PARDON OUR FRENCH

3.5 stars. FRENCH TV are from Kentucky and have been around releasing albums since the mid eighties. An avant band with the focus on humour, these guys are a lot of fun led by bass player Mike Sary. A four piece here but three of them are multi-instrumentalists plus we get six guests adding instruments, plus a couple of vocalists helping out. The guitarist adds a lot here with mandolin, banjo, cello, viola and electric violin. The violin sounds so much better than the hick playing on that more popular mid-western band. Sophisticated here, country sounding there. No comparison. The keyboardist by the way adds horns.

It's hard unfortunately not to compare any FRENCH TV album with their "Violence Of Amateurs" from 1999. Their high water mark by far. Still, there's so much that I like here but hit and miss overall, mostly hit hence the 3.5 stars. An hour of music and only five tracks but there's that 17 minute suite where they cover eight different songs by French bands. A lot of respect for this from yours truly. I mean bands like ANGE, SHYLOCK, ETRON FOU LELOUBLAN, ATOLL, PULSAR and CARPE DIAM get the FRENCH TV makeover. This is called "The Pardon Our French medley.

There's a lot of variety on this recording, in fact the opener sounds like a Spanish or Mexican song called "Everything Works In Mexico" yes the humour is all over this record. The closer is my favourite because they seem to be more adventerous on this one with more depth. If your into avant music with humour, than this is a band for you. Not as good as say CHEER-ACCIDENT who play in a similar style, but I'll leave that up to you.