MINDERGIFTIG

An apparent sequel to 'Schadelijik' in both sound and song content, things haven't sounded quite so dark for Sébastien Gramond before 'Mindergiftig', the French multi instrumentalist's 12th album. While much of the man's previous music was rather quirky and upbeat in its own way, 'Mindergiftig' makes no effort to cheer up the listener, instead drawing heavily upon Gothic and dark ambient influences to piece together this album. While a change of pace for such a prolific artist is always welcome, the music doesn't quite make for the best listen. Instead, what good musical ideas that are here are instead divided and held down by a great deal of less-inspired sections, and an approach to songwriting that generally lacks direction.

The two highlights to this album are the opener 'Insane' and the closer, entitled 'Schadelijik III'. These two songs make up the majority of my impression towards this album, with the middle parts feeling evermore forgettable. Firstly, 'Insane' begins with lo-fi howls, sounding almost like noise were it not for the creepy carnival organs driving things along. The music eventually degrades into an eerie jam of sorts, which can be hard to follow at times, but features enough strange effects to make for a somewhat interesting listen. 'Schadelijik III' on the other hand, follows the song suite that began with the 'Schadelijik' album. This time however, the sound is quite different, making ample use of electronic and trance music, although some scarce sections are recognizable from the earlier pieces.

The rest of the album is driven by guitar, and sometimes even the vocals of Gramond himself, which have certainly improved since he started recording, but are still somewhat weak. 'Simone' is quite a good guitar track, featuring great soloing from Gramond, and 'J'ai vu bouger la moquette' bears a stunning resemblance to the ethnic music of Senmuth, another highly prolific progressive artist.

This album unfortunately tends to be both listless and inconsistent, as it turns out. While there are indeed beautiful sections here and there and even some new emotional ground being covered by Gramond, the album feels more like a collection of half-baked songs than anything.