Notes
I like FD Project. His music always flows with a harmony which the premise is a skillful dosage of guitars, as electric than acoustic, and synths whose oscillate between the territories of Berlin School, the new kind as the retro one, with a sweet ''Oldfieldian'' influence. On Heavensgate FD Project charm as ever, with a long magnificent epic track which worth itself the purchase of the CD. A true good old Berlin School well sequenced which FD Project throws between our ears and who thrones among a magnificent collection of titles all so harmoniously attractive. A slow droning shower opens Mandarinentraum (The dream of the Mandarin). The intro is spatial, with it's analog sound effects, under a fluty mellotron with a very Mergener-Weisser (Software) flavor. Quietly, Frank Dorittke, the man behind FD Project, immerses us in a sulphurous Berlin School post 70 with a crystal clear tone and a sequence to crystalline keys which turn delicately in a sea of synths to spectral breaths, wave-like and sharp. A hypnotic fantasia which is lulling in a cosmos to starry background filled of shooting streaks in order to fit a delicate rhythmic with a hopping keys sequencer. A bloody great track very well structured Mandarinentraum gets perfumes by ''Tangerine Dreamian'' several musical influences with puzzling rhythmic approaches, quite as we hear on Blue Planet. Approaches which destabilize the listener with unexpected rhythms, as we get around the 15th minute. A segment where the tempo is illuminating under good tam-tam percussions and a synth with sharp whistles. Constantly Mandarinentraum evolves on rhythms in constant permutation, but which overlap with subtlety, as rarely can offer a track that length without falling into some atonal sources. A magnificent piece where synths and guitars have a pleasant complicity, especially towards the finale with sequences to stunning inversions. Some very good Berlin School, Mandarinentraum is certainly one of the beautiful track written in 2008. Galaxy 2008 flows languishingly on a wavy mellotroned vocal and a beautiful line of bass. The tempo is pleasant and marries a sensual movement under a thick cloud of loopy guitar solos. A title of a delicious sweetness, quite as November Day and it's melancholic melody. Spaceball is for guitar fan. A heavy guitar which grips a cosmic serpentine intro, on good percussion strikes from where are winding good electric six-string solos. A guitar which becomes heavy and incisive, on a pounding pace hypnotically weighty coated with a zest of interstellar sound effects. Shy, Heavensgate (the title track) moves nervously, as a clock which looks for it's tick-tock, before taking the shape of a hooking sequenced nursery rhyme. A beautiful intro which engenders a rhythmic more supported with a guitar phase which hangs on ears to be in hiding there, as worm ear. Spectral does not betray it's naming with it's sinister mood on a hopping bass line. Fine keys hang on to this line, unwinding a melodious spectre which furrows a more robust movement, kissing a funky touch. Heaven Must Be Proud encloses this FD Project 6th opus of with a beautiful melody starring the fine voice of Brandon Michelle which sensualism and virginality are tying marvelously the laments of an electric guitar. Heavensgate got lost in the mazes of EM albums which abound in profusion in 2008. Nevertheless, it is one of the pearls of that year. A magnificent album which should parade among 2008 top ten. 2009. Sylvain Lupari / Guts Of Darkness.
