LES ESPACES INQUIETS

Fifth disc for these Northern French, and a fair change of musical direction. If one thought Art Zoyd was already difficult, wait until you get a load of this album. In their first three albums, AZ was evoking a XXth Modern classical work, much similar to Univers Zero (Bartok and Stravinsky), but also Magma-tinged, but with this album, they get even sombre and took a more ambient turn also. With this album, the writing balance between the historical leader Gerard Hourbette and the up-coming Zaboitzeff is now tipped in favour of the second one. This album sees the return of Patricia Dallio on piano

Not that the two styles are much different anyway as they both seem to write in complement of each other, but it seems that the decision to make a rockier album than previously was common. Here, for the first time we can speak of a rhythm section in the rock sense of it, even if the musicians playing it are . Hourbette and Zaboitzeff. Weird for the usual string players, uh?!?! Book-ended by two highly atmospheric Légende pieces, the record's three main tracks are the focus of the album. Cérémonie is an early Russian-inspired piece somewhere between Prokofiev or Moussorgski oeuvre, with JP Soarez's trumpet piercing your eardrums in calling into a war-like march (not unlike the typical Present beat) until the halfway mark when the tracks veers into an almost musique concrete atonal passage. The Hourbette 3-part 13-min+ mini-suite Images D'une Ville Poussière (again this post-catastrophe or revolutionary urban theme) starts out on a doomed piano-led landscape before the second movement veers to total insanity and schizophrenia. The third movement is an incredibly tense but gradually more serene climate. Migrations (again penned by Zaboitzeff) and there is a very surprising passage where clearly, they were influenced with Wyatt's Rock Bottom, especially when Soarez comes in with his trumpet. The whole track is somewhat more up-lifting and slightly more "straightforward" than the rest of the album. Clearly the best moment.

Not really my favourite AZ record, but still another classic album of theirs, although rather tougher to really get into (but maybe ultimately more rewarding), but definitely worth the time investment, and since time is money.

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