Monday, April 12, 2010

Bahamas - Le voyageur immobile (Fra 76)

I almost want to feature this just because of the cover. As I've said before these 70s albums are always worth checking out for their cover art-- the ingenuity and artistry that went into them is astounding. Nothing like today's stuff, although the alternative records from the 90s really came close with a very fresh spirit towards art. Here we have a beautiful homage to Rene Magritte, complementing the album's title.
A bit like countrymen Ocean's hard rock style with prog, on the dial going from jazz to rock to prog to chamber, it's a bit on the right side of the rock setting. The songwriting here is really masterful and interesting, sometimes achieving pop rock greatness with the basic rock quartet of bass drums guitar and piano, some really inventive guitar melodies are woven together with bashed out piano chords. Eerie synth figures occasionally make an appearance, but those are very lightly used unlike the traditional french sympho-prog.

The second song is the prog masterpiece, starting with an eerie scale on top of the classic augmented fourth that is so essential to this genre, it passes on to a more traditional rock composition soon enough but without leaving the progressive roots. The third song painfully reminds me of 10cc's big hit "I'm not in love," which because it came out in 1975, predates this album by a year. Same sustained major chord moving into its minor counterpart with long background curtains of vocals throughout. By mentioning this I hope I don't ruin it for anyone. Could be a coincidence, but 10cc's hit was a number one I think-- hold on, I'm probably wrong about that, please no comments.
Really enjoyable album with enough progressive to keep us happy, very much indebted to mid-70s rock-pop, sadly and unfairly forgotten. These are the songs that should be played on your local AM radio station, not more led zeppelin and "I've got a brand new pair of rollerskates". No tracklist, I apologize.

Motel...

16 comments:

Tristan Stefan said...

http://www.megaupload.com/?d=IIYWIS2F

Anonymous said...

Thank you very much!

Ben Sommer said...

That is a very interesting cover.

BillC said...

Tracks:
1. Jimmy
2. Motel
3. Norway Samba
4. Bahamas
5. Oscar Chesterfield
6. BIzarre
7. Il Pleut Des Fleurs Sur Mon Piano

Anonymous said...

new link

http://lix.in/-836c9a

Anonymous said...

Hello!
I can't make flameupload work.
Is it my fault or is the album no longer available?

Ps: Very nice collection!

isabelbc said...

hi Anonymous,

try it http://www.sendspace.com/file/h9rbsm

isabel :o)

Anonymous said...

Thank you, but it's not the album, it looks like a web site.

isabelbc said...

open http://www.sendspace.com/file/h9rbsm and click on orange button below

Anonymous said...

Thank you, but i wrote aboute the rar file. In this, there are few folders with pictures, html pages. Looks like a website that sells digital cameras. And the rar file is only 7.5 mo.
Excuse me to flood on this post, but i'm really interseted in this album, since i've heard Motors compilation (realeased in France a few weeks ago). There are 3 tracks of this album in it, and i found it very cool.

isabelbc said...

please, try this link http://flameupload.com/redirect/1EAHFLQU/2

isabelbc said...

or this http://hotfile.com/dl/39963491/77df979/Bahamas_-_Le_Voyageur_Immobile_76.rar.html

Anonymous said...

It works!
Thank you very much.

Harmonium said...

I remember this album! And if I remember well it is fantastic, very very seventies sounding.
Both hotfile and flameupload links are disabled.
Would you repost it?

isabelbc said...

new link http://netkups.com/?d=1f7de750ebf94

Harmonium said...

Thanks very much for the repost.
This blog is really fabulous!!!

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