Artist: Art Zoyd
Label: Self-released
Released: 1985
Rating: 4.8/5
Even though the Belgians Univers Zero have always been the peak of chamber rock for me, classical music played (also) on rock instruments, really, the French band Art Zoyd were doing it before them and surely inspired Daniel Denis (Daniel even guested as a drummer on some Art Zoyd albums) and his crew.
The heart of Art Zoyd is its two main composers, Gerard Hourbette and Thierry Zaboitzeff, who among other things also played on an Univers Zero album (Ceux du Dehors). Although the two masters write their pieces separately, their styles are so compatible that in most cases their albums glide along with the same ease as a breeze through birch leaves. The only big difference between their styles is that Zaboitzeff prefers to use lyrics and vocals too, while Hourbette mostly swears by purely instrumental works.
Besides the two multi-talents and multi-instrumentalists (Zaboitzeff and Hourbette, of course), Patricia Dallio also lends her fingers to the album; she stuck with Hourbette in Art Zoyd all the way to today, while Zaboitzeff has long since left. Among the keyboards it’s mostly piano you hear, but there are synths and organ in there too. Then there’s the wind section (trumpet and sax), which adds some jazz impulses, though for the most part it sticks to the set classical guidelines.
The album kicks off with a Zaboitzeff masterpiece that showcases all those typical Art Zoyd elements – dark motifs that majestically tie into other, even more demonic parts. Some fan of more orthodox prog rock might say their pieces move slowly, but if you stop to consider the zeal and perfectionism with which Art Zoyd build their motifs, you definitely can’t say there’s anything simple about them, and it’s nowhere near the work of mental slowpokes. If Zaboitzeff has already started this powerfully, Hourbette of course can’t lag behind, and with his epic Cryogenese he maybe even tops his partner in crime, or would have, if a metronome weren’t used as percussion through almost the whole piece, which eventually starts to sound a little monotonous. But the splendor of the composition as a whole doesn’t fade much because of it. Hourbette continues with Io, another gloomy suite, and later returns to Cryogenese once more, but it’s a brand new piece (apart from the damn metronome). Zaboitzeff as a composer isn’t as present on this album as Hourbette, but he makes up for it with top-notch pieces like Mouvance and the second part of Sortie.
When it comes to scary, creepy atmospheres, Art Zoyd generally outdo even Univers Zero themselves. Only on the album Heresie did Univers Zero make something so black that neither Art Zoyd nor anyone else can get near it. But Art Zoyd are more consistent in their darkness, and in that department they feel more natural. The pieces unfold in an extremely natural way, the apparent simplicity is only apparent, and soon you can hear how many levels this album is really built on.
This album is pure catharsis, and 70 minutes fly by. The compositions are incredibly coherent and cleanly laid out. When you first hear the record it may not seem all that complex, but their effort and hard work come through later, when the compositions start to breathe and you realize how hard it must have been to create something so perfect. And that’s not even the most shocking part. From the first album right up to the end of the eighties, Art Zoyd put out nothing but releases like this, full of thought-out, polished works that confuse and thrill me again and again. Since Zaboitzeff left, Art Zoyd may really not be what they once were, but that’s exactly why we have records like Le Marriage, to show us what’s possible in music, and as the album’s title says, heaven and hell join forces here, and the sense of dread is good and cleansing.
Lineup
Patricia Dallio – electric piano, piano, keyboards
Gérard Hourbette – viola, violin, electric piano, piano, keyboards, percussion
Jean-Pierre Soarez –trumpet, percussion
Thierry Zaboitzeff – cello, bass guitar, vocals, tapes, keyboards, percussion
Didier Pietton – soprano saxophone (3,4,5)
Production
Art Zoyd
Tracklist
1. Sortie 134 – Part 1 (11:00)
2. Cryogenèse – Rêve Artificiel (18:12)
3. IO 1 (3:51)
4. IO 2 (2:15)
5. IO 3 (5:15)
6. Mouvance 2 (3:34)
7. Mouvance 1 (5:54)
8. Cryogenèse – Les Portes du Futur (14:30)
9. Sortie 134 – Part 2 (3:48)
