French Zeuhl band Xalph (1974-1981)

PNF, April 2010:

Touchdown. We've landed on planet zeuhl.
Volcanic bass erupts in repetitive lava flows and atmospheric drones swirl in the dark and methaned scratchy air.
A dim dark sun, pregnant with red hydrogen, casts for radioactive nuclei in the brass rocks that pump up a strange and discordant, disharmonious wind, full of unfamiliar dreams and memories... Snatches of keys and chords break through the magmatic surface of this cratered planet, continental drift passes in fast-forward, thundering through hurricanes to a smashing closing... Far, far in the future, where we travel the galaxy clusters and walls and voids of deep space to eerie planets of ghostly life, gloriously insane, S. J. Gould Wonderful Life, our starship powered by the amplification of bass, drums and guitars, we discover a sonic boom that makes our long, long hair trail in the solar wind and cosmic rays...
An unknown masterpiece of this french style, released only on cassette, I think this should be ranked and evaluated next to the other musical masterpieces of the 20th century like The Rite of Spring or Prokofieff's ballets, studied in music schools and conservatories, the compositional quality is not inferior in any way. I hope I'm not the only one who will hold this opinion...
Actually the music is not as dissonantly difficult as Yog or Yochk'o or Shub, more similar to early Abus [Dangereux]or Eider [Stellaire].

From the (unofficial) CD information:

"In 1976 Christian Vander was very impressed by Xalph, enough to have them as support act for part of the winter Magma tour (Festival Utopia). The group came from Bordeaux and intended to produce their first LP on the Utopia label - they had a lot of original ideas and produced some fine music with a strong identity, but for some unaccountable reason their hopes were dashed. They had been expected to rise to the same level of esteem in European Music as Magma... Of course they were strongly influenced by the best of Vander's work and also by Mid-70's WEATHER REPORT, and were quite a success in the Bordeaux region but being so far away from Paris eventually led to their disbanding. No recordings were officially released until Musea put one track from a 1980 session on their 'Enneade' sampler album. Their original leader and sole composer was Jean-Pierre d'Aran who played electric guitar, sax, soprano sax and bass clarinet (phew!). The group's sound however was a collective affair, all the musicians playing an important part in the process. There was a slight predominance towards the keyboards of Serge Korjanevski who later took over control of the group before leaving to join UPPSALA. Another strong element in their music was the dual guitars of Francis Ferrere and Patrick Briand. A demo tape from the late seventies line-up exists (with Jean-Pierre Alcauve on bass and Xavier Jouvelet, drums) but not much else. Claire Laborde, the vocalist, later joined Magma briefly in 1980."

The idea that this music is from demo is astonishing to say the least.  I would go so far as to say that it's superior to Magma in the inventive, creative ingeniousness of the all-instrumental compositions, pretty much on the same plane as modern classical music as crafted / conceived in university post-graduate music studies, as enjoyable as the great Stravinsky at his best, if not more, bearing as it does all the technology of electric music.

So in the beginning there was a demo cassette, which was all we had.

Track 5 from that cassette always threw me into fits of unchemical ecstasy by the end due to the incredibly dramatic, almost novelistic way in which the musicians build up the intensity of the work using those 'throbbing' bass lines (the mandatory music-review cliche) and torrential electric guitar patterns smashing down like flaming sulphurous hail-balls on a distant planet, creating a storm that just sweeps me off my feet transporting me like insane-asylum-Dorothy into what can only be described as the Oz of musical heaven.  If you fast forward, which I don't recommend, at about the 5 minute mark after everyone has played out their solo, a sudden modulation leads to a different ostinato with a slower melody on top that finishes by crashing into some monumental octave bass notes that rise up like a mountain range at volcanic speeds like continental drift accelerated up to mach one, the speed of sound.  Incredible...





When I listen to music like that, I wonder almost to tears how the human mind can craft something so totally original and totally beautiful.

Then there appeared later a 2-CD set of demos. 

Track 3 from that mysterious set is highly reminiscent of Eskaton's most magnificent masterpiece, Les Quatre Visions:





Xalph of course also appeared in the Musea compilation Enneade along with some other unknowns that proved well worthy of unearthing.

I had no idea what was the provenance of that 2-CD set of demo performances, in fact I assumed it was an unofficial compilation of all their work known thus far, and super rare to boot.  But then, to my utter amazement, last year popped up another release by Xalph with extra tracks that had never before been heard from the earlier demo or CD demo compilation, databased here.  It's true that some of the recent LP tracks can be found mixed up on the old 2-CDs (the b side of it, I think).  Which makes me wonder if there are still more unreleased, unheard tracks from these formidable composers left to be discovered.

The one track that, again, blew me away like a handkerchief was the second called Les Soldats (i.e. soldiers):





When I played it for my wife, she asked, predictably, 'uh-- is that music?'
My answer: 'it's sheer brilliance that you can take an electric guitar and create sounds that are basically noise and that it functions, as music.'  In answer to which, as expected, she gave me that look of 'you're crazy.'

The whole track is unbelievable.  The chunky chord passage after the noisy intro gets even more confused (like an army in battle) and then suddenly retreats into a softer quieter passage that takes the song out, very anticlimactically, with the most incredible, unheard-of single-chord harmonies plus bizarre melodies.  Make no mistake.  This single piece is a musical masterpiece.
Compare it, straight up, with the first track of the recent Moodgraft, this one is head and (mutated) shoulders superior.

It's like music from another planet without a doubt.
But I welcome this invader like family into my home, into my ears.
Thank you Xalph.

Btw, I wanted to also quickly mention another rediscovered zeuhl band, completely unknown to everyone as far as I know, except me ;) which has resurfaced and is reviewed by Tom Hayes on rateyourmusic here.  They are called Evohe.  He's right on the money with what he wrote there and I strongly recommend everyone listen to these guys, they are not as tight as Xalph, more Magmaesque in their meanderings, but still really lovely for the zeuhl fan tired of all the oldsters like Dun and Zao.