j o e

Open letter to Christian Vander: What are you trying to do, blow my mind? After some twenty odd years, Magma is finally Hhaï (that means 'alive' in Magma-speak), and damn if you won't be high too after this soaking this one up. "Kohntarkosz Anteria," a lost opus written by Vander in 1974 and resurrected 3 decades later, boasts the best sound quality by far of any Magma studio album and my two favorite ingredients of the band, namely Christian Vander's unique drumming and the band's layered choral work, are front and center in the mix. The piece is broken into three parts, and all are amazing. "Part 1" orients the listener to the band's vocal style: the repetitive, phonemic chanting in the opening E minor segment; the resplendent, legato harmonies with an eagle's wing span half-way through; the erratic alarm-hiss ("Rui!") that follows directly upon that. If by the slim chance you were hearing this album as a Magma newbie, well...listening to "Part 1" tells you all you need to know within minutes: this is a rock band that sounds like no other. "Part 2" is arguably the most consistently great of the segments that comprise the album. After quoting the invocation chords of "Kohntarkösz," the first half of "Part 2" centers around a cheering chorus and 'verses' that to me conjure up images of a warm-blooded folk dance, like one might hear in Spain. It detours somewhere in the middle into a gliding jam led by a bluesy guitar solo and Vander channeling Elvin Jones. The second half of "Part 2," in considerable contrast, evokes a world of cool innocence. It sounds virtually like a carol heard at Christmas time, with the chorus' gentle vocals drifting down like snowflakes and Vander's ecstatic, foreshadowing proclamations of "Alleluia." Independently, the two halves of "Part 2" build until they have drowned the listener in a blissful, fathomless ocean of voices and harmonies. "Part 3" opens with a moody jam known among fans as "Om Zonka" (from its title on Inedits) and builds masterfully towards an awe-inducing climax: a mantra of protracting, spiraling, interrupted 'Alleluias' collapsing in upon itself. It is hard to listen to this — at once idiosyncratic, volatile, and with a universal power — and not feel viscerally shaken. In the spirit of balance, I will offer what I feel are two shortcomings, though these are both very minor. One is that the abrupt transition from "Part 2" to "Part 3" doesn't work for me, not flowing nearly as well as other transitions in the piece. I would have preferred if the end of the carol section just ended more naturally, perhaps with a quiet, tasteful fade-out if need be. Second, the keyboard-led "Om Zonka" jam is too subdued, never really going above a low-simmer. Fair enough, I suppose, because Magma's precedent has been to restrain themselves on their studio recordings and leave any jamming supernovas for live. Still, anyone who has seen them play this piece live knows what they can do in this section and I wish it came across more. Now, forget you read that last paragraph, because it is so rare to play a CD and know within several listens that you are listening to a destined classic. Let's hope Vander will continue with works of this quality, and a garland of umlauted Alleluias for him if so. In the meantime, get your hands on this disc. review by Joe McGlinchey — 4-4-05 —

b r a n d o n

This isn't supposed to happen. Any of it, really. A band that sings concept albums in a made-up, umlaut-dominated language about space and planets named Kobaïa and shit isn't supposed to be any good. And, most certainly, a band like that that hasn't released a full-length studio album since the early 1980s, and hasn't released one that was any good since the 1970s, isn't supposed to come back twenty-odd years later and release a brand new album that's any good. Much less one that's — hell — awesome. Which, let's face it, is what K.A, Magma's first full-length studio album since Merci, is. Granted, it's not precisely "new" material, since the composition was written in the 1970s right around Magma's classic period (and parts of it can be heard in different forms scattered across different albums, most notably Inedits). So there's nothing here that will surprise anyone that's familiar with Magma and Christian Vander — no shocking innovations or stylistic switchbacks. Instead, what we get is prime-period Magma in the style of the Theusz Hamtaakh trilogy that we know and love. It's a little ironic that many avant-prog fans hell-bent on listening to only the most cutting-edge rock music will celebrate this album despite its lack of innovation - which is either a testament to Magma's lasting talent and uniqueness or to the utter fanboyishness of its devoted following. Or both. Who cares? There's much to like in K.A — it combines the Theusz Hamtaakh-period style with a slight tinge of the gospel influence that dominated the band's later works, but to very nice effect. The centerpiece of the album is the choral work, which is usually melodic yet repetitive, by turns aggressive and beautiful, and often performed in maddeningly shifting time signatures. There are a couple slightly underwhelming solo spots — a guitar solo which is nice, but understated in the mix, and a keyboard solo which I could have done without. Otherwise, the melody instruments take a back seat to the vocals — and to Vander's drumming, which is stunning and head-turning as usual, but made even more so by the fact that you can actually hear it! Yes, that's right, K.A is perhaps the first Magma album ever that boasts excellent production. The sound is clear and clean, and Vander's drumming is properly set in the mix instead of muddied up and made all but indistinguishable as it has been in so many other albums. If K.A has a shortcoming, it's that it might be just a tad bit less aggressive and headstrong as Magma's classic period albums. The solo spots are a good example — they should absolutely burn, but they just sort of fade into the background. More prominently, the bass playing just doesn't have the consistent fury of Magma's late-70s years. And the gospel influence on the chants and vocals has a detrimental effect at times on their aggressiveness, although I don't mind the occasional emphasis of melody. Otherwise, my only nitpick is that the ending of Part 2 sounds rather contrived; it's the only place in the composition where the transition from one theme to another is jarring. But these are minor complaints, and irrelevant ones. It simply isn't particularly useful to compare Magma now to Magma then. In the end, the fact is that Magma have built such a legend in the progressive rock world that K.A is an event as much as a mere album release. Only the fact that it has been played live many times in recent years makes this event less monumental. Nevertheless, anyone with even a passing affinity for zeuhl has reason to rejoice. Especially since, as Christian Vander hints, the best is yet to come. For a band that's pushing 35, that's a hell of a thing to say, but I'm willing to happily go along for the ride. review by Brandon Wu — 12-7-04 —