Le Triton (in Les Lilas a Parisian suburb) now in his tenth year has become  one of the important prog venues in Europe, with an accent on Zeuhl (homeclub of Magma) and Canterbury. In the begining of the summer the club schedules Les Tritonales a two week festival dedicated entirely to Prog (see also Harmonium's Univers Zero review) a good occasion to see classic bands like Magma, Univers Zero and Canterbury musicians (who had unfortunately sad losses these last times with the departure of Pip Pyle, Elton Dean and lately Hugh Hopper who have all played often here) but it's also the occasion to discover newer bands like Aranis.

 

 

With seven musicians on stage and about twice as much audience members the band seemed slightly disappoined when coming on stage, but as they got a hearty welcome this was quickly forgotten.  Le Triton works like a Jazz club in set fashion and the first set was interesting but a little stiff . The compositions coming nearly all from bass player Joris Vanvinckenroye are excellent and the band is tight and has a good ensemble play. I would describe their music  as Imaginary Folk Minimalism. P. Glass and S. Reich are obvioulsy a big influence but also eastern European folk tunes, some passages reminding Bartok's work on Roumanian and Ungarian folk tunes. Despite the enthusiasm and the good musicianship the music didn't really got off the ground during the first set apart from some solo passages, with a special mention for the energetic piano playing from Axelle Kennes the rest of the band was too reserved. Even so the acoustic au Triton is normally excellent Aranis had for my taste an unbalanced sound with too much high end and the lack of medium and low end (the double bass was far  too low in the mix) which didn't served the music.

 

After abeer and a chat at the bar, (Le Triton is familar venue where you can easily make contact with the musicians and fans) back to the second set...

 

...which  showed the band more confident, the music was edgier and rougher and the musicians getting looser. While the first set presented a quieter and dreamier athmosphere the second set was closer to the dynamics of Univers Zero and Present with stronger rhythmic accents and a "rockier" sound even so no electric instruments are present. The audience reacted positively and cheered the playfullnes! The second set saw also elaborated solo sections from all members again with a special mention for pianist Axelle Kennes

 

All in all a pleasant concert and I am curious to see Aranis in september on a bigger stage in Carmeaux during the RIO festival.

 

 

I was not familiar at all with their music before the concert, each set lasted about 45 minutes so I suppose they played most of their material...plus one or two unreleased compos...

BTW will you be in Carmeaux?

BTW yes the Aranis girls are cute, also I don't recognize the one on the cover they were less undressed so

 

 

 

Yes, it's a shame that a country with such a great cultural tradition doesn't put more the spotlight on its real great artists : Pierre Bensusan (I am pretty sure he has more fame in the US than in France), Didier Malherbe, Akphaezya, Sebka Chott, or the guitar hero Christophe Godin (who played with mathias Ekhlund, not sure that Morglbl trio is on PA though ?)...

 

On the contrary, Poland (my native country) has such prog artists as Gargantua (RIO), Riverside, Quidam, Satellite, Lao Che...whose albums can be easily found in the record stores or megastores like Empik (polish equivalent of Virgin or french FNAC) who have a huge fan base. But also artists like Leszek Mozdzer (pianist who released three albums with Palle Danielsson and Zohar Fresco in a jazz/world vein) or Piotr Anderszewski (probably the best current "classical" pianist) are also acclaimed and listened by Poles.

 

 

 

 

 

Belgium is a country full of talents.

 

 

Hi Martin,

 

glad I could entice to see them! It's a little sad that they were difficult to start with, but if one violinist missing, I can understand  it took them time to find their marks.

 

 

 

 

 

Ricochet wrote: Oh, that. It's also the cover of the debut.

 

 

Almost indeed!! but if you look closely those are male bodies on the debut album. Which is the better album, especially with the 15 mins epic.

 

 

And no, most likely, it's not their own bodies on the second album's shoot.