TÉO & TÉA

Since the release of the excellent "Oxygene 7-13" album in 1997, Jean-Michel Jarre has tried to experiment with other styles for his albums; "Metamorphoses" had the more commercial approach but still remained good and it had the Jarre feeling to it, "Sessions 2000" was more experimental and dealed with moody ambient jazz tendencies and "Geometry of Love" was a mix of those two again. All those were fairly good albums, but for this new release, Jarre has yet again found a new style but this time it wasn't so succsseful to my ears. Being that Jean-Michel Jarre fan that I am, I was pleasantly surprised when I heard that he got a new album ready for release this year (2007). After several months of waiting for it to be released, I got it about a week after it's release date and was really exited when I first putted it in my CD player and pressed 'play' and expected an album in the same experimental/ambient fashion of his two previous albums, but it really didn't turn out the way I hoped for. Now, let me explain why..

"Teo & Tea" is basically a dance/house album with a slight dose of JMJ's older styling mixed in at a few places. Why he releases an album like this is beyond my understanding, and it surely was disappointing to me as this has nothing to do with the Jarre I knew and loved. Songs are basic dance tunes with few progressions and the melodies are quite typical unfortunately. Taking for what it is, it's really not that bad though, and it has some fine moments featured on it but the rest isn't impressive at all, just ordinary dance tracks. However, Jarre manage to create the melodies with a good harmony to them and they results as far more intelligent than many other dance artists works, and the production is clear and bombastic. Yet, these facts doesn't really save it though and overall I could only recommend it to collectors and/or fans only. I hope Jarre will turn away from this style and start making albums in a more 'classic' Jarre style like masterworks such as "Equinoxe" or "Chronologie". On the other hand, you can never predict this man, but we are allowed to hope aren't we..?

To look to anything prog here is quite an achievement. The stuff recorded here is plain boredom from start to finish. Poor electro-beat from the eighties; released in 2007. What's the point? I don't know. To me, this album is totally useless.

Not a single track is really worth a listening. At least from a prog angle. Awful dance stuff all the way through: this is the offering. I have reviewed most of JMJ studio albums, and even if none has reached the masterpiece status in my books; most of them where quite good as far as I am concerned.

This album is a total disillusion. No use to depict each "song" from this album. They sound all equally poor. Forget this one, really. A long "press next" story: from the first to the last track.

One star is the verdict. A total musical desert I'm afraid. Only "Melancholic Rodeo" is decent.