"It gives you a cool vibe, and you walk away feeling better," Leeb says of the new album.
"I want it to be a bit of a journey, not just one style. It's more of a record of a mystical journey that provokes your moods inside and your thoughts about your day and about life; things that aren't driven by trends or time."
Chimera succeeds in achieving all of Leeb's goals. From the opening one-two punch of the world-tinged 'Love,' which features vocals by newcomer Zoe Johnston, and the first single, the cerebral pop of 'After All,' through the haunting 'Serenity' and the soothing 'Magic,' a track highlighted by the sultry crooning of singer Julee Cruise, 'Chimera' finds Delerium returning to the form of 1997's breakthrough album, 'Karma'.
'Chimera' marks a reunion of Leeb and Rhys Fuller after a brief separation following 'Karma'. As a result Leeb recorded 2000's 'Poem' on his own, while Fulber established a successful venture with the critically acclaimed Conjure One project.
Leeb says that the Canadian pair, which has been working together since starting seminal industrial act Frontline Assembly in the mid '80s, each learned lessons during the time they worked on their own. Ultimately though their reunion came down to both of them learning to appreciate what they had already accomplished with Delerium. "At the end of the day, when you look at it, maybe Delerium wasn't such a bad thing and there was room for all of it," Leeb says. "And just having time apart, people growing, life changes everybody. It's not like we ever had a fallout; we got to a certain level and he felt it was time to move on."
Leeb wants everyone to know that the two voices behind Delerium's biggest successes have reunited, and made, what he proudly calls, the best album they've ever done. Of 'Chimera', Leeb says, "There are tracks, like the chill-out, jazzier kind of numbers, that are a bit more of a departure from Delerium. We've sort of interwoven those with a world sound, and we've never done that on any record before," he says. "It gives you more to listen to than a one-dimensional world record; there are a lot of different elements. This is a more musically accomplished record."
Leeb is the architect behind 'Chimera's' sonically uplifting and diverse soundscape, but, as has always been the case with Delerium, he had plenty of help in bringing his vision to fruition.
Chimera features a wide array of vocalists, ranging from the aforementioned Cruise and familiar Delerium collaborator Leigh Nash (of Sixpence None the Richer), who appears on 'Run For It,' to Rachel Fuller on 'Touched' and Kristy Thirsk on the album's epic finale, 'Returning.'
One might expect that after more than a decade as Delerium, and collaborations with the likes of Sarah McLachlan and Matthew Sweet, Leeb would have the art of picking vocalists down to a science. While Leeb says it's always a tricky endeavor, he knows now what he is looking for in singers.
"The thing I like the most is it a true collaboration. We send them a song and we don't ever say, 'We're looking for this type of style.' We give them a song, then we get it back, and it's really the most fun, because it's never what you expect. So then it is a real true collaboration," he says.
That approach, of which he says, "I don't know if anybody else does things the way we do. I think we've always done things a little out of the ordinary," is how 'Magic' came to be. "Julee Cruise sent back her idea, and we were like, 'Oh, this is really cool.''
As for doing things out of the ordinary, that's just the way Leeb approaches his music. "I've always felt more like an outsider," he says "Rhys and I have never had a major label kind of deal; we've never had a manager; we've never played that game." he adds. But Delerium certainly isn't coming out unnoticed after the success of 'Silence.' Five years after the song became an international smash, topping the dance charts in the U.S., Britain, and more, Leeb is still modestly amazed by the song's popularity. "There was no rhyme or reason why that one went so big, it just did. There wasn't even a video for it when that happened," he recalls.
He also can tell you though when he knew the song had truly arrived. "To me, the highlight of the whole thing was, on New Year's Eve on the Judge Jules show on BBC and Radio One in London, which was the most listened to show, and they broadcast it worldwide on the Internet, they played 'Silence' as the song to bring in the new year. That kind of said it all. Rhys and I were listening to that at midnight with our jaws hanging down. We couldn't believe that was the song England would bring the New Year in with."
"I thought Kristy's track came out great and it was nice to have her back on board because she kind of helped launch Delerium," Leeb says. "Our first sort of official hit was 'Flowers Become Screens' and 'Incantation.' And she actually sang on both of those, so Kristy coming back that was another thing that was a returning a bit too."
When it comes down to it, that's what 'Chimera' is really about, believes Leeb. "The two guys who invented Delerium and put out pretty classy records together have reunited after doing their own things for a while and have put together what I think is, in some ways, the best record we've ever done," he says. And it couldn't have come at a better time.
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