L'OCÉAN

L'Océan was recorded and published in 1989. It came out before the live album Tokyo, c'est Fini - Live in Japan. L'Océan was so successful in Japan that the band (or rather Chris Beya who is in command) decided to make a live album from a concert in Tokyo, obviously to cash in their oriental success. However, in Europe it didn't become a hit, fortunately or unfortunately accordingly. As you can see from the track listing, what you have are popish songs but not popish enough to be commercial if you see what I mean. The long weird tracks in the earlier albums are long gone. The songs are very melodic, a mix of prog and pop, a bit like Mike Oldfield and his less progressive albums. The singer sounds like Balavoine, a successful French singer. There is one pretty good track that stands out in the progressive vein and that is Métamorphose which is unfortunately and incredibly cut on the album ! You can find the complete version of this track on a compilation by Musea called Enchantement. This track alone makes the compilation a must have. So, overall, for fans only. I did hesitate with 1 star but I like the songs !

Atoll took an extremely long break (ten years since their last studio album "Rock Puzzle" and this one). The line-up has been fully changed. The only founding member that's left is Christian Beya.

I have been rather indulgent with "Atoll" so far except with "L' Araignée Mal" (bizarrely I rated it only with three stars). But this time, I have to say that this album is extremely poor. French pop music. That's all what we'll get here. Here and there a good guitar solo ("Coup De Coeur", "Lune Noire" and especially "Hymne A Laïah") but the tendancy is not really prog any longer. Even on "Rock Puzzle" some songs were prog-oriented; but nothing as such here.

Only "Sarah/Odysée" is different. It's a classical instrumental track. But not really good, I'm afraid. And it is not the acoustic "Métamorphose" that will save this album either.

And what about the album cover ? Is this a joke ? Inspired from "Tales" (Yes), but really poorly designed. I guess that it is just normal : a poor cover for a poor album. One star.