Ulan Bator
Nouvel Air

It is a shame that, with everything released in 2003, the album reviewed here risks going unnoticed. Truly a shame because this is one of the most beautiful albums I have listened to so far.

The Italian/French band leaves aside the austere sounds that characterized their previous work ("Ego: Echo") and presents us their masterpiece; an album so profound it leaves you breathless, gives you chills down your spine, an avant-pop album, dark yet bright, enveloping, passionate.

The opening "Airlines", for example, is warm like the wind that can blow during an August sunset, with those initial guitars that seem like a fine summer drizzle. Or "Merci X Faveur", my favorite, slow, sinuous, and then it grows, grows and grows; incredible. "Terrorisme Erotique", as the title itself suggests, is pure eroticism in music, to be listened to in the evening lying in bed with your lover close by.

Amaury Cambuzat with that voice that almost seems to whisper the words of the lyrics, in French, creates a unique intimacy with the listener, and Egle Sommacal's guitars (formerly of Massimo Volume) draw crystalline and alluring patterns. In other instances, we admire intrusions of violins, hammond, rhodes, and various winds. Finally, in the last track, "Predications", Robin Guthrie (formerly of Cocteau Twins) also participates and took care of mixing this masterpiece of this Italian/French group called Ulan Bator. Truly a shame to ignore it.