II

CD Info

2012
Self Released / France

9 Tracks

English Lyrics

It’s relatively rare to find a band that pretty much gets a unanimous positive response from the music reviewing crowd around the world on a regular basis. Especially when that band is female fronted. But, in my research, I’ve yet to hear anything remotely negative about this French Progressive trio. Funny thing is, the vast majority of the commentary regards the music, which is surprisingly large given the fact that only three people produce it and one of them is a vocalist. And yea, it is good, more than good in fact. But, much as I treasure that musical component, I find myself focusing at least as much on the story. We have an interesting bunch of musical reviewers here at Sonic Cathedral, most are very much into the art of writing, and are not limited in their interests to strictly musical topics. Sara Letourneau, for instance, is a published poet, and has a professional interest in writing in a corporate environment. Allyson Kenning is also a professional writer, as are others on staff. I, of course, am not; I’m the amateur of the bunch. But damn, I love a good story, as do we all. And delusion squared tells about as good a tale as you’re going to get in the progressive metal realm. I’m actually a little surprised you don’t see more about it in the reviews you find; they almost always focus almost entirely on the music. Well, we’ll talk about the music here as well, but I can’t ignore the story, or the deeper meanings behind the story. They’re just too interesting to ignore.

You kind of have to have some background to get into the second installment of the story presented on this release. You can get the short version of the first release here. It tells the story of a futuristic society that is run by the corporations with less than uplifting results. Kind of like our own direction in our own time, which is no accident, that was the intent. That story ends with the death of the woman responsible for regaining some sense of normality to mankind after the ruling elite hit the pike in an attempt to find greener pastures.

II begins at this point. The music is similar to the previous production, but a bit larger. Again we have three primary musicians although there is some limited background help. However, this is not music you can expect to see performed live any time soon. According to keyboard player Emmanuel de Saint Meen " We wanted this album to be more ‘dense’ in terms of melodies and sound. All the parts of songs that we judged boring after a month were cut or diminished. We also wrote more songs just to keep the best ones at the end. About mixing and mastering we defined the colour we wanted before starting...something like ‘In absentia’ for the richness of the harmonics but less compressed and produced. We also add intensity to choir and piano parts." I wouldn’t say it’s a dramatic departure from the first installment, but you do notice a difference. It’s a prog sound with instances of a heavy guitar but more typically what you get is a more melodic sound that serves to support the Lorraine Young vocals. Remember, it’s the story that is all important and we don’t let the music get too much in the way. Keyboards range from a piano sound to a synth approach, one that contributes significantly to the atmospheric setting that serves to set the tempo for the story.

I asked Emmanuel about the lack of label support. He responded that, although they have been approached by labels none had provided an offer that tempted them to sign. The labels aren’t what they use to be I guess, they certainly don’t seem to want to support production costs much and that may hurt here a little, I’d like to see more technical help with some components, the drums for instance. When all you have is three people, sometimes parts of the sound can suffer a little. The band seems to make up for this lack of percussion at times with a more base oriented sound, one that meshes with the keys and other guitars to provide a different interpretation to the prog metal sound.

Clearly, the tale is the focus with this production, although there is little to complain about with how that tale is told, the sound being masterful. This CD takes place centuries in the future when things have changed from the conditions described at the conclusion of the first CD. During that time, a religion builds based on the life of the "Mother". However, as is often the case with religion, the story and the message have been distorted and twisted, the truth is lost over the years and the current version of the story bears little resemblance to actual fact. Anyway, an accident releases the forces of the ancients and an army is produced to attack the human population. It gets a little technical here, but the long and the short of it is that the machines also develop a replicate of the "Mother". Initially, she has no understanding of how her original life unfolded and works with the attacking horde. However, as time passes, she slowly becomes aware of things from her human past. The humans refer to her as the Usurper. At one point, she enters one of the temples built to worship her legend. Her rage erupts as she begins to understand how her message has been used and she threatens the priests and novices who control the religious institutions. After a battle, she is finally overcome and thrown into a dungeon, still unknown to the people she once saved. From her dungeon, she tells the people they have turned away from her teachings, betrayed her vision and perverted her dream. And she tells them their doom is upon them. The CD concludes with the complete annihilation of the world at hand. Lyrically, we hear:

The CD is organized, as the last one was, into sections: Providence, Primordial Sin, Oblation, and Atonement. Each provides a focus to the individual tracks contained in those sections. And the tracks musically capture the focus of that part of the story. The first track is Double Vision and it doesn’t take long to get a feeling for how things will go, and sound. Other tracks utilize spoken vocal and a more atmospheric tone to continue the tale, Recipe for Disaster for instance. However, even here the multiple approaches to musical interpretation are featured, this one utilizing both the pounding guitars and the keys to focus the music.

It’s hard to get much better than this in the prog rock arena. The music is first rate, the story more than that. And, should the band eventually find a label to work with, I can only imagine how a third installment will sound. Until then, this is more than enough to help fill the time while waiting. Well done.

9.5 / 10

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