“Samsara is a nice ode to an Arabian world that only Dead Beat Project can draw with such musical precision”
1 Warrior of the Light 4:45
2 Slough 3:51
3 Original Secrecy 4:08
4 At the 13th Moon 4:26
5 In Memory 2:34
6 Ritual 8:11
7 Mirror of the Wave 6:18
8 Enter the Circle 6:49
9 In the Silence of the Earth 7:19
10 Samsara 6:18
11 Fire Drums 3:56
12 The Harmony of Silence 6:52
13 The Celebration of Behl 4:50
(CD/DDL 70:17) (V.F.)
(Ethnic, cinematographic EM)
SAMSARA begins with a mortuary approach. A bit like in the old westerns of Sergio Leone, bells are ringing in the West. Driven by winds, their ringing mingles with the breaths of mourning voices which hum in cavernous breezes. The percussions of the sands are awakening. Rubbing the balls of their maracas, they spice up a dramatic approach that rises in a poignant cinematographic crescendo where the layers of violins cry in the drumbeats of the land armies. Warrior of the Light sets the tone for a superb album with very theatrical ramifications from Dead Beat Project. Who has not dreamed of dancing in the clouds? To be carried away by the breeze of the winds of ambient rhythms. To see the superb cover, the dream takes over the imagination. Those who liked R'Evolution will be quite simply delighted by this second album of Olivier Goyet who offers here an intensely cinematographic work where the beauties and legends of an Arab world are brought to our ears with all their delicacy. And those who don't know the universe of Dead Beat Project will be downright seduced by this music which is inspired by the choreographies of the dancer Gwan, muse of the French synthesist, who is also present on the album with her ethereal voice which narrates and hums heavenly poems.
After a very musical and cinematographic introduction, Slough plunges us into the ambient universe of the Arabian astral poetries. The movement is of air and dusts in which float the incantations of a didgeridoo of which the hoarse breaths embrace the celestial voice of Gwan and the tribal percussions which dream more that they forge rhythm. Original Secrecy seizes of the finale to enrich a little more the poetry forgotten by Slough. More musical and clearly more ethereal, Original Secrecy floats into our ears of its glass arpeggios like a lullaby that the time had forgotten in the sand dunes. It's very beautiful, but especially very lyrical. Heavy and laborious lamentations stir up the tribal rhythm of At the 13th Moon. One would imagine being in the public markets of the sand's peoples with an air of carnival where flutes and dulcimer weave a lively Arabian dance which swirls on the tribal percussions and these sinuous reverberations which had enlightened the intro. After the very ambiospherical In Memory, Ritual brings us near the celestial lasciviousness with a soft rhythm. A morphic and hypnotic rhythm which eats our passivity with the slow strikings of Bedouin percussions where the layers of synths and the ethereal voices float and buzz on a hypnotic pace from which we do not even realize an oblong growth. Winds and thunders bring us up until the seraphic voice of Gwan who heaves a sigh in the vastness of a oozing cave while that slowly Mirror of the Wave takes shape and offers a delicate down-tempo which pounds with its line of bass of which the slow drives are blowing of desire for the soft arpeggios which stroll around Gwan's voice. This is another beautiful moment of tenderness which runs away in the oasis breezes and the embers of a fire crackling in nomads' nights.
After this intro of ambiences, Enter the Circle offers itself at its tribal pace by catching clanic percussions which dust a good line of sequence of which the heavy and nervous chords weave a hectic pace. The musical cloth becomes incredibly dense with this meshing of percussions and pulsations which bubbling nervously under a Berber melody weaved in a dulcimer that Goyet pinches with ardour and in the multiple breaths of synth to tints of oracles, nymphs and sandy winds. Intense and poignant with a rhythm in constant progression which crashes into an Arabian techno, Enter the Circle is one of the best passages of SAMSARA. On a morphic rhythm, like a slow spiritual trance, livened up by tribal percussions and ringings of bells which harmonize into a musical decoration, In the Silence of the Earth is use as soundtrack to a poem, which we find inside the artwork, recited in French by Gwan and in English by Olivier Goyet. After a slow departure whipped by sinuous reverberations, grazed by evasive strings and hypnotized by ethereal voices, the title-track takes off from a semi-techno rhythm which has difficulty to control its velocity in an orchestral sound density as captivating as stifling. Fire Drums wears its title with nobility; it's a fire fed by impressive percussions as much wrathful than harmonious. Noisy, intense and fascinating! Let's say that it bangs and that it disturbs the neighbors. Imagine the eardrums now! After the anger of the percussions, The Harmony of Silence offers a very beautiful moment of sweetness with a superb ballad where the arpeggios dance and sing in the chords of a soft dulcimer. The Celebration of Behl ends this album with a swirling ethnic dance where the elements of an exhilarating techno à la Jean-Michel Jarre resound in ears which swirl as winds and in virgin flutes of which the cheerful breaths are the equal of a story which ends into jubilation.
From ambient rhythms to soft down-tempos which flirt with Arabian techno, SAMSARA spreads its 70 minutes with a delight which keeps increasing. It's a musical work which scrolls its visions with a neatness which pays tribute to Olivier Goyet. We see sand, desert, dunes and oases. We see nomads, craftsmen and merrymakers. We feel the breezes and the hot breaths caressed our dreams. And we hear a wonderful music among which the aromas and the beauties of a world that we would like to caress of our senses seduce with a surprising fascination. It's as if we were there. Beautiful, oniric and extremely musical.
Sylvain Lupari (July 10th, 2013) *****
Available at AD Music Shop