VANTAGE POINT

It is amazing to see all the fuss going on about this record (in Belgium). Always expected with great interest in their native country (which is incidently mine as well), their label (Universal) built a wall of silence about it, having the press signed an agreement to not publish any official interview with the band, before a certain fixed date (April 15th) threatening the ones who would do so with a 25,000 ? penalty! Fortunately, some will do break this "rule".

This will lead to a certain boycot of the press and to a lesser airing on the radios. A good reaction to this attitude IMO.

For the very time in their career, the line-up has stabilized, and this album is more the work of the whole than the one of Barman, their charismatic leader. He declared that he is very happy with this situation and hopes that the same group of people will be working together on their next release. It has been recorded in the "Vantage Point" (the new studio from the band, located in a part of Klaas Janzoons's house).

The band is extremely popular in Belgium. Their pre-festival tour is sold out and they will be the top of the bill of the Werchter festival (one of the major summer festival in Europe).

In terms of music, there isn't anything really new with this release. The band signs catchy compositions ("Favourite Game"), pleasant ballad ("Eternal Woman), some potential hits ("Slow" which has been released as a single), the hectic "The Architect" which could have been written by "Talking Heads" (as well released as a single, but in some European countries only).

Besides a more accessible and pop style, this album is not very different from some of their earlier releases. "Is A Robot" could have been featured on any "dEUS" album without any problem. But this is the problem.

The final part of this album is also less interesting. "Smokers Reflect" and the soft "The Vanishing Of Maria Schneider" are just average songs. IMO, this album is a non-event. Good at best but no more.

If I may suggest mijn landgenoote to go pay a visit to his ophthalmologist, because from his VP, the view is more blurred to him than anyone else. Yes Tom, your latest album is a catastrophe and easily the worst you've done so far. Whatever took you to make a "homage" to the worst decade in music, the 80's, I don't k now, but I suggest you snap out of such ideas and return to being yourself and make more of those great albums. Unfortunately Barman seems intent on keeping a stable line-up (the same as on Pocket Revolution) and allows them to implicating them in the creative process, which according to this album is not a goof thing

Actually VP starts out honestly enough on maybe its best track, When She Comes Down, probably the most 90's alternative-rock-sounding track on the album and the urgent Your God, the liveliest and raunchier, and maybe (?) a mellotron in the back. Unfortunately for the dEUSheads, that about it: most of the rest of the tracks are sounding like a lame U2 (Eternal Woman, Slow), or double Duran (Architect) and just about every song in its middle section either derivative or wearing its influences too openly. But one thing is sure: it's hard to believe we are on a dEUS album. The album closes on a slightly more interesting track (string arrangement & glockenspiel) Popular Culture

Soooooo hopefully dEUS has finished its slide downwards ever since it came back from its almost three year break, but somehow I'm afraid not. It might seem easy, but this album is about as bland as its booklet artwork