A more down to earth Clearlight
BENJAMIN MILER | Veneta, Oregon | 05/15/2006
(4 out of 5 stars)
"Les Contes du Singe Fou is the third album by Clearlight (fourth, if you want to include the excellent Delired Cameleon Family album). The band was no longer recording for Virgin and now recording for a French RCA subsidiary called Isadora. This album was recorded in late 1976 and presumably released the following year, 1977 (the LP gives a 1976 copyright, although the album was recorded in November '76 and mixed in December '76, which meant it was unlikely the album was released before the year was over, unless it was released within days of the final mixing). Clearlight certainly went the other direction of many of their prog contemporaries of the late '70s. While a band like Eloy started relying much more heavily on synthesizers than ever before (with albums like Dawn and Ocean), Clearlight cut back on the synthesizers, mostly just the occasional synth effects from Tim Blake or some minor use of ARP Odyssey. This album was very much dominated by Cyrille Verdeaux's piano. The Clearlight lineup this time included Verdeaux (of course), Tim Blake, bassist Joel Dugrenot, guitarist Yves Chouard, drummer Serge Aouzi, keyboardist Francis Mandin, and violinist Didier Lockwood. With Christian Boule out of the picture, it's pretty obvious that Yves Chouard had his own style of guitar playing. Musically, the album has a more down-to-earth symphonic prog feel, with English vocals courtesy of Ian Bellamy of Zoo. Bellamy, because he was British born, meant you didn't have to face the problem of a non-English speaker attempting to sing in English (unlike many of the German prog bands of the time). Instead of the Gong or Hillage comparisons, this album got frequently compared to Yes or Genesis. Check out the vocal passages on the side-length "Time Skater" which bears more than an uncanny resemblance to "Supper's Ready", but you'll find out, aside from this vocal passage, is not a total clone of that epic, especially the extended piano and violin passages (the band knew they could never top off "Supper's Ready" as that is regarded as one of prog rock's crowning glories, and for good reason, it's darn near impossible to surpass that piece). "Soliloque" features some really nice piano playing, before Didier Lockwood gives us a violin solo. "The Key" is a three movement suite, starting first with vocals, then comes "A Trip to the Orient", which features some truly unique piano playing, some Asian influences and some fusion tendencies. And then the piece ends pretty much more or less as it started, with the vocals.
Check out the cover: the back cover shows Cyrille Verdeaux as a chimpanzee (in a female body) hanging on a moon's crescent, with his feet holding the Earth.
Maybe not the best place to start if you're new to Clearlight (go for Clearlight Symphony and Forever Blowing Bubbles first, and also get the Delired Cameleon Family album as well), but it's still worth having, just be warned: it's not as so spacy."
