VACABOU - Vacabou

Another small hidden gem, long lost in the folds of record production, is being unearthed and offered to a wider audience than before. The album isn't exactly new: it came out in 2003 and is only now being distributed across Europe, through Ird, following its reissue on All Saints. Secondly, you risk badly misjudging it if you listen with the wrong ear.

The genre of reference is trip-hop. And one might wonder: what's the point of making trip-hop now, when the genre is wheezing its last breath? Well, in this case, you need to clear your mind of such thoughts. The album starts from a trip-hop foundation but doesn't stop there, veering off onto crosscutting paths, refusing any single definition and drawing strength from the many influences that shape it. The atmospheres are dark and shadowy, the voice is a sharp gust of wind, the music tastes of pain and melancholy.

A bit of history on this duo, unknown to most. The author of the music is Juan Feliu, a Spanish composer who kept the project shelved because he couldn't find someone to sing his songs, not having much of a voice himself (or so he says). In an interview he talks about his first steps in music, buying a PC, frantic composing, the urge to explore new horizons, the solitude in which he shut himself in his bedroom to carve out his own remote, desolate landscapes.

A few years later he met Pascale Saravelli, who was immediately seen as the perfect complement to his music, the voice that fit seamlessly with the compositions he had carved out. She'd never had any musical experience but joined in, and they began recording their tracks together.

It might seem absurd to draw comparisons with sinuous, melodic male-female duos (Lamb, Portishead), given that, as mentioned at the outset, there's no single stylistic signature under which this work can be filed. Feliu himself says: "Music lives on its own, we don't create it. But we feed it with our most varied experiences: travelling, reading, seeing photography exhibitions - this last point is something very close to my heart, in our live shows we take great care with the projection of appropriate images." And then this crucial statement: "Every aspect of composition matters, and I'm an absolute perfectionist; before I can call something finished, a track has to be completely free of weaknesses. Still, the decisive thing in a song is finding the groove; and that's not easy, it doesn't always lie in the rhythm, sometimes it's in a guitar chord, in a keyboard part. It's hard to find, but it's essential."

Feliu's words are crucial to understanding the meaning of his work, so as not to misread his intentions. And the album really does have rhythm and groove. These autumnal brushstrokes, that nocturnal, venomous, clouding momentum, leave no escape. Also worth noting is the singer's contribution, masterful in several tracks, with an almost hushed, detached, sidelined tone.

"Meditation Park" is a little tune for a radio at 3am with a drink too many, a guitar strumming foolishly and awkwardly, voices overlapping in a drugged tangle. The keyboards are fussy, the digital percussion is a bed of sweetness.

"To Russia In White" is a slow urban mantra, a limping digital chant, a pop infected by some mechanical illness.

Direct, stretched-out notes, stellar loops scurrying everywhere, and a carpet of fake whispers, at times docile, at times raw, add something unusual to the mix.

"Life As Interference" is a playful, spacey digital-pop track, "Plain" is a highly creative song, with piano, schizophrenic drumming, electronic crackle and a repressed male voice. "Rannveig" seduces with its synthetic strings and a drum machine unsure whether to lead or support, while on "Blue Glass Highway" the duo try their hand at folk-tronic-pop. Surprising and enjoyable.

"Burunka Left" is disorienting and never fully tamed, moving between moments of classic-pop-rock and flashes of digital, alien crackle. As the seconds tick by, it all melts into a noisy silence. Pascale's voice is the tip of the iceberg on this record. A hybrid of Beth Gibbons, Anneli Drecker, and who else? It's simply her, beyond cumbersome comparisons.

"Iceland" is playful and amateurish, a delightful home-made feel runs through the whole track, the vocals are doubled and the "groove" (as Juan calls it) is irresistible. Honking horns are held up by drone and metallic percussion.

"Angels Of Night" is perhaps the track that best symbolizes the record. Colorful bleeps, a tinkling keyboard, words both distant and close, painful and pleasurable, a rhythm that struggles to take flight and stays mired in a sea of sweetness and melancholy. Gorgeous - impossible to stay away from.

The album closes with the sprawling, relaxing ambient of "Dream Ner9 This Week: PDLV Piano". A small suite for a peaceful world.

This work doesn't invent anything new, nor does it presume to teach any kind of lesson. It's simply made up of songs with an intrinsic beauty, steeped in warmth, love, and a beat that feels like a pulsing heart.

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30/04/2026