Time for another message from the middle of the bottom with Canadian trio Dionée demonstrating that an almost intellectual musical curiosity combined with advanced artistic sentiments can take the listener for a walk on the existential side of the street. Their album “Mille-feuilles” may well have no particular place to go yet, as is often the case, the journey is more important than the destination.
Those unfamiliar with the many and myriad ways of the avant-garde may find the absence of recognisable elements such as the verse and the chorus somewhat off-putting but it is important to bear in mind that Dionée - Clarisse Bériault, Éric Normand and Robin Servant – are masters of their own inventions with the four, often rambling and always wordless, extemporisations in the key of life being designed – I would suppose – to induce a more internalised emotional state than the three minute pop song ever would. With that said, and while all that is here is fragmented with that appealing discontinuity so beloved of fans of the avant-garde, the result still has that coherence that comes with a concerted attempt to be different.
It would not be difficult to imagine these oboe and accordion decorated wanderings forming part of the soundtrack cues in an arthouse movie that, as a matter of course, has permanent subtitles and Dionée are just the kind of band to do such things as a matter of their course.