L'Orchestre Noir
Cantos

Year 1997: "Cantos" is released, the first official album under the name L'Orchestre Noir, the symphonic project of Sir Tony Wakeford (a project, in truth, active for a couple of years already, but only in a live dimension: an idea that germinated live, while Our Hero attempted on stage to present Sol Invictus' songs in a more pompously "orchestrated" form, making use of a real chamber ensemble).

Let's take a step back: the last work by Sol Invictus was "In the Rain," a significant album in Wakeford's career, as it consolidated the choral dimension of the project, which from the beginning had Wakeford himself firmly at the helm. Around the indisputable leader of the band, an agglomeration of musicians (often truly remarkable) developed, enriching the sparse sound of the origins. In other words, Sol Invictus was increasingly liberating itself from a setup still drawing significant inspiration from the industrial background, moving towards a more refined form of folk, indeed apocalyptic, but not in the sense popularized by the "frenemesis" Douglas P. with his Death in June. Where the old comrade-in-arms aimed at isolationism bordering on the pathological, Wakeford broadened his horizons, until he reached the symphonic music of his Black Orchestra.

"Cantos" thus opens a rift in Wakeford's career (not without significant consequences for the evolution of Sol Invictus, increasingly immersed in the context of a tragic chamber ensemble), capturing the spirit, the unmistakable poetics of the End of the mother band, to transmute them into dark symphonic music, an experiment already sketched out in Wakeford's two solo efforts in the nineties ("La Croix" and "Cupid & Death").

"Cantos" is primarily a "dark" work and should be traced back to this subculture, despite Wakeford's ambitions, who is probably an incurable romantic and a visionary genius, but certainly not a composer of classical music. Perhaps not even a musician, when you look closely, but Wakeford has a heart as big as the entire world, and his works, imperfect, limited, as puerile as they may seem, still shine with his personality, well describing his dramatic visions, vibrant with his existential unease.

"Cantos" is therefore a work of atmosphere that aims to outline the perimeter of a fantastic land where a tension is palpable that seems to be forgotten in the useless noise of the modern world: the distant howling of wolves, the drums of war rumbling preparing for legendary battles, the carts creaking under the immense weight of weapons, while the flags flutter battered by the cold wind, drenched by the first splashes of an imminent storm, with the sky gray, while silent lightning blinds for an instant the field where armies stiffen as time passes in a desolate calm that is the premise of their heroic death. In a corner of the painting, an ensemble of madmen weave solemn melodies led by the slow gestures of Eric Roger, right-hand man in this operation of Wakeford. The Frenchman Eric Roger, the sublime trumpeter Eric Roger, already known in the ranks of Sol Invictus, and a man of vast classical culture. But he will not be the only piece of Sol Invictus present: answering the call are the violin of Matt Howden and the angelic voices of Sarah Bradshaw and Sally Doherty, who over time would form the core of Sol Invictus's full maturity.

The impression that Wakeford has taken the infamous step longer than his leg is, however, glaring: purged in fact from the intense singer-songwriter breath of Wakeford that has always illuminated the limping path of Sol Invictus' apocalyptic folk, that of L'Orchestre Noir remains a music solely and exclusively evocative, full of the martiality, the desperate epicity, the dramatic pathos of the mother band, but nothing or little more, as if the dish served were a good side dish without the substance of the main course. The sumptuous arrangements of strings and winds that until then had enhanced the rough ballads of Sol Invictus, with difficulty seem to support themselves alone, and it is no coincidence that inevitably Wakeford finds himself forced to insert, as ghost songs (well hidden not to contaminate the "pure" nature of the concept underlying the project) two live tracks of Sol Invictus accompanied by L'Orchestre Noir to feed the most integralist fans.

Repetitive melodies devoid of significant flashes indeed go on to weigh down the static evolutions of a project advocating rather verbose music far from exciting, which in the end seems to have no other merit than to confer conceptual coherence on the discourse undertaken by Wakeford. Even if, in the final glimpse of the work, a couple of highly suggestive episodes cannot be ignored, and I refer to "The Lake of Bodies - Aqua Morta" (a sumptuous symphonic fresco dirtied by the arpeggios and gloomy electric tolls of Wakeford's guitar and bass) and the sublime "In Europa", sung by a magnificent Sally Doherty and rightfully ending among the classics of Sol Invictus of the era.

Needless to say: L'Orchestre Noir is a project that can only interest the most die-hard fans of Sol Invictus, and particularly those who loved and still love Tony Wakeford's indomitable battle in every facet on this world. For others, an album to do without with no qualms.