It's in celebration of Cage's landmark work

Musicians will reinterpret John Cage’s conceptual composition ‘4’33”’ for a mammoth new release.

In 1952, the experimental composer infamous composition instructed performers to not play their instrument in a piece for an allotted four minutes and 33 seconds. The idea was to allow for listeners to instead focus on the environmental sounds.

Mute Records is now releasing a box set of 50 artists reproducing Cage’s famous work, including Depeche Mode, New Order, Erasure, Moby, Goldfrapp, Liars, and dozens more. Each act filmed their performance.

The label’s founder Daniel Miller said: “John Cage’s 4’33” has been present in my musical life for as long as I can remember as an important and inspiring composition. When the idea of every Mute artist doing their own interpretation of the piece came up during a conversation with Simon Fisher Turner, I immediately thought this was the perfect way to mark the label’s MUTE 4.0 (1978 > TOMORROW) series.

The collection is called ‘STUMM433’, which is released in May. Slovenian avant-garde group Laibach are the first act to perform 4’33” – watch below.

Full list of participants [via Stereogum]:

A Certain Ratio, A.C. Marias, ADULT., The Afghan Whigs, Alexander Balanescu, Barry Adamson, Ben Frost, Bruce Gilbert, Cabaret Voltaire, Carter Tutti Void, Chris Carter, Chris Liebing, Cold Specks, Daniel Blumberg, Depeche Mode, Duet Emmo, Echoboy, Einstürzende Neubauten, Erasure, Fad Gadget (tribute), Goldfrapp, He Said, Irmin Schmidt, Josh T. Pearson, K Á R Y Y N, Komputer, Laibach, Land Observations, Lee Ranaldo, Liars, Looper, Lost Under Heaven, Maps, Mark Stewart, Michael Gira, Mick Harvey, Miranda Sex Garden, Moby, Modey Lemon, Mountaineers, New Order, Nitzer Ebb, NON, Nonpareils, The Normal, onDeadWaves, Phew, Pink Grease, Pole, Polly Scattergood, Renegade Soundwave, Richard Hawley, ShadowParty, Silicon Teens, Simon Fisher Turner, The Warlocks, Wire, and Yann Tiersen.