Dark Swedish electro sensations The Knife are back with recorded material, albeit in “soundtrack” mode. In the wake of 2009′s superlative Fever Ray, the solo record from the duo’s female half, Karin Dreijer Andersson, comes Tomorrow, In A Year, the commissioned score for an opera concerning the life of Charles Darwin and his magnum opus, “On The Origin Of The Species”.

According to a press release from the group’s website, a recorded version of the score is to be released on March 1, 2010, and spans two discs. The press release also details the project’s fascinating background and development, which was first announced online at the end of 2008. The Knife were commissioned to write the music by a Danish performance group, Hotel Pro Forma, and have worked with Mt. Sims and Planningtorock on the score, which has been influenced by Richard Dawkins’ gene trees, and includes sonics both artificial and natural. The group have called the undertaking a “challenge” to the “conventional conception of opera music”.

The first “single”, if you can call it that, is entitled “Colouring of Pigeons” and is available for free download from the website (an e-mail address is all that’s required). If this first piece is any indication of what the rest of Tomorrow, In A Year will entail, this could be a quite spectacular thing indeed.