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oG Musique - Water Birds CD (album) cover


oG Musique

Crossover Prog

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Eclectic Team
5 stars "oG Musique" is a Crossover Prog project from Belgium founded by a man who wants to keep a low profile, so there is very little information about him or the people involved in the making of the albums. Six studio albums have been released since 2009, the sixth one being called "Water Birds" which was released in June of 2019. The album has 14 tracks which span a total run time of just over 42 minutes, so the tracks are mostly short. The line-up for this album consists of oG on bass, guitars, sitar, steel guitar, piano, synth , organ and vocals; JP Gerard on organ for many of the tracks and guitar on track 5; Quanah Zimmerman on electric guitar, Will Z. on percussion and Alice Artaud on vocals.

The album starts off with one of the longer tracks at almost 5 minutes, "Insects Generated By Plants". The music is a swirling of chimes, synths, and nice effects, plus various other instruments. It is a symphony of spacey and textural sounds and music that flows beautifully under a synth pattern and free-melody. It is a beautiful beginning, one that immerses and transports you to a textural world built upon musical sounds and tonal architecture. "The Pyrallis" has a generated rhythmic pattern that is upbeat and a rolling synth playing in a low register while chords and shimmering sounds surround it. The song builds to a thick wall of sound by the end. "The Golden Fruit" has a soft guitar pattern that is more melodic with support from more synths and wordless vocals. "The Mermecolion" has a moderate rhythm with a chunky bass that churns along heavily while light notes sparkle from the synths and spacey, warbling effects play on the fringe of it all. "The Arimaspians" has a distinct start/stop guitar pattern that creates it's own rhythm while percussion, high chimes and more spacey synths play around the pattern.

So far, this is quite a pleasant collection of smartly thought out soundscape nuggets that take you quickly from one distinct style to another. "The Gold Bee" has a ticking, percussive sound with melodic keys and supported by tonal effects. Listening closely, you can hear the steel guitar in the background and more clicking percussive noises begin later. "Griffins" has a more persistent and distinct rhythm and the music is more pronounced with a heavy bass, guitars and synth passages. A standard melody seems to be on the brink of this track, but other than some passing riffs, it never gets to that point. Still, as is all the music here, it is captivating and nice. "The Blemmyae" has fast moving synth lines providing a bass pattern and other tonal sounds with a strange almost vocal quality to the dissonant chords from the guitar and metallic clanging. There are quite a few layers to pick out here, and they all get more intense as the track continues.

"Perytons" is suddenly quite heavy with hard guitars playing a repeating riff and guitars chiming over the top of the pattern. A shuffling percussive sound builds the intensity a bit and then it returns to the original pattern and melody. "The Kraken" fades in while the previous track fades out, and it is also more guitar based, but with a fast, somewhat subdued drumming effect, probably electronically produced. Various guitars and synths shimmer and sparkle along while the rhythm persists and spacey vibes and squealing guitars give it all a psychedelic feel. A crashing cymbal brings in more intensity and the groove turns it into an almost toe-tapper. "Hydra" breaks down the happiness of the previous track with a dissonant clanging passage and strange wordless vocal sounds with a track that sounds like an unpleasant procession of some kind. This is quite a contrast to the previous track.

"Hyperborean Frogs" is the longest track on the album at almost 7 minutes. Strange guitar and synth effects subtly create a strange atmosphere with a organ that sounds like something from Pink Floyd's early psychedelic meanderings. The bassey guitar provide the image of chaotic frogs and a higher guitar brings up images of frogs hopping around while the sparse organ holds it all together as it meanders along. It all has a strangely pastoral feel to it, but there is nothing normal about the music going on here, but it is definitely psychedelic and without any kind of standard melody as it all seems improvised. This is definitely inspired by Pink Floyd's early work and could have easily fit on "Ummagumma". "The All Ears" takes over as the previous track flow into it with a high pitched tone and then some cool effects, probably created by processed churning guitar, make for some interesting sounds. Later, on top of this, chiming, single notes from the guitar create a melodic line. Very cool. "Water Birds" ends the album with water effects and a steel guitar playing a mournful, yet lovely melody, again with a nice Pink Floyd sound that resolves everything on the album, the dissonant passages and odd effects. Then, a nice wordless vocal comes in over it all while the steel guitar continues. Beautiful ending to a very dynamic and variant journey.

I absolutely love this. The album takes you through several styles and textural pieces, never resting too long on any of the soundscapes, but developing everything enough to not sound choppy or disjointed as one might expect with so many short tracks. The music is gorgeous, ugly, strange, lovely, melodic and non-melodic, but it all wonderfully ties together with the final track. This is one that must be heard in it's entirety, because it all fits together. I know a lot of people may not be attracted to it's experimental feel, but it is really easy to listen to since it flows along so well. This is probably one of the most inventive albums I have heard by a band labeled as being Crossover, because this album probably fits better in the Avant-prog category, but then it does wander to different styles, so who knows, maybe that is why it is Crossover because it does cross into different territories. But it all flows so beautifully. I have to say that this is a masterpiece, but it may not appeal to everyone as it definitely is not standard material by any means. It is excellent, dynamic, inventive and immersive and I can easily give it 5 stars. One of the best this year for sure.

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Posted Wednesday, June 5, 2019 | Review Permalink

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