Artist: P. Y. Marani
Label: Self-released
Release: 2009
Duration: 68:18
Rating: 3.9/5
P. Y. Marani, an otherwise unknown name on the progressive rock and fusion scene, has found a brilliant formula for marketing himself. What trips up so many artists in this genre is no problem at all for the Frenchman. His debut solo album “Outline” comes with an instrumental story that every sci-fi fan is going to fall for. Why? Every track title is tied in some way to science fiction literature. But Marani didn’t stop there – he trumpeted his collaboration with one of the best keyboardists in the world, Derek Sherinian, from the rooftops. Sherinian joins the Frenchman, who handles the keys himself otherwise, on the album’s fourth track.
The whole concept of the album is built around science fiction works, and it shows in the songs themselves. A space setting is conjured up instrumentally, not just through sound but through melody and rhythm. And like I said, every track title links back to some sci-fi literary hit. “The Harryman’s Dream” is lifted from Heinlein’s “The Man Who Sold the Moon”, whose main character is David Harriman, a man obsessed with the idea of owning the moon and being the first one on it. “The First Foundation” is surely Asimov’s idea, since he created a sci-fi universe set in the future, where two worlds most often clash – the human one and the robotic one. The third track bears the title of one of the best-known novels ever – “Brave New World”. Huxley’s hit is really a disguised dystopia, where the world is supposed to be perfect but is truly far from it. “Ubik”, where Sherinian joins Marani, is the title of a book by Philip K. Dick, another one of the groundbreaking authors of sci-fi. In 2005, Time magazine even named “Ubik” one of the 100 best English-language novels published since 1923. Ubik is a product that a group of astronauts, unwittingly traveling through time because of instability in space and time, come across in every environment and era they find themselves in. That gives the story a big aftertaste of mysticism. The track “The Rediscovery” could be titled after Cordwainer Smith’s short story collection “The Rediscovery of Man”. In all the stories, which follow one another chronologically, Smith describes a dystopian world of the future. The second-to-last track takes its name from Stanislav Lem’s novel “Solaris”. Lem writes about an impossible symbiosis between the human and non-human species, driven by human nature; the relationship between the main hero, psychologist Kris Kelvin, and his dead wife, who killed herself after Kelvin left her, is also front and center. The closing track of “Outline”, “Goodbye 1984”, references yet another dystopian work – George Orwell’s “1984”. In that book, the writer introduced the so-called Big Brother for the first time, someone who sees everything and knows everything, because of whom the concept of privacy doesn’t exist in the world the Englishman creates in “1984”.
Across the whole album, Marani tries to capture the mood of each book as closely as he can through instruments alone. Dystopias are mostly sad, melancholic or angry, with dominant distorted guitar and dull, minor-key keyboards. Take “Brave New World”, for example: the intro is a naively playful tune, but in the background the keyboards announce a kind of disharmony, a hidden danger. So a melody that’s pleasant at first glance takes on a hidden hint of menace, the one it has right from the start. “Solaris”, a more psychological book, works wonderfully with the saxophone (which only shows up here), nailing the atmosphere Lem wants to create with his book. “The Harryman’s Dream” is a more ambitious, fast-paced track, kind of invigorating. It reflects Harriman’s desire, as he dreams of owning the moon and running it afterwards. You can’t make out every book in every song, but Marani’s idea is incredibly fresh and executed in an interesting way.
So P. Y. Marani introduces himself to listeners in a very creative and intelligent way, not just as a great guitarist and creator in general, but as a man full of ideas with a knack for connecting cultural subgenres. The album “Outline” is definitely a breakthrough and does its job brilliantly, and after a few spins you almost feel like grabbing a sci-fi book and enjoying some gorgeous music alongside it.
Line-up
PY Marani – guitar, bass guitar, keyboards
Xavier Richard – drums
Guest musicians:
Matthieu Gevreau – bass guitar
Denis Cornardeau – guitar
Derek Sherinian – keyboards
Serge Servant – saxophone
Production
P. Y. Marani
Tracklist
1. The Harryman’s Dream
2. First Foundation
3. Brave New World
4. Ubik
5. The Rediscovery Of Man
6. Solaris
7. Goodbye 1984
