CLOWNAGE: Trails (ALTERNATIVE ROCK): review / opinion to read on Music Waves

Honestly, I don't write laudatory reviews every day. Comments are often mixed, divided, the little pebble in the shoe, the problem of accuracy, of sound, of interpretation, the too blatant influences are so many defects too often met. Today, it is different. Clownage, a French band surrounded for this opus by Mike Major (At The Drive-In) and Charles de Schutter (Pleymo) presents us its second opus, sung in English: "Trails".

The evolution compared to their first effort is huge. The influences are wider (Foo Fighters, Queens Of The Stone Age or Biffy Clyro), the compositions turn out to be more efficient without ever falling into melodic or even structural easiness, the themes and musical themes matching and overlapping each other very often within the tracks. It is difficult to give an example on the scale of this album because the quality is almost constant, from the anthems cut for the stadiums ('Trail' or 'Apo') to a very wrought pop and full of subtlety ('U.K. or 'Soma') to more atypical tracks such as 'Tyson' which stands out by an incredible groove carried by samples of rap very well integrated to the music or 'Candles In The Berry' which is exemplified in what is close to a very mastered post-rock, all in finesse and based on a very intense crescendo. All this shows the extent of the talent of this young formation which assures in different styles from a piece to the other while having fun.

The arrangements are full and embellish the really wrought compositions. The verses and choruses are never taken again in the same way the ones after the others, a progression is made in each piece, filling up with more and more musical elements to give a very dense effect without being indigestible. Because each track turns out to be a real treat, it's simple, we never get bored. Be it the charming bass lines of Olivier Crescence, often coming with a light distortion, the guitars, efficient and melodic, the drum parts playing a lot on the toms and on various percussions or the voice of Jérôme Litré-Froment who is very brilliant all along this "Trails", all the elements fit perfectly to the various developed atmospheres.

With this second album, the four Frenchmen give birth to an extremely coherent record which does not suffer from any dead time. Having perfectly digested their influences, the members of Clownage have largely known how to renew themselves by offering us a music entirely devoted to its public, without any facility and without any digression of any kind. The French rock landscape is enriched by a mature formation to follow closely, because with an album of this kind, their future is looking bright. - Official website

CLOWNAGE

TRAILS

AUTRE LABEL

ALTERNATIVE ROCK