Sean Trane Even if One Shot’s second album is a live release (recorded on Friday 13th, 2001 in Macon, France), but it contains all-original material, so it should be regarded as a full-fledged album. Graced with a polar artwork and featuring the same line-up, this album was again a long-OOP private pressing, but is now again available through the Soleil Zeuhl label. What’s changed is the general sonic feel as this second effort is much more refined than their raw debut album, but you’ll be nowhere near the neo-prog production values either. Indeed, this Friday 13th remains a typical Zeuhl album, without any kind of compromises or concessions.

The opening two-part 20-mins+ I Had A Dream piece is demented track that might be a little too repetitive and overstay its welcome, despite an extremely complex rhythm pattern. For the rest of the album, OS delivers another batch of their dark and sombre soundscapes, between King Crimson and Magma, and on the more modern or lesser-known influences, one could mention Potemkine, Vortex, NeBeLNeST and a few more. The 9-mins No track is the jazziest track of them all, and I mean this in the “standard jazz” manner, because of the second part of the track’s solos are very much in that vein - and therefore less broody and menacing.. The following Wild Way is definitely the most-fusiony. Sooooo, you could say that One Shot sounds typically French prog, with some Zeuhl and fusion touches, induced by the pounding bass, but also the dark atmospheres of their music.

Personally, I do not find that Vendredi 13 is their better album and it should not serve as an intro (try the remastered debut or the latest Dark Shot), and might just be my least fave, but it is still an excellent Jazz-Zeuhl album, although there are albums much more urgent to discover before you get to this one.

Sean Trane Latest release (that I know of) from this French “Zeuhl” quartet, and a double disc affair: with one studio album (recorded over three months in early 08 in the Le Triton studio) and a live DVD of a concert, recorded early in that recording period over the adjoining concert hall. The still-unchanged line-up of OS delivers another batch of their dark and sombre instrumental soundscapes, between King Crimson and Magma or even Univers Zero, and on the more modern or lesser-known influences, one could mention Potemkine, Vortex, NeBeLNeST and a few more. Sooooo, you could say that One Shot sounds typically French prog, with some Zeuhl touches, induced by the pounding bass, but also the dark atmospheres of their music.

The DVD disc is made from one night’s concert, where the band was allowed to develop their musical realm, but they chose mostly to feature their in-progress work of the album they were busy with. Indeed only Ewaz Vader (from the album of the same name) and Urm (from Vendredi 13) were familiar to the small public, the rest of their set being from the Dark Shot studio album. As you can guess, the DS tracks are much rawer live than their final studio versions, but they’re already fairly close to their final version. As for EV and Urm, they sounded understandably more at ease with those older numbers. There is also a bonus live footage in the studio version of Blade (from their new album) and a two-part interview that is of relative interest. While all One Shot albums are fairly close sonically (especially with their first album recently remixed and remastered), this means that anyone of them could serve as an introduction to the band’s works since they are all representative of the band’s oeuvre, but if you’re going to chose just one, you might want to choose the present Dark Shot, precisely because you get a visual aperçu performance to complete the aural experience.

Sean Trane Third album from this French “Zeuhl” quartet (your basic instrumental prog quartet), one that got the help of the Triton association in Paris, released in 06 and that was distributed through the Musea label. The still-unchanged line-up of OS delivers another batch of their dark and sombre soundscapes, between King Crimson and Magma or even Univers Zero, and on the more modern or lesser-known influences, one could mention Potemkine, Vortex, NeBeLNeST and a few more. Sooooo, you could say that One Shot sounds typically French prog, with some Zeuhl touches, induced by the pounding bass, but also the dark atmospheres of their music.

The opening title track starts the album on a demented pace, but to be honest, it’s rather repetitive and overstays its welcome, despite being the shortest track on the disc. The following 15-mins Fat tracks offers an excellent intense ambiance, on that can remind some of the mid-70’s fusion (Borghi’s electric piano helps out a lot) before smlowly dying away in flurry of beauty. If the following I Had A Dream pt 3 & 4 (the continuation of the two tracks on the previous album) starts out smooth and almost ambient, it soon crescendos to an amazing 100 MPH. The closing Missing Imperator is McGaw’s first composition for the group since its origins, but it’s not like his “songwriting” differs much from the rest of the band.

BTW, I haven’t been able to view the famous bonus video that’s supposed to be on the disc, so I can’t comment on it, but it won’t change my outlook of the album, giving it an average One Shot rating, because EV is no better or worse than their other albums, just a bit of a return to their debut album’s newer version (remixed & remastered). Soooo it’s your call to see if you need all of the OS albums..

Sean Trane One Shot is one of those French Zeuhl band that benefits from a semi-legendary status, despite the band being only around for slightly more than a decade. The wild instrumental quartet (lead by American guitarist McGaw, keyboardist Borghi and bassist Bussonet) released their debut album in 99, and followed-up with two more albums throughout the next decade. As the title of the present disc might indicate, the present album is a re-melting of their debut album (the only available version nowadays), some ten years after its original version, because they thought that the recording process was somewhat perfectible, but it’s not like we’re about to get an over-produced and slickest album, quite the opposite..

OS’s instrumental soundscape is a typical Zeuhlian product, one that owes still to the Kobaian band, but clearly shows its personality. You will instantly recognize the French paw, despite a certain propensity of McGaw at splashing his incendiary guitar solos at the forefront. Aside McGaw’s guitar pyrotechnics, you can only be impressed at Bussonet’s pulsing bass and Borghi’s excellent Hammond and Rhodes exhibitions, while Jeandheur’s drumming is aptly responding at his musical pals’ adventures. Despite the renovation of the original recording, the album has kept a very immediate in-your-face almost-jammy rawness that characterizes One Shot, much of it, courtesy of McGaw’s bleeding guitar. Generally the music flies around the speed of sound, but there is a fairly welcome rest in the 10-mins with Un Jour Dans l’Est, where Borghi’s Rhodes reigns king above all, before Bussonet’s Riff Fantom just sends the album into Neptune’s orbit, especially with Jeandheur’s awesome drumming performance. Added as a bonus on this remixed, remastered and repackaged Reforged version of the album, Fleuve is a cool bonus track (a real one), but definitely jazzier and “cleaner” in terms of sonics.

Clearly Soleil Zeuhl’s captain Alain has again dropped a very timely bomb in the Zeuhl microcosm (he just stroke another major blow with the reissue of eider Stellaire’s debut album), but it’s not like the very-involved nature of One Shot’s Zeuhl music will draw big sales. Nothing to revolutionize the Zeuhlian world, but along with early Eskaton or Stellaire, this is the kind of album that perpetuates the legend of the genre, but beware that this gem is un-carved.