LE PETIT VIOLON DE MR. GRÉGOIRE

Mona Lisa is a french band that I had never heard of before finding this CD on an imported records store. Only recently I found out it was on PA. According to the other reviewers here they have a sound that is close to Ange, but since I really don´t know anything about that outfit, I´ll have to judge this one by just what I hear. And I liked what I heard a lot.

To me this group has some similarities to Genesis on the instrumental parts, althiugh the guitar here has more bite. Very well recorded and well performed. Vocals are all in french, sometimes sung, sometimes spoken, all in the traditional way of France´s popular music. Some people say singer Dominique Le Guennec has some Peter Gabriel´s ressemblance, but I see none of it here (maybe live with the masks and things like that?). He has an interesting voice that make me wish I knew some french to understand the lyrics. They sound interesting.

However, the music here is quite rich and pleasant. The songs are all good and quite symphonic. The musicians are great, specially newcomer guitarrist Pascal Jordan, who is very talented and creative. His solos are beautiful! the album is quite varied: it combines quite well the french tradtion with the english rock influences. Some people will have trouble handling all the theatrics of this band, but they don´t bother me at all, since the music is so good. All tracks are at least good and Plus loin vers le ciel, with its epic 9 minutes time, is probably the highlight here. Interesting enough several parts seem to foresee the neo prog style of the 80´s (La Folie is almost a blueprint for early Marillion).

Conclusion: a very interesting band indeed! Although far from perfect, it has some real great moments and it surely spurred my interest in knowing their other works and also something about Ange. For this one my rating is something between 3,5 and four stars. Recommended.