EMMANUEL DILHAC-ENTRE OMBRE ET LUMIERE, LP, 1979, FRANCE

One of the cornerstone documents of French outsider musical thought also happens to be amongst the countercultural documents most lost to humanity, this LP being the sole copy that I've seen after all these years with my head buried in fringe collector esoterica. Though this dates from the late 70's, every detail here smacks of an earlier era of French rock radicalism, Dilhac's ground-leveling post May of '68 angle of approach frequently positioning the genre dissolve here much closer to the aesthetics of Futura label artists like Jef Gilson, Jean Guerin, Chene Noir or Mahogany Brain though for every shitstorm of avant strangeness that transpires (howling at the moon Living Theater cum AAO Kommune-style insanity, declamatory spieling and percussive clatter ala Francesco Curra or Giorgio Battistelli), there's an equal measure of sumptuous songcraft and artful arrangements, with everything from delicately shaded jazz moves ala the AAOC's backings for Brigitte Fontaine to emphatic folk glazed by halo-ing electronic susurrations.

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