The second LP from this Frenchman was his soundtrack to a 1962 film. Coïncidences is music of a broader narrative. Links, crossovers, connections between our lives, our technology and our ideas. Through a reduced lens Kartell has produced a sheer and stylistic record, one that finds incredible depth through a shallow selection of sounds.
La Jetée d’Orly, Franck Kartell’s second album on Bass Agenda, was one of my favourite LPs of last year. Out of, what seemed like, nowhere came a record that extended the electro formula into new arenas. Cold sci-fi chords, mechanical abstraction, winds and warmth swirled in a silver screen inspired LP. Bass Agenda knew the score then, and now; Kartell returns for a new album; Coïncidences.
The same distanced style, the same focus on the machine, of La Jetée d’Orly is explored in Coïncidences. And like its predecessor, this latest double LP journeys between future tundra and past abandonment. “Réactions En Chaine” is bitterly chilling, a clear winter’s night sky interrupted by thundering bass and shivering synthlines. The title piece brings a thaw. Sniping rhythms support arcing strings, brightness breaking in beautifully vivid bars. But the natural world is just one of the may themes given audio form in the awe of “Eternité” before being deflated in the skin crawling “Destin Ou Fatalité.” The collection has an incredibly wide scope, a sound that is achingly simple but layered into feats of complexity. “Providence” is steeped in a future gaze, a vision expanded into “Pressentiment” before being mocked in the wastelands of “Le Règne Du Chaos.”
The second LP from this Frenchman was his soundtrack to a 1962 film. Coïncidences is music of a broader narrative. Links, crossovers, connections between our lives, our technology and our ideas. Through a reduced lens Kartell has produced a sheer and stylistic record, one that finds incredible depth through a shallow selection of sounds. A collection that proves, once again, the caliber and quality of Franck Kartell.
Coïncidences is available on Bass Agenda.
