LES DISCRETS - Septembre Et Ses Dernières Pensées

Already guitarist with the now-defunct Amesoeurs, the very young Fursy Teyssier carries on with the companions of that brief and thrilling adventure (with the exception of frontman Neige) to launch his own artistic project, Les Discrets, which had actually already existed in embryonic form for a few years and had until now been devoted only marginally to music; Fursy is in fact a renowned visual artist, illustrator of books, fairy tales, artwork and comics, and creator of animated short films. All that was missing was for him to bring his activity as a musician to the forefront too, a gap now filled by this dense debut album, for which the young lyonnais was given free rein by the ever-farsighted Prophecy Productions.

Much anticipated, as is by now everything orbiting the Amesoeurs "family", "Septembre Et Ses Dernières Pensées" sets out with its opening tracks (particularly the single "L'Échappée" and the sweeping "Les Feuilles De L'Olivier") along the lines of an effective dark-metal sound drawn from the invaluable lessons of Agalloch and Katatonia. But more than anything, it's the legacy of the Amesoeurs experience that asserts itself most strongly: that ability to read the anguish and greyness of everyday routine and translate it into songs that are a tumult of jolts and contrasts. Desolate, wasteland-like settings in which every track on the album is born, grows and fades away.

And it is only in the melancholic, elegiac surrender for which Teyssier shows a pronounced sensitivity that light and breathing room are to be found. When this latter aspect prevails, the songs strip themselves bare until they become naive, dreamlike little vignettes, at times stumbling into kitsch ("Sur Le Quais"), at others sweeping the listener away with melodies of the highest emotional charge, pure Amesoeurs stock (that tiny, touching spell that is the title track).

Overall, though, the album doesn't live up to the expectations that preceded it.

Teyssier's songwriting is flawed, growing tiresome and repetitive over time, and his impersonal vocal abilities don't help matters. Compared to his friend/rival Alcest, in whose shadow Les Discrets are for now almost inevitably forced to live, Fursy chooses to start from different premises, but still lacks inspiration and imagination. Certainly, even as a songwriter, it's his visual talent that, more than anything else, fuels the best moments of his music. The path laid out is in all likelihood the right one.

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24/05/2010