We're in the year 2012: More than 70,000 people have flocked to Commonwealth Stadium to see I Mother Earth's ultra-virtual multimedia concert spectacular which makes Pink Floyd's Division Bell tour look like a jug band festival.

The big finale is I Mother Earth's 40-minute, three-part epic, One More, Two More, Three More Astronauts, during which a colossal spaceship descends on the gawking crowd, awash in 50 million gigabytes of cyber-illumination. Then a hatch opens and out steps an enormous robot in the likeness of ... Oh, my God, it's ...

Whoa! Hold that dream.

There's a gig to do, playing a sold-out concert with Moist at the Convention Centre tonight. About 5,000 people are going to turn up, and the only reason Moist is playing last is that Moist had a bigger hit than I Mother Earth did.

For now, I Mother Earth is an art rock band trapped in a hit-radio world. The band's latest album, Scenery and Fish, takes a few stabs at the "hit" song, as with One More Astronaut (five minutes and 24 seconds, and all those parts - still rather turgid for hit-fuelled radio). But it goes against the band's nature.

"I would definitely like to do an album that is just a trip - you know, like, song part one, part two, part three," muses lead singer Edwin, who consistently refuses to give his last name. "I would love to do that. I've always loved those types of albums. Pink Floyd - they didn't care about three-minute pop songs. I love Pink Floyd. I love Rush, Led Zeppelin, any band that's creating a certain atmosphere and not trying to sell commercials.

"You're torn in the middle when you're an artist these days. Maybe if we had sold a couple of million records, we'd be freer to do something along those lines. But, at this point, we're still trying to make our mark. There have to be a couple of singles on the records, or the record company's just going to go, `(dramatic pause) ... keep writing!'

"I know for a fact that when it comes to, `OK, guys, this is going to be the next single, we need an edit,' we all get this little pain in our stomachs. `Oh, here we go, we gotta cut this, we gotta cut that.' It's not going to be the song we wrote; it's going to be this little commercial of the song we wrote. On this last album, we tried to write pop songs - not that it was a painful thing; there's a certain art to writing pop songs. It was more a matter of `let's write songs that we may not have to edit so much, so we're not losing our cool bits.' And we kind of achieved that a little bit on this record. Where we go next I have no idea."

Once thing is certain: Everything I Mother Earth has done up to now has been written exclusively by the brother team of guitarist Jagori Tanna and drummer Christian Tanna. Edwin's going to have a creative piece of the next album or he's outta here.

Of course, he doesn't put it quite like that: "At this point, if my creative input isn't, um, let's say, harnessed, then I have no reason to be here. So we're definitely going to take a slightly different angle. Everybody's ideas are welcome, but I feel I have a lot to express."

After all, I Mother Earth could be the next Pink Floyd.

Edwin laughs, but answers seriously, "That would be nice."

The band hits the studio again this spring.

SOUND BITES

VIRTUAL EARTH - A lot of rock bands are getting cyber-savvy these days - and I Mother Earth is one of the leaders of the trend.

The band's Web site (www.imotherearth.com) is one of the most extensive of any band, with tour journals, tour and fan databases, chat rooms, photos, sound and video clips. Singer Edwin says it gets roughly 1,500 "hits" a week - "the best advertising we've ever had."

I Mother Earth also won a MuchMusic multimedia award for the CD-ROM contained on the Scenery and Fish album. "I grew up with albums," Edwin says. "Albums have a lot of art-work and you can pull out stuff. You could kind of get more into the band with the artwork. With a CD, even if you do have good artwork, it's so small, so the CD-ROM is kind of a substitute."

FACTOIDS:

Formed: 1990

Band members: Edwin, vocals; Jagori Tanna, guitar; Bruce Gordon, bass; and Christian Tanna, drums.

Albums: Dig, 1993, Juno winner for best hard rock album; and Scenery and Fish, 1996.

Shortest song on Scenery and Fish: Another Sunday (4:05).

Longest song on Scenery and Fish: Shortcut to Moncton (7:56).

Bands I Mother Earth has opened for: Radiohead, Rage Against the Machine, Stone Temple Pilots.