Fontaine Wallace - Le Projet (CD)

"The project is what everything remains in désordre"... with this chorus punchline, which is both slogan and program, Fontaine Wallace is back.
With their first album (2018), the band continued the magic and unique style of Superflu, Nicolas Falez's former band, with a still unmistakable vocal timbre, close and gentle. With Fontaine Wallace, the group dynamic is more palpable: the drums are handled by Ludovic Morillon (Prohibition, Valparaiso, Yann Tiersen...), who has now taken on a more prominent role, as are the skillfully arranged choruses of Cécile Beguery (bass) and Fabrice de Battista (keyboards).
For its second album, Le Projet, the Parisian quartet has written ten new songs that more than confirm this attempt and are undoubtedly among the most mature and moving songs in Nicolas Falez's repertoire. A warm voice with precise and precious diction, slightly drawling, almost deaf, the complicit voice of a confidant who examines the ordinary with extraordinary acuity and speaks from the heart as others speak from the nose.
The author and narrator never takes center stage ("The weakness of my analyses / I have to spit out the cherries / and crack the cherry"), but right from the beginning of the album, it's clear that the situations are always described with remarkable precision and eloquence. Falez is unsurpassed in his ability to describe the world's great movements with the small movements of the heart, bringing the universal into dialogue with the intimate ("Au crépuscule de l'homme blanc / est-ce que tu veux encore de moi?"). It's also very much about losing (Tu débarques avec la nuit) and getting lost (Dédalus), about hidden treasures and (re)discoveries. It's also about aging, about resignation and acceptance, about regret and the occasionally soothing power of memories.
And even though several pieces sound like lessons in humility ("Towards the end of the day / all I could do / was this ridiculous memorial", "The most beautiful thing I did / was the unnecessary"), they are lessons received that were never given, and in this respect the spirit of Leonard Cohen is never far away.
Behind these rainy narratives and poetic confessions lies a band at the height of their art, equally at home in the practice of the syncopated pop song (Point Polka) and the Lynchian road trip (Fougère). An album in which doubt triumphs over certainties, fragility over boasting, and instability is tamed rather than subdued.

1. The project
2. The Hidden Love Song
3. Finishing systems
4. Point Polka
5. You set sail at night
6. Dedalus
7. Under the radar
8. Take care of your love
9. Fougère
10. Other words