Lion Prod.
Ilous & Decuyper (F,1971)***°
This duo made this studio based album with the help of some session musicians from Jacques Dutronc (Dutronc is/was a popular mainstream rock chansonnier), which includes guitarist Jean-Pierre Alarcen, -someone who also received fame in the collectors world in the group Sandrose-. The group had all the time they needed and had the disposal of a great major studio (Vogue). This important element resulted in a perfect and subtle rather quiet sound, with fine musical arrangements and lots of attention to -lots of- vocal harmony layers. This made their album sound closer to the more pastoral examples of which there are some more popular examples in Quebec (Harmonium, Cano). (For France this was an approach which didn't happen so often). These subtle sound arrangements were difficult to perform live, so the group depended on the idea this was a studio project mostly. Even when their album sold about 12,000 copies the label didn’t find that sufficient enough to provide them the chance for a second album. I’m glad to see how nowadays many more labels (like Lion Prod.) take the chance to survive with idealism with a relatively small income, but I can imagine that in this case a more expensive studio project had to be ensured.
Most tracks were French songs or instrumentals with a certain openness to innovation, and with little drums (guitars and piano, vocal harmonies mostly) and with a certain delicacy. Two songs were in English on which their “Eleonor Rigby” (Beatles) is a great interpretation. It sounds at first as if it’s interpreted as a traditional into rock territory, and then gets a great ‘70s guitar improvisation to it (by Alarcen).
This is a limited edition of 500 with extensive background biographical notes and rare pictures. The extra single which the duo made after the album had the same quality and ideas in arrangements. It also fits well, and makes the album more complete.
Audio : ?
