'Sadness'
NERIS RECORDS
The sophomore outing
for Ludovic Dhenry, AKA Exponentia, is a blend of gothic and
classical music. It's something that is often attempted but very
rarely achieved, especially on shoestring budgets. The lack of
classically trained session musicians mean that many artists opt for
the synthesized sounds, and lets face it, if you're not using top end
hardware or software it never sounds as good as it would with the
real instruments. And yes, this is a reoccurring problem with
Exponentia as well. But there are some interesting and redeeming
factors to the album.
Firstly, Dhenry is a
pretty good composer. Despite the fact that many tracks sound as
though they've been pulled from a 90s Playstation RPG soundtrack,
they are actually very atmospheric and evocative. Secondly, when the
formula is a little more striped back and minimal in its approach it
is incredibly haunting, especially when coupled with Dehenry's
Gregorian chant style vocals.
Tracks such as 'The
Wind Takes Its Life', 'The River Of Your Soul', 'Sadness – Part 2',
'A Shadow Smooths' and 'Finale' are all based around warm, hanging
strings with notes flowing into each other smoothly. Sometimes there
is a minimal beat, or a strange vocal section or even a juxtaposition
of more modern electronic sounds. But they all work really well.
What lets the album
down is the use of the wind and choir sounds, which just make the
whole album sound dated and low-fi. It's a shame though, because if
you listen past these things, the actual compositions are good.
'Sadness' is a very
“bare-bones” affair, sounding more like a composer's private demo
tape rather than a finished piece. But the fundamentals are
undeniably present, and even in this form there are some strong
tracks that still work. If you were to let Dhenry into a studio with
half a dozen classically trained musicians, the end result would
no-doubt be stunning.