world of bees.

Taking three years to write and record, the soundscape features previously unheard recordings of bee communications. These amazing sounds are used as raw musical stems within the composition. They have also been processed through guitar pedals to augment the music with an entirely new library of sounds. The listener will hear bees communicating in various ways, from the vibrations produced by their famous ‘waggle dance,’ to the noises scientists affectionately refer to as bees’ tooting, quacking and purring.

The cello featured in ‘PORTAL’ was recorded from inside the first Bramley Apple tree in Southwell, which is 200 years old and sadly has only a few years left to live. Apple trees are pollinated by bees, which are dying in unprecedented numbers, so it seemed fitting that ‘PORTAL’ reflected this sadness both through its composition and the method of its recording.

‘PORTAL’ takes the listener on a reflective journey, making connections to the changing seasons of life and our increasingly fragile relationship with nature. The track is melancholic but suggests a sense of hope through its mysterious beauty, the sounds of bee and human harmoniously integrated to suggest a brighter future. In this way it parallels the message of Buttress’ upcoming exhibition: bees are in a crisis for which we are responsible, but a dream of better days through humanity’s efforts is implied.

For more information about the upcoming exhibition for which the track was written visit: https://www.liverpoolmuseums.org.uk/stories/behind-scenes-bees-exhibition