Animalé
by Vincent Liben

From MadhattanJack 01/07/2026 08:25 | #312496

Old-school French and Belgian pop music is often treated dismissively by music critics and other aficionados, because... I don't know, actually, maybe they've just never forgiven them for Johnny Halliday, Serge Gainsbourg and Jacques Brel. (Kind of a "triple threat," there.) But the fact is, those guys were supremely talented at what they were doing, and it's possible they even knew why they were doing it, too. Vincent Liben continues in that same tradition, only he has the benefit of having come along a bit later than those guys, so he has cool modern synthesizers and guitars and quality recording gear and he's listened to Nick Cave and New Order and all the rest of 'em. (He doesn't actually sound like them at all, but that's not necessarily bad.) Also, he's Belgian, not French, so he gets extra points. This LP is a fine effort, though it does fall off a bit after the (opening) title track. (Also, I suspect the accordions and melodions are used "ironically.")