ART ZOYD 3 [AKA: SYMPHONIE POUR LE JOUR OÙ BRÛLERONT LES CITÉS]

ART who? ART ZOYD! Nope, not a dude but a band from Valencienne, France. To be more accurate on this debut album SYMPHONIE POUR LE JOUR OÙ BRÛLERONT LES CITÉS (the day the cities burned) they were going by the name of ART ZOYD 3.

This band had the honor of being chosen as one of the newest members of the Rock In Oppisition movement after the initial six (Henry Cow, Stormy Six, Samla Mammas Manna, Univers Zero, Etron Fou Leloublan) for their "musical excellence" which allowed them into this strange and esoteric club whose only mission was to make the strangest and most twisted music that could still technically fit into the rock genre.

Indeed these sonicscapes are excellent, original, bizarre and just plain twisted. In fact you can hear how this album influenced Mr Bungle's craziness especially on the "Deux Images de la Cité Imbecile" side.

The music on this debut is predominantly chamber rock for the most part excercising daunting and haunting classical music (Stravinsky, Wagner, Berlioz) passages that together with Univers Zero's "Heresie" qualifies as true dreadful horror music that solicits doom and gloom like any good downer type of music should.

There is a free jazz feel to much of it with outbursts of Zappa and rock energy incorporating sparsely utilized percussion. This music is avant-garde even by RIO standards but i find it exhilarating and unique even amongst the AZ's own future albums.

Perhaps too weird for some but only approaching where i really want to go. A nice soundtrack for an insane asylum with some circus antics thrown in the mix for variety's sake. A slice of RIO heaven.