“There is no more Jean-Michel Jarre than himself? Well, we have to add Can Atilla to this equation now”
1 Vivaldi 6:46 2 Le Visage 5:14 3 Atomium 7:43 4 Hope 8:14 5 Idea 4:35 6 Sarajevo 8:22 7 Soyuz One 11:27 8 Moongate 5:31 9 Victory 6:51 10 Justinianus 4:33 Cue Records & Groove
(CD/DDL 69:21) (V.F.) (E-Rock & EDM)
Can Attila has put back his name on the chessboard of EM in 2018 with a splendid comeback album; Berlin High School Legacy. Subsequently, the name of Can began to circulate out of his native Turkey with posts on Facebook. Posts about upcoming concerts, but in a pattern other than the Berlin School. Either with philharmonic orchestras, we forget that Can Atilla has a Master's in Music from the Turkish Conservatory, or with another project; Masiva. Words surrounded this project; Electronic Rock Experience! They were 4 on various posters; Can Atilla on synths and sequencers as well as rhythm programming, Mahir Dawn Tuzcu on guitar, Muhammet Özer on bass and finally Mehmet Levent Ünal on drums. The few excerpts suggested energetic electronic music. Soberly titled CAN ATILLA'S MASIVA, this new album is a bombshell! A bombshell of accessible and highly harmonic music with frenzied rhythms and electronic anthems that flirt between rock and electronic dance music (EDM) inspired by Jean-Michel Jarre's shows between Rendezvous and Chronology. The most intense period of the French musician for live shows.
And it starts with Vivaldi! Sequencer beads flow timidly into nebulous mists whose fluttering sneaks into resonances of new, more energetic arpeggios. A DJ comes in and tunes his sequencer in mode; survival guide for a Saturday night in a trendy nightclub. A shot of electronic percussions, sequences that try to follow the same flow and chords à la JMJarre, which absolutely want you to dance, propel this version of Vivaldi in Techno's wonderlands. The bass drums, boom-boom-boom, makes vibrate our eardrums while the guitar tears the moods with incisive solos. From then on, it's an attack of massive and extremely voracious rhythms which assail as much the febrility of our feet as our eardrums adjusted for contagious rhythms that will parade for the next 9 tracks. The guitarist, molded in the sonic forms of Patrick Rondat, will make epic duels with the synth for stormy solos. His riffs and the heavy bass of Muhammet Özer second the sequencer and the rhythmic programming which, with the drum, will club the soles of our feet. One just recovers from this Vivaldi that Le Visage offers a line of bass pulsations à la Rendezvous IV. The percussions and slamming of hands redirect the rhythm towards a semi-techno electronic rock with a guitar and its heavy riffs as well as a synth and its melodious arrangements. A choir adds a more pink-candy dimension to this music that turns resolutely more in mode rock. The arrangements and the guitar form a melodic duet that easily weaves its ear worm. Atomium proposes a soft introduction that deviates towards a morphic Techno and its slow boom-boom which shake threads of harmonic sequences. The guitar adds weight with riffs and solos. It's catchy and especially very good when a sweet seraphic voice infiltrates these ambiances of lunar dances.
It's in Tangram's influences that Hope comes out of silence. If the beginning is oneiric, as soon as percussive effects of pit-viper's style, like in Oxygen 4, start to get hear the rhythm turns for a big but static e-rock with a guitar always so stormy. This Mahir Dawn Tuzcu is very solid and his solos are of fire! The pieces of harmonies always have this little very catchy side. And apart from its arrangements, effects and harmonies in the background, the synth justifies its presence with more harmonic solos. Hope exploits to the maximum its minutes by taking a more rock corridor. The finale is very cosmic with an astral soprano voice that sings on the backwashes of a cosmic ocean. Ocean that we will meet again in the more exploratory title, Soyuz One. Idea, a title which appears on a previous album of Can Attila, just like Vivaldi by the way, is reinterpreted in a vision of electronic rock that only Jarre could give to his classics in concerts. The music welcomes lyrics and solos, always very harmonious, which are shared this time between the guitar and the synth. There is more text in Sarajevo, the most electronic title of CAN ATILLA'S MASIVA. The rhythm is very dynamic with a mesh of sequences, boom-boom pulsations, keyboard-guitar riffs and a good connection between the drums and the bass, always so heavy. A bass that I forget to write about, and which is however very present and makes a remarkable work of support throughout this album. The synth eclipses the guitar with good solos in Sarajevo. Laser harp chords and jerky layers of voices as in Rendezvous complete the setting. Soyuz One is an evolving title with a firework of cosmic effects, we immerse ourselves in the atmosphere of Houston-Lyon Cities In Concert. The arrangements are thunderous, and the intensity is designed to give us chills. Phases of rhythms and of ambiances lead us to a finale where the synth is literally in mode; On the Run by Pink Floyd. Moongate puts us back into an energetic rock and EDM with a mix of boom-boom and hyperactive sequences. The guitar tears the moods again with very good solos over staccato orchestral riffs that give more tonus to the rhythm. Victory is a bit in the same mold while Justinianus ends this CAN ATILLA'S MASIVA with a fiery EDM anthem full of these rattlesnakes' percussions and structured around a melodious approach as much eater of earlobe as in Le Visage. Boum-boom, yeah-yeah ... let's rock to the moon!
There are not 36 ways to talk about this CAN ATILLA'S MASIVA! Rhythm, lots of rhythms. Melodies, many melodies. There is no more Jean-Michel Jarre at the moment than this new band of Can Attila. In fact, one would think to hear JMJarre scroll all his hits since there is no hole, no empty moment in this album which is certainly intended for fans of the French musician. Excellent! Like Ave, but in another music style ...
Sylvain Lupari (May 29th, 2019) *****
Available at Groove nl.