[Julien Demoulin & IA :: The Bay on Basses Frequences]—A cyberspace collaboration devoted to a real place. Julien Demoulin resides far from it in France while IA, making his recording debut, is right there in Oakland, California, breathing the same air that circulates over San Francisco Bay. A fog rolls off of it, and a bird´s eye view of the great big belly under the belt of the Golden Gate Bridge clears. The wind that blew away the fog gains in strength and carries in its tailwinds a deep, throaty string melody that slowly merges with the looped guitar following its wake. The draft calms to a breeze at it plays with a wind chime under the eaves of a porch overlooking the bay in the rain. The second, twenty-minute piece drones deeply, inflappably. Finally, a harp and a flute, as if softly alighting among the gentle folk of some Camelot.
The Bay is big and expansive and virtual. When I’m Gone is intimate and analogue and traditionally recorded and arranged between tight-knit familiars.
[Silencio :: When I’m Gone on Three:Four]—As Silencio, Demoulin has released three previous albums, in tandem with either Nicolas Lecocq, Bernold Delgoda or Lénina Epstein. When I´m Gone is a collection of wistful melodies played in a marginally melancholic mood by Demoulin and Lecocq on sythesizers, keyboards and guitars, with a little or a lot of help from the above mentioned and a handful of others. Solo violin and trumpet are especially nice touches, especially against the subdued, textured ambience the duo contrive. It’s an intimate album, which whispers stories in your ear, some grandiose, some tinged with nostalgic regret like “Wasted Youth.” “Taking Time” wanders absent-mindedly into a cozy electric guitar cul-de-sac. Arriving “Home,” the place feels familiar, restful and exotic all at once.
The Bay opens its arms wide to embrace a world, while When I’m Gone reaches over the table to reassuringly pat the hand of a friend.
Both releases are out now on Basses Frequences and Three:Four.
