Ex-Tension 2013
Catch 22
French polymath exercises contradiction in an attempt to harness elusive matters of the heart and mind.
Marcus Liñon might be firmly connected to MAGMA – as a son of the French legends’ singer Stella Vander and their light designer – but he doesn’t seem interested in Kobaïan adventures and explores domains that are closer to home when left to his own devices. And there are many of these, Marcus playing all the instruments and painting idiosyncratic pictures that are perfectly characterized by the tightly-wired sway of “Skyzophrenia,” a penultimate track on the garçon’s debut album which justifies its agenda with plaintive vocals set against the most versatile bedrock.
In a classic titular scenario, the artist’s approach feels self-defeating, so desperation hangs heavy in “A Man Like Me” in an alt-rock fashion, while the folk-kissed “We Are Life And Love” and “One Colour One Sound” pack hope and harmonies in a, well, catchy, scintillating strum. Modern-time blues it ain’t, though, and metal riffage often fails to dwell so organic in its midst as it is in the Gothic title cut or bouncy wail of “No Evil” where Liñon’s drumming shines brightly. “Third Eye” possesses the heftier clang than the tuneful gloom in the piano-rippled likes of “Willing And Able,” yet such a desire doesn’t require so much alienation. Let there be light where the catch is.
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