SEQUENTIAL DREAMS: Chrysalis (2021)

“The way Sequential Dreams has built it asks a bit of love because the best is for the end, mainly its 3rd part”

1 Our Last Best Hope 6:18

2 Dawn of the Third Age - Part 1 3:46

3 A Voice in the Wilderness 6:04

4 Dawn of the Third Age - Part 2 (Feat. Johan Tronestam) 7:04

5 Diachronic Verbs in Temporal Sentences - Part 1 7:49

6 Diachronic Verbs in Temporal Sentences - Part 2 5:17

7 Diachronic Verbs in Temporal Sentences - Part 3 2:01

8 Diachronic Verbs in Temporal

Sentences - Part 4 3:53

9 Lost in Translation 3:41

10 Moments of Transition 2:09

11 Chrysalis 7:37

12 Everending Story 4:26

Sequential Dreams Music

(DDL 60:09) (V.F.)

(E-Rock-Berlin School)

Coming back from a hiatus of more than 3 years, Sequential Dreams did not hesitate too much to know what to offer to its fans. After ten albums carried by the influences of Tangerine Dream, Ron Charron's project comes back to our ears with 1 hour of EM still transported by the influences of Edgar Froese and his mythical astral vessel. In fact, CHRYSALIS continues where Metamorphic Waves left off at the end of 2017, but with a more creative vision from Ron Charron who signs very beautiful compositions in this album divided into 3 parts. The history of CHRYSALIS revolves around the Babylon 5 series and especially the death of the interpreter of Delenn, the Croatian actress Mira Furlan who said before her death; I look at the stars. It's a clear night and the Milky Way seems so near. That's were I'll be going soon. We are all star stuff. Words that were somewhat like those of Edgar ...

The opening of Our Last Best Hope is filled with distorted and reverberating sound effects from which bursts a beautiful melody hummed by a synth and supported by the march of a keyboard. The percussions solidify this first phase of semi-catchy ballad style that solos and harmonies in riffs from the electric six-strings take to a more heavenly level. A slight change in tone and the rhythm initiates a catchy phase in a progressive rock style before becoming pulsating in a fleeting wild phase. The sequencer makes jump its keys filled with a dark ardor while the synth throws solos in a phase of stationary rock. This title bears the seal of Sequential Dreams, as does the vividly undulating rhythm of the sequencer in Dawn of the Third Age - Part 1. Short, the title still offers some very good synth solos, while its second passage is strewing of keyboard riffs and synth pads in the colors of Edgar that Ron joins with guitar solos. It ended up curtly! A Voice in the Wilderness offers an opening centered on an acoustic guitar strummed by dreamy fingers. The idea of imagining the musician on the roof of the world making toast his chords for cosmic winds is not crazy. Especially when the synth winds become sources for our memory with whistled solos and ghostly tunes having that Tangram scent. It's a good track largely dominated by the acoustic six-strings flirting with the astral winds. Dawn of the Third Age - Part 2 is co-written and performed with Johan Tronestam. And it shows! The rhythm of sequencer is fluid and is accompanied by guttural vocal chords-effects from the Tronestam repertoire. It's good electronic rock radiated by the influences of Edgar Froese, especially in the second part where we reach a roundabout where finally Dawn of the Third Age - Part 2 takes a tangent like Our Last Best Hope's. By sniffing two rhythmic approaches in quick succession, which are the opposite, Dawn of the Third Age - Part 2 risks confusing more than one listener in this lack of coherence which has its charms. But too much can turn like not enough!

We reach the second part of CHRYSALIS with the long segment of Diachronic Verbs in Temporal Sentences. Divided into 4 parts which seek to have their own identity, it's the Tangerine Dream part of this new Sequential Dreams album. Part 1 begins with this flute melody giving us this taste of hearing Tangram. The melody moving away, the rhythm which replaces it does not take away from us this desire. The approach is more rock and pouf!!! We start again with a vision of Chris Franke at the sequencer in the tormented finale of Poland. Keyboard riffs fall, scattering their colors in a rhythmic flow always in search of unity. The sequencer still beating, Diachronic Verbs in Temporal Sentences - Part 2 slips towards an ambient phase with synth outbursts à la Silver Scale. There is no rhythm! Just that drumming of the sequencer that goes out after 3 minutes, letting go those Silver Scale's flashes roam without looking for anything. Diachronic Verbs in Temporal Sentences - Part 3 offers a short vision of Flashpoint while Diachronic Verbs in Temporal Sentences - Part 4 does more in the originality with a line of pulsating sequences which moves away from our ears to return to it in a formula which does quite like in Dalinetopia, a solo album by Edgar Froese.

Lost in Translation is a good little title which vibrates on elastic-organic sequences and a series of melodious arpeggios trapped in a melancholic melody. It's a rhythm structure that lives on three layers of the sequencer and some good percussions in a progressive atmosphere of Pink Floyd conducive to good exchanges of solos. Moments of Transition is heavier than rock and carries a fascinating melody that clings to our earlobes. Here are 2 superb titles, original and creative which would have deserved more minutes on the counter. And that's a bit of the criticism I will have to make on CHRYSALIS. When it's good and creative, it's often too short! Except for the title-track which leads us towards good electronic rock with a movement of the sequencer whose analog tones coexist with good sound effects. The rhythm is fluid with a good alternating movement of the sequences which jump in these mysterious mists of the chthonian universes of EM. There are some good grave chords with just enough resonance to make us wonder if this is a good hungry and organic bass. Especially since its vampiric and elastic effect slows the pace a bit. In short, good EM with a dose of mystery and seductive effects that stimulate the appetite for listening. The percussions are very good by the way. I was going to write that there was nothing of Tangerine Dream in the music since Lost in Translation that a little bit of Wavelength surfaced at the very end of Chysalis. Everending Story ends CHRYSALIS with a good title which has its nervous structure pounding a static rhythm with a very ingenious melodious ascendant. The kind of thing that hangs on the first listen and that we never get tired of hearing again.

In the end, CHRYSALIS turns out to be a very good album with good ideas which arouse, with good reasons, the taste to hear again and again. The way Sequential Dreams has built it asks a bit of love because the best is for the end. Mainly, its 3rd part!

Sylvain Lupari (March 30th, 2021) ****¼*

SynthSequences.com

Available at Borders Edge Music