History of Modern is the title of the 11th studio album by British synthpop band Orchestral Manoeuvres in the Dark. It is their first album since 1996, and the first album featuring the full classic line-up since 1986's The Pacific Age.
The album is due for release on the 20th of September 2010. The artwork has been designed by Peter Saville. The title was thought of by lead singer Andy McCluskey after he took his daughter to an art exhibition called 'The History of Modernism'.
A free download of a demo track called "Sister Marie Says", taken from the album, was released on 25 November 2009. Elements of the song were originally composed in 1981 and a reworked version of the track was due to appear on the 1996 album Universal but got shelved because it sounded too much like early OMD and was out of step with the more reflective tone of Universal.
The second song to be played from the album was 'History of Modern (part II)". The song was played on the 31st of May 2010 on BBC 6 Music, the title of the song was revealed on the shows web page a week before the broadcast. In an interview during the show the band confirmed the album would have two songs named 'History of Modern' on it and plans to change the name of one of the songs to 'The Big Bang Theory' had apparently been scrapped..