PAIX

Considered as their most progressive output, the 1972 "Paix" album (released in 1974) features two excellent long pieces, the 15mn eponym track "Paix" and the 24mn "Un jour. la Mort". The beginning of the "Paix" piece reminds of german prog thanks to a dark acid introduction with cosmic keyboards and a haunting bass. There's an impressive organ part sounding like Canterburyan trafficked organ sound. Then comes the lyrics declaimed by Catherine Ribeiro which gain progressively in intensity. The breathtaking "Un jour.la Mort" is even better with very intense lyrics related to death, multi-layered keyboard and guitar soundscapes over pulsing percussions. One of the most original records from the 70's French underground.

CR&A's third album (fourth if you count the 2Bis album) is probably the best acclaimed by connoisseurs and deservedly so! Their hippy psych rock filled with revolutionary ideals in their lyrics works wonders in this case as it will in the next few albums, but back in 72, there was still a lot of peoplethat actually believe it was all still possible, something the 73 oil crisis will crush (at least in the old world and around the globe, bar the US). The quintet has again suffered some line-up shuffle and besides guitarist/composer Mouillet, percussionist, drummer Santangelli and keyboard Lemoine, appears Jean-Sébastien, brother of Patrice on bass guitar. With only four tracks and a very pastoral artwork cover

Starting with the wordless a cappella Roc Alpin, the album is off to a rather short &and unrepresentative upbeat track, that presents a slight folk feel. Much more impressive is the equally short (both around the 3-mins track) Jusqu'à Ce Que La Force, which shows all the usual CR&A dramatics over a Tony Banks organ line. Ribeiro's vocals are again very powerful, maybe recorded a tad too low, but her French singing shouldn't be a problem for anyone having the basis of the language. This minimum French is of course mandatory to understand Catherine's usually very strong lyrics, often selling revolution as if the obvious alternative; her sometimes arresting images in her lyrics are very powerful and add much to the group's flavour. Indeed the lengthy (15-mins+) title track starts on an extended instrumental intro (and equally long outro), showing the musical quartet being very good at their respective tricks, but its constantly crescendoing prog chords only add that much weight once Catherine starts bellowing her "peace" messages: "peace to our bellies, tanks for academics garbage" or "peace to our degenerate generations".

The flipside's sidelong suite, Un Jour. La Mort, is another fabulous journey into Alpes' universe: slow organ grindings with spacey electric guitar whinings taking their sweet times to develop, but once the bass gets along, Ribeiro's death-throes scat vocals are taking you on the other side of life, the whole thing dying down around the 7,5 mins mark, until Ribeiro's singing is now taking an almost liturgical tone (especially over the organ), until she becomes seductive and enticing, even when using colourful rebellious and thoughtful revolutionary lyrics. Interrupted by a strident musical raga-like interlude sprinkled with dissonant piano, enchanting acoustic guitar strums, Catherine comes back eructing death, claiming she's not a real lesbian (too bad for her. She's missing out, I am one ;o)), the same happening a little later than Catherine promising to make you a kid as the track slowly retires in a mish mash or her rantings and other antics mixed with strong organ.

Rather hard not to agree with many that Paix is one of CR&A's major achievements, Paix is indeed the perfect entry point to those seeking to enter this amazing French psychedelia. You'll have understood that CR&A is not for everyone, but if you love unusual music and smile at the thought of saying "WTF is this music???", no doubt that CR&A will take a few spins per year in the next few decades in your life.

A delightful French folk? No, not at all!

Let me say please don't be deceived by the first poppy French pop-rock Roc Alpin - Alpine Rock. Ah, sorry, of course this is a very smart and fine song, with Catherine's masculine husky and overwhelming voices and rhythmical French poppy sounds. Consider this is exactly a wonderful French Rock song. And furthermore, in the next ballad Jusqu'a Ce Que La Force De T'aimer Me Manque, with a flamenco guitar solo, Catherine's voices can get more flexible, more passionate, and more melancholic. Cannot help crying in her graceful but exploding chorus, let's try this ACID FOLK!

However, naturally, the real gems in this album should be the last two long songs - especially, the last track Un Jour... La Mort, with three independent parts in it, has absolutely all of their musical essence; quiet, smooth, (and a bit boring) opening... Catherine's mysteriously hoarse but palmy, fruity vibrations with heavy riffs of a bass solo... ethnic percussive sounds with her aggressive French singin'... and based on a fantastic electric guitar solo, impressing avalanche of pleasant voices and psychedelic keyboard & guitar sounds... even her shouts and cries can be comfortable for us, what a beautiful ending scene!

The title track Paix is another gem. spacey percussion is particularly impressive. Repetitive and fragrant riffs by a fancy keyboard solo and a simple (and sometimes eccentrically heavy) guitar one can remind us French progressive folk with some danceable and sensual texture. But the basis of this song is "Rock" I wanna say.

Oh, anyway, finally let me say - Roc Alpin can be very fit for my daily jog. :-)

Here we have the usual awful clash of dress sense on the sleeve complete with ropey photograph. Thankfully, I'm here to rate the music. Ribeiro still looks pretty hot though eh? What a jawline!

'Paix' gets off to a surprisingly jaunty start complete with 'La-la-la-la-la' vocals on 'Roc Alpin' with Ribeiro sounding like she's throwing daisies up in the air in a sunny forest. It's unrepresentative of what's to follow though.

Track two is more like I was expecting. Acoustic in nature with lots of weird effects pushed through the instruments along with the usual astounding baritone vocals of Catherine Ribeiro. The title track is the highlight. Fifteen minutes of near perfect music. Somewhat doom laden and pretty heavy in atmosphere.

Thankfully I can't speak much French - (apart from 'Le chien mange de pomme') and I'm led to believe that this might help matters, as there's supposedly a fair bit of Socialism in a Communist kind of way involved in the band's beliefs.

The last track 'Un Jour... La Mort' takes up a mighty 24 minutes. This has that 'jenais se quois' that all Ribeiro and Alpes albums retain - even after nearly 40 years. Indescribably beautiful.

There's a lot of bongos present on this album and apart from the first track there's no drum kit at all, which gives things a strange folky groove. Hypnotic and psychedelic are the two words I'd use to sum 'Paix' up with.

The best female vocalist ever? Well, she's better than Lisa Gerard, Kate Bush and Diamanda Galas. So quite probably. Excellent

What if Hawkwind or Gong went folk, with Nico on lead vocals? Perhaps they would have ended up with a sound a bit like the one exhibited by Catherine Ribeiro's backing group Alpes on this release. Sputtering hazily between psychedelic space rock vistas and hippy folk chants and songs, this bizarre release combines adventurous musical experimentation with capable and diverse vocals on the part of Catherine herself, which have a resonance and a boldness to them matched by very few. There aren't many groups who can count themselves as having a truly unique sound, but Alpes might just be one of them.

I'm prolonging my stay in France for the next couple of reviews (and of course for the fragrant opium cheeses) this fabulously outrageous album called Paix came out in 1972, and believe you me when I say that it's formed in the hands of a group you've never heard the likes of in your life. With the progressive folk scene frolicking in all kinds of constellations - the vibe coming out of Germany felt particularly hippiyish - let's all get together and sit on the lawn, while a good deal of the music coming from the British isles suddenly had changed - fast becoming more introvert and "ugly" in its expression - epitomized by the likes of Comus, Jan Dukes de Grey and Tea & Symphony. Catherine Ribeirou belongs to these mad cats, and with her band Alpes - formerly known as 2+bis - the music coming out of your speakers when you hopefully decide to take the plunge - sounds like a haunted and slow motion catatonic version of Edith Piaf eroding through the music like pouring acid of sand.

The entire album revolves around simple, yet obnoxiously brilliant guitar patterns that chuff along like a decisively more edgy acoustic Keith Richards. Even the finger play is spot on! Hurling in a sea of mist - the psychedelic and often luminous fizzing organs snake effortlessly underneath, above and right in front of the guitar - creating an image of a wild frenzied kid haphazardly in circles with a guitar on his back - swooping about the stoic submersible rugs of furry glistening sound being hurled your way from those organs.

The focal point of everything here is the terrorising vocals of Ribeirou. Man, I'll tell you - sometimes she sounds like an androgynous Gestapo interrogator with big booming demonic obsessions darting out of her like fountains of beautiful darkness. These are the sort of vocals that echo Edith Piaf standing on top a skyscraper summoning a dangerous and desperately edgy vibe.

The first track Roc Alpin immediately gives you the impression that you're going to hear a folk rock album with somewhat strange fittings glued onto various other musical surfaces you didn't catch the first time around - but then again the first time you hear this record, it'll stop you dead in your tracks - just because the vocals appear in the room like small splintered knives.

This is however not how it all starts. Paix begins like a proper album and serves to you perhaps not the most accessible tune, but at least it sorta rocks. Feels something like a being led through a green faerie wonderland with a large and merry sailor's wife going LALAAAAAHHLAALAAHHH LALAAAAH!!! Then the organs turn up and the moods get twirling murky and soaring. Small guitar figurines leads it gently to the door as it doses off into silence.

Then an extremely French ballad comes in the form of laid back guitar strumming, and the most raging vibrato I've ever heard applied to a female rock performer. Short and very French piece - sending you along Parisienne Walkways straight onwards into the sadness of the gutter. Melancholic sweetness haunts this tune from start to finish.

At this point, you've pretty much accepted that you've acquired a progressive avantguarde cabaret album, but then something funny happens - the mood changes for the more airy and porous, and I could swear we were suddenly somewhere along the ridges of NEU! - and finally the pieces fall together, when the odd electronic string instrument called the percuphone emerges and starts emulating the well familiar two stroke rhythm of a sequencer. Additionally the music veers into dark hedges and demented yet most befitting organ runs mimic the sort of free association you'd hear from a guy like Ray Manzerak when he played live gigs with The Doors. Right there and then Ribeiro steps in and speaks out on behalf of the mad country and focuses the spotlight on all the fabulous midnight lurkers of everyday life - sporting distinct left field convictions. The track goes back and forth between these two outer extremes - feeding off the powerful back swing it gets from either side of the fence - and then slowly coming to a halt with the electronics fading smoothly out, and you get the sense that the upcoming storm is awaiting brewing round the bend. She then sings out in the most angelic voice, and the skies rip apart like new born butterflies. This is effectively only a percuphone, a light decor of atmospheric guitar riff raff, some keys and vocals, but with this title piece it feels as if the world is on the verge of becoming a speaker and everything around turns alive with sound. It's a real trip man! Ford I love this thing.

The final piece instigates with a Cluster like elegance - like a feather caught on the up-draft - refusing to land anywhere. It's as insubstantial as it is pretty - and moreover, the soothing lapping watery music from the previous track now comes to the fore and you effectively get lured out into the slippery end, where everything seems like it's melting. When Ribeiro returns to song, all of the locked away emotions seep right through under the crackling of her menacing soaring vocal lines. Oh yes, there's buckets of beauty in here as well. The final bewildering whisper/effervescent rodeo flute always sends me off chasing mice in my skull. This is like having an alluring and terrifying conversation with the incarnation of Medusa's ancient bloodline...

I've loved this thing the past 15 years, and it never ceases to amaze me just how wild and out there this album really is, and that's with the simplest of instrumentation conceivable. Sometimes less is more. So true. So very true 4.5 stars.

This sounds like a cross between Acid Folk and Psychedelic music, there's very much a hippyish vibe here especially on the first two tracks. The highlights though are the final two songs that clock in at over 15 1/2 minutes and 24 1/2 minutes respectively. Man Catherine is a beautiful woman, just a unique and gorgeous face while her voice is strong and deep.

"Roc Alpin" opens with guitar, bass and drums as vocal melodies come and go. An upbeat tune with keyboard-like sounds that come and go. This one's fairly straightforward and there's a 60' vibe with the vocals. "Jusqu'a Ce Que La Force De T'aimer Me Manque" opens with strummed guitar and vocals as the organ floats in. Keyboard-like sounds come and go too. Vocal melodies follow then back to vocals. The Psych/ Folk flavour to this one is strong. "Paix" has a sparse beginning with percussion-like sounds and atmosphere. The organ becomes more prominent then it's fuzzed out before 4 minutes. Nice! Catherine starts to speak before 6 minutes as the guitar melodies come and go while the bass, drums and organ continue. This is trippy yet her words seem serious. She starts to get more theatrical before 10 minutes and the music also turns more powerful. Love the fuzzed out organ that returns. Some almost avant sounding guitar around 11 1/2 minutes. Vocal melodies are back at 13 minutes. A psychedelic beauty right there, almost perfect and my favourite song on here.

"Un Jour... La Mort" is spacey with trippy guitar sounds to start. Vocal melodies and a change in sound after 4 minutes as bass and strummed guitar help out as well. Love the organ-like sounds after 5 minutes and also a minute after that. Vocals arrive just before 7 1/2 minutes and there's lots of depth instrumentally as she sings so beautifully. She starts to sing with more passion at 8 1/2 minutes. The vocals then stop as the music winds down until there's silence after 10 1/2 minutes. Then it kicks in with percussion, vocals, organ and more. Intense and determined is the sound here. Suddenly they seem to jam as the vocals stop. Organ and drums stand out here. The vocals are almost drugged-out sounding around 15 minutes, then she sings normally and man this all sounds so amazing. Silence before 18 1/2 minutes then solo picked guitar takes over. Strummed guitar and vocals follow. Bass and organ also join in. Some deranged vocal yells come and go over the last few minutes.

This is such an enjoyable album and it's often adventerous both vocally and instrumentally. A solid 4 stars and well worth tracking down.

Chanson, folk, symphonic rock in the vein of early Pink Floyd, a hint at Canterbury and arousing political poetry; this album is a truly original record in the classic progressive rock era. Catherine Ribeiro can sing beautifully, but will often to choose to almost 'primal scream' her way through the most intense moments! The gives the album a real sense of authenticity, which is often missing in smaller prog groups of the seventies.

The two shorter tracks in the beginning of the album are highlights, especially the melodic and fierce symphonic folksong 'Jusqu'' Ce Que la Foce de T'Aimer Me Manque'. The album continues to deliver two long symphonic pieces in which the band combines spacey atmospheres, spoken word (or rather political arousal) and gothic vocals. The power lies in the minimalist approach of the group, which creates a warm symphonic bath. Almost like a cleansing ritual for the mind. The music excites by keeping a few musical themes relevant by constantly raising the stakes. Perhaps Ribeiro & Alpes are so flexible because of the few instruments they use; often you'll only hear an organ, a bass guitar and a hand drum. Perhaps a bit like Robert Wyatt's Rock Bottom.

The recording of this album is good as long as you listen to it in a room with speakers. This is partly because of the sound and partly because of the ritualistic feel of the music. I don't know whom to recommend this music to, but I myself became quite attached to this record and its predecessor 'Ame Debout'.

When it comes the idealistic hippie psychedelic rock 60s evolving into the more serious musical workouts of the progressive rock 70s, few integrated the two styles more elegantly and convincingly than CATHERINE RIBEIRO + ALPES who found a unique niche in the zone that lay in between. RIBEIRO and her team found instant notoriety with their unique one-of-a-kind album 'No. 2' which scored them a seven album run on the Philllips Records label. Not only would the band enjoy the stability of a supportive label but CATHERINE found a secondary career with more pop oriented solo albums where she revived the songs of Edith Piaf and Jacques Prevert in more traditional French fashion.

Pictured in full hippie regalia somewhere in the forested mountains of southern France on the album cover, the band's third album PAIX (French for 'Peace') which was the second on the Phillips label saw the addition of bassist and percussionist Jean-Sébastien Lemoine joining the team after the exit of percussionist Claude Thiebaut. The band shifted gears a bit more towards the world of psychedelic space rock with long organ fueled hypnotic grooves which found less emphasis on the experimental homemade instrumentation of Patrice Moullet and focused more on the lysergic possibilities of the interplay of the organ, bass and guitars fueled by tribal drumbeats and RIBEIRO's vocal eccentricities.

On PAIX the band crafted the perfect balance between the unique avant-folk of the previous works and psychedelic rock which featured a new emphasis on bass grooves and guitar textures. PAIX also featured RIBEIRO expanding her vocal style into more traditional folk arenas as well as her electrifying declarative poetic prose that existed somewhere between Janis Joplin styled singing and recited spoken word tangents. While performed entirely in the French language, CATHERINE RIBEIRO + ALPES sounded like no other and was easily one of the most unique acts to have emerged from the progressive musical world of France possibly second only to space trippers Magma.

PAIX features only four tracks with the first two only hitting the three minute mark with the remaining running time dedicated to the 15 1/2 minute title track and the grand finale, the side swallowing 24 1/2 minute 'Un Jour' La Mort' which is actually several musical motifs merged into one massive psychedelic behemoth. 'Roc Alpin' starts PAIX in a rather catchy upbeat folk rock mode which features a tamer RIBEIRO engaging in a more sensual approach to her singing style. The following 'Jusquá' Ce Que la Foce de T'Aimer Me Manque' features the longest title track name but the shortest playing time at just under three minutes. The most authentically folk number features RIBEIRO unleashing a series of oooo's and aaaah's as she weaves majestic melodic melancholy with the acoustic guitar providing the musical accompaniment along with tribal drumming.

The title track somehow teased an instantly addictive melodic motif into a near 16-minute marathon of variations of a bass groove, lysergic organ runs with psych-soaked atmospheres and a hypnotic drum circle vibe. The track takes a good six minutes just to warm up before RIBEIRO unleashes her classic declarations in half spoken form seemingly having a conversation with Lemoine's stealthy bass workouts. RIBEIRO whips you into a frenzy as she sounds as if she's performing some kind of ritual or perhaps an exorcism of some sort as she brings back some of the more outrageous proclamations that made ''Âme Debout' so intense. Overall PAIX is a much less frantic release with RIBEIRO having chilled out a bit and finding clever ways to weave her lyrics and wordless utterances into the fabric of the instrumental interplay with remarkable elegance.

The closing 'Un Jour' La Mort' is a bonafide transcendental journey and in many ways the logical conclusion to the psychedelic hippie era having unfolded in its unadulterated natural purity. By opening with a layered atmospheric effect of swirling ambience and pointillistic guitar notes that hint at the melodic developments to come, the track is like a spiritual ride in the astral plane. The rather simple yet catchy melody oozes into the framework as a bass note adds the missing pieces. Around the four minute mark CATHERINE begins delivering a series of wordless vocals while the acoustic guitar and bass grooves accent her hippie chants. The music coalesces into a unique folk-infused gleeful tune with sing-along oooo's and aaaah's building up the momentum and a lead guitar lick transmogrifying the hippie folk into psychedelic space rock. The track showcases several motifs which excel in recurring themes and variations on those themes. The track climaxes with RIBEIRO delivering a frenzied almost psychotic series of screams while the musical build up leaves you with the most pleasant mix of organ, bass and guitar strumming.

While CATHERINE RIBEIRO + ALPES would follow PAIX with five more albums, this unique act would peak with this 1972 release in tandem with the previous album ''Âme Debout.' While this team would never create such majestic magic that rose so high seemingly to the stars, the band remained fairly consistent for the next few albums in staying true to its core values of melding its unique brand of avant-folk with psychedelic rock. What's cool about this album is that while most 60s psych bands totally reinvented themselves and strayed far from where they began their journey, CATHERINE RIBEIRO and her boys were very much still rooted to the idealisms of the hippie culture without having been derailed by the nihilism and reality checks that followed. Instead they fueled their stylistic approach ever so intensely and in the process refined the possibilities of their musical vision until it shined like a diamond. PAIX is without a doubt one of the most magnanimous expressions of free form musical expression coupled with catchy pop sensibilities, folk inspired melodic underpinnings and the excesses of progressive rock all wrapped up in pure psychedelic escapism. One of the best albums that the era had to offer period.

A brilliant record from Catherine Ribeiro & Alpes from 1972, "Paix" will take you on all sort of lovely journeys. You'll hear what a Cosmophone sounds like on the first track, "Roc Alpin", a sort of joyous and whimsical cross between a reed instrument and an organ in sound. In this first track, there are moments when you'll feel they channel a British psychedelia sound here reminiscent of Kaleidoscope.

"Jusqu'à Ce Que la Foce de T'Aimer Me Manque" is where the record really takes off. A lovely and moody pastoral folk prog with acoustic guitars, organ and synth like sounds emanating from the varied instruments. Ribeiro's vocals are stunning?lower in range than many female singers and this presents a dramatic haunting quality to it that is essential to the effectiveness of their sound for me. Her voice has texture and passion and a beautiful resonance?its presence is well felt, but never dominates the record.

The third track, "Paix" is a stunner?hypnotic and with a wonderful bass and organ melody over a sort of heartbeat-style drum pattern. The middle of the tune is rather chant-like before eventually returning to the main theme toward the end. You will feel you traveled to far out spaces on this one, and this is all before you flip the LP over for a side-long final track "Un Jour... la Mort". I hear some moments that remind me of Romania's Phoenix, or Sam Gopal?at other times Pink Floyd.

Although there is a variety of approaches they take in sound and songwriting on here, the record never feels like it lacks cohesiveness. They collage these sounds together wonderfully and are patient, not wanting to give up on a melody too quickly. The 2018 Universal Music France reissue LP sounds delightful, and any fan of psych-folk-prog and international rock should consider this essential listening. 4.5 stars.