Deep Forest
Comparsa

THE REVIEW

In recent decades, popular music, especially of the Western kind, has re-discovered archaic and ethnic rhythms and sounds, borrowing heavily from the traditions primarily of African, Asian, and Middle Eastern countries. In the '70s in our country, the group Aktuala, led by Walter Maioli, had already embarked on this direction ante-litteram, releasing albums that went unnoticed by most, but remain interesting even today.

Even international rock stars could not resist in the '80s and '90s the allure of Afghan flutes or Burundi drums, from Sting to Peter Gabriel, Paul Simon, and many others. Casting a pitying veil over commercial operations like that of Enigma, the group Deep Forest or, better said, the "duo" consisting of Eric Mouquet and Michel Sanchez, had the merit of dressing with ethnic and folkloric sounds tracks certainly of excellent compositional and arrangement quality. This "Comparsa" from 1997 envelops and fascinates our hearing with a multicolored sonic kaleidoscope; musical guests from all over the planet contribute their vocal and instrumental parts in a mix of refined and never banal moods and feelings.

Special guest in the piece "Deep Weather" is Joe Zawinul, who with his Korg Synthesizer, spreads pentatonic and hexatonic scales like colors on a sonic palette. Deep Forest reciprocate in the track "1716" dedicated to the band Weather Report. The singer Madame Sana at the age of 100, gives us the last vocal emotion before departing this earth in the track "Green and Blue", while Arab and Andalusian rhythms chase each other through evocative sampling and vocoder-filtered voices. An excellent work that struggles to age after 13 years, is that possible? A must-buy/have, even for the beautiful pop-up/disappearing package with Afro-Amazonian colors.