Orbe

I seriously wonder what a band name like Inhepsie (a weird written form for ineptie, French for ineptitude) is supposed to imply. Are the bandmembers suggesting their work is nothing but nonsense? Nonsense can be art, though, could have said Edward Lear (1812 – 1888) – you know, the man behind those hundreds of nonsense limericks. Lear had never taken himself too seriously. Now coming back to nowadays France, when one see Orbe is a concept album about nothing less than “the association of the seven human faculties with planets of the solar system and, figuratively, the circle the man describes around power and money” – I’m not kidding – one may suppose the two Inhepsie members do, indeed, take themselves a bit too seriously.

Artistic ambition may be a good thing, but when it borders on pretension... For which result, exactly? This release is flat. Lyrics, as expected, are little more than a necklace of platitudes about mankind, not even in a poetic fashion. The music could be summed up to a bland atmo-gothic background, with hints of metal here and there. Not that it’s unlistenable, far from this. The production is crystal clear, you may find several beautiful orchestrations, and the female singer has an interesting ethereal voice; however, in the end very little has stuck into the listener’s mind – apart from the fact the band is using a drum machine which stinks like a drum machine from ten miles away. Everything is far too soft, and after the sixth track the album begins to seriously draw circles, not unlike the solar system planets the songs are about, indeed.

All the more that, for a concept album, this one isn’t really well constructed. The songs could have been put in random order, the final effect would have been more or less the same. The long sixth track Sociabilité, for instance, would have worked as a closing song far better than the sluggish Reflet, which sounds more like another unnoticeable deep album track. The first track Volonté ends on a nice chanting flute theme, which will come back, with some variation, at the end of Sociabilité: well, this recurrent melody is just the best idea of the whole album, so why don’t you guys take it a little further? At least, simply sticking it again at the very end would have provided the work with a stronger architecture; instead, it just concludes on a pretty low note.

When it comes to the musicians there is, well, little to say, as everything here but the voice and guitars is synthetic. The already mentioned drum machine does little, and the little it does is rather annoying, the snare especially. The guitar only consists in elementary, long electric guitar chords, or not very intricate either acoustic trickles. Not a single solo, figure it out. The forefront is, indeed, monopolized by these keyboards, pianos, harpsichords, flutes, violins and cellos - I might forget some of these; and if musically what they play isn’t particularly BAD (nothing to do with the pompous sympho-pop crap of most orchestral bands there), what bugs me is none of them is REAL. Yes, Sir, samples only...

But after all, this album is nothing but naive, naivety can be charming, and Orbe undoubtedly has some charm. The voice in particular may not always be completely well-assured, however when it is it shows a kind of crystalline, angelic vibe, if you manage to pass through the silly lyrics (not a real problem, will you say, if you can’t understand French); anyway the fact a chick from my beautiful country can actually sing is rare enough to be underlined. Affectivité for instance is a beautiful track if one can ignore its artificiality, and the fact it isn’t exactly what I’d define as a metal tune. There is some majesty in the slow opener Volonté. The remaining tracks all have their highs and lows, the highs often consisting in sung vocals and melodies, the lows in some ridicule spoken vocals, or the really minimal guitars. Boy, girl, it’s supposed to be a metal album, isn’t it?

Highlights: Volonté, Affectivité