LA FÊTE SAUVAGE

The second act of the soundtracks for Frederic Rossif is quite different from the first. Instead of a collection of songs written to underline a specific moment of the documentary we have a single long track.

There are several different moments separated by spaces in any case.

The initial part is very 70s. The percussions and the mellow organ melody could be good for an erotic or a B-adventure movie of that age. It doesn't last too much. Suddenly a very evocative piece of jungle noises and tribal singing is backed out by a typical Vangelis keyboard work.

When the tribe stops singing we have a spacey keyboard over tribal percussions, then percussions alone then keyboard again. Vangelis may have said: "I give you a number of things. For your movie you can cut and paste"

But this is an album, too, so the main theme comes and goes several times to give it a structure and something "recognisable and distinctive" to the listener.

Another drop of silence and I see a dawn in Kenya or something similar. The "flute" solo with only percussions behind is one of the best moments of the album.

Silence again, just to make us aware that this is not a suite. It's effectively a soundtrack. And this tribal song seems to be just a recording. Nobody other than Vangelis is credited on this album but it doesn't seem that he's the one singing...

Another spacey moment comes, but the keyboards are always in the background. The slow percussions drive this part..

The A side is closed by the main theme again, but this time the sounds are more "usual". This is the most famous excerpt from the album. It continues for almost all the B side. When it stops there's a spacey section in the mood of Albedo 0.39. A sort of "Mare Tranquillitatis" without the French speaker. Another very good moment that last until the end with some returns of the main theme.

In brief the A side is tribal and made of recordings while the B side is a Vangelis suite. Spacey and newage oriented. The jazzy experiments of the first albums are gone. This is the starting of a new phase in Vangelis music that with high and low moments will lead to his most famous works.

The limit of this album is that the music has been extended, specially on the B side, to be able to fill a whole album. Fortunately it was the vinyl era. I can't imagine 40 minutes of filler music to fill a CD... Being most of the B side a filler and the A side good but made of recordings, I cant rate it 3 stars as I wish.

Nothing more than a collector's item.