Les Quatre Directions

Dominique Grimaud
Les Quatre Directions
locust106
CD
2008-01-22

Dominique Grimaud is a hidden treasure of France's psych, free rock, electronic & jazz improv scenes. As a founding member of the legendary psych / krautrock inspired french act Camizole (1970 - 1978) to his equally inspired new wave duo Video-Aventures (1978-) whose groundbreaking music has been viewed as a precursor to the sound of Stereolab, and in more recent times, jaw droppingaudio visual performance installations & live performances with celebrated performer Colleen, Grimaud has spent his entire life exploring the musical fringes of the French underground.

With Les Quatre Directions, Grimaud reemerges with his first release in nearly a decade and it's a whirlwind mind altering long form of grand proportions that hearkens back tothe expanded audio visoneering & spiritualism of 60s electronic music luminaries from Stockhausen ttoRamon SSender. On Directions, Grimaud combines the other worldly synth effects of his moog, EMS Synthi AKS & Sequential Circuit Prophet and the hairy electric guitar bravado of his Fender strat with shamanic chanting, commune improv sessions with fellow travelers with odd acoustic instrumentation into a celestial homemade orchestra. Les Quatre Directions pays homage to the culture of the American Indians of the Great Plains, to theirrituals & their paintings. This culture is deeply rooted in the themes of the circle and the cardinal pointsthat they call the four winds. The whole piece evokes the outside world with the Four Elements : water,air, earth, fire and at the same time our inner world : heart, mind, body and spirit. Grimaud views Les Quatre Directions as four different paths in a person's life with his contradictions, his period of stagnation, and his return.

Reviews:

"Les Quatre Directions [The Four Directions] marks a comeback for French freak rock guru Dominique Grimaud. Surprisingly, it is also one of his finest hours of music. Conceived as a tribute to the Native American tribes that fought well, Les Quatre Directions is a continuous, hour-long piece. In this multitracked epic, Grimaud plays several guitars, analog keyboards, drums and percussion. Interspersed irregularly through the piece are the names of a dozen tribes, spoken by the musician. The quiet floor tom rumbles in the first few seconds of the piece and the freeform texture that ensues give the false impression that were are in for a long psychedelic jam, but the music is much more structured than that -- and carefully so. Inside the booklet is a graphic score of Les Quatre Directions, but it isn't clear whether the score was created before or after the piece. In any case, with Grimaud working in multitracking mode, Les Quatre Directions definitely features a certain level of organization and planning. It moves gently between introspective moments with soft drumming and subtle synth work, and much noisier sections with guitars and stacked synth sounds. Grimaud's choice of analog instruments opens up possible comparisons to the experimental fringe of ‘70s German free rock, but, again, this album is more organized than that and in a league of its own. A better comparison would be to Otomo Yoshihide's compositions for his Anode and Cathode projects, but in a psychedelic rock frame of mind instead of an electro-acoustic minimalism one. Sounds strange? Definitely, but it is also surprisingly convincing, and one mesmerizing hour-long head trip." - François Couture