PRÉSAGES

The music on French progrock band NEMO's second CD entitled "Présages" is an exciting progressive blend of metal, jazz, rock, symphonic and classic. In my opinion this formation sounds as innovative as RUSH did from their album "Caress of Steel", even their guitarplayer has the same inventive and varied sound as Alex Lifeson. The five alternating and dynamic compositions contain lots of captivating breaks and many changes of rhythm and atmosphere. Most of the music is based upon an adventurous, jazzy sounding rhythm- section, a harder-edged guitar and varied keyboards. The interplay between guitar and keyboards is amazing: bombastic with howling guitar and orchestral keyboards, swinging with acoustic guitar and jazzy piano (Chick Corea meets John McLaughlin) or symphonic with heavy guitar-riffs and flashing, very spectacular synthesizer solos. The French vocals sound convincing, this man has a wide range but his role is a bit limited, many parts of this CD are instrumental with lots of biting electric guitarsolos, sparkling pianoplay and even some marimba on two songs.

Nemo is a french band who has almost 10 years in prog field, and by now in this moment they are a very strong band who captures all the best from the old school in their music. Clearly influenced by Rush but even in places I trace some Tiles elements, Nemo's second album - Pressage from 2003 is a very exciting piece of work, realy, not very often I have the chance to listen to such compact, tight and in the same time very original and intristing music. They realy done it with this album, extremly well crafted musicians delivering some very strong moments, the instrumental passages are long and very challenging , and never boring, with each piece you descover that Nemo is among the best in this zone. Nemo combines very well symphonic elements with a lot of heavy prog arrangements a la Rush and Tiles but also some jazz interplays here and there. The time signatures are impressive with a lots of breaks and changes in rythm. First time I've listen to this album I was impressed specially by one thing , the duel between guitar of Jean Pierre Louveton (who also done the vocal parts) and the magnificient Guillaume Fontaine the keyboard player, the interplay between these two guys is mindblowing, intelligent, and damn good all the way, they realy know to make an album shine all the way. Not to mention that the drumer Jean Baptiste Itier and bass player Benoit Gaignon made a solid rythm section hard to beat even by well known bands. As a whole this album kick ass , and all the pieces are very strong. More than half of the album is instrumental, this is another thing worth mentioning because these guys realy knows to handle the instruments in such way to make almost a masterpiece of an album, and above all this is a young band with a great future in front of them. I will give this album 4 stars without hesitation, more like 4.5, a serious band for serious listners, recommended for sure.

Nemo is still a young band and the year is 2003. And all around this album - Présages - the second one for the band - you can feel the potential of that band. Of course, this potential is yet to be revealed, but the provocation to the big bands has been sent from here (and maybe from the first album named - Les Nouveaux Mondes). But here we can find step forward made by Nemo. I strengthen my position that every next album of Nemo is stronger than the previous one. I'm not sure where they can measure up. Probably among the best progressive rock bands at the time and why not among the greatest of all time...

But that's enough for commonly opinions by me. Especially for Présages I want to say, if you hear this album first you can find it as perfect as everything else, but it contains some flaws. I can't rank it like the later efforts by the band. Some repetitions, some amateur-sounding moments, some weak vocal passages, some simple ideas make this album good and a quarter!

Nemo's second album, Presages continues in the same vein as their debut, released the previous year in 2002. Nemo combine elements of symphonic prog, heavy rock and occasional jazzy moments into complex and inventive compositions with plenty of space for long instrumental sections between the French sung vocals.

In J P Louveton they have a guitarist who's both technically proficient and inventive with it; never overplaying for the sake of it but unleashing fiery lead runs and laying down heavy riffs where required. The rest of the band are no slouches either - an incredibly tight rhythm section twist and turn through the complexities of the compositions overlaid with dextrous keyboard work.

While Presages presents a slightly more mature writing style to Les Nouveaux Mondes what it lacks is some of the hooks of that debut. Nevertheless, there's still plenty to get your teeth into on the dynamic and ever shifting compositions with some exciting moments of instrumental interplay. There are however moments of instrumental noodling that lack direction and loose my interest but these are thankfully few and far between.

Overall a very good second effort, that falls a little short of 4 stars, so let's settle for 3 ½.

Despite a rather directionless and confusing sound, ''Les nouveaux mondes'' received some positive reviews worldwide and strengthened the motivation of Nemo to record instantly a second album.Original drummer Pascal Bertrand though would not be part of these sessions, he was replaced by newcomer Jean-Baptiste Itier.The album, which would be named ''Presages'', failed to attract the major prog labels and once more the French band decided to produce it by itself, this one found its way to the market in October 2003.

There still are some questionable choices and ideas in ''Presages'', but this time the group appears to have grown compositionwise in a work, that contains over 60 minutes of music condensed in five tracks, four of which are over 10 minutes.Fans of modern Progressive Rock won't be dissapointed.Nemo play a mix of hard-beating guitar riffs, Fusion keyboards, orchestral textures and Neo-Classical orientations, drawing inspiration from French Prog ala ANGE and ATOLL, Progressive Metal in the vein of DREAM THEATER and SYMPHONY X, and modern PORCUPINE TREE-like Prog Rock, maybe colored with some Neo Prog flourishes in the process.The music is emphatic, rich and powerful, ranging from symphonic moves to heavy, pounding guitar leads, passing often through virtuosic keyboard solos and melodic themes, while the atmosphere tends to be dark and dramatic quite often.The influence from the 70's French Prog scene becomes obvious in many of the lyrical moments of the album, which are very poetic and expressive, while the arrangements are pretty interesting with plenty of breaks, tempo changes and shifting moods.The last two pieces, each divided in several shorter movements, show Nemo at their most progressive.Here is where the band becomes very flexible, introducing quirky piano themes, acoustic guitars and straight, symphonic references to its music.The result is charming, full of sophisticated passages and clever switches into heavier territories, which can satisfy even a Prog Metal fan.

''Presages'' mark Nemo's right choice on developing well-composed, atmospheric and intense music.Heavy Prog with Classic French Prog and Fusion vibes, played with passion and enough talent.Warmly recommended.