Frant1c – A brand new World (2024)

For me the biggest musical surprise of last year was the album The Lightmaker by the French/English band Nine Skies and I dare say that my favourite song of all time, The Dreamer, is on this album. The keyboardist of this band is Anne-Claire Rallo and she has now released a kind of solo album with the intriguing name Frant1c, A brand new World. Before we go into this beautiful album, it is important to know that Anne-Claire's partner, the multi-instrumentalist Eric Bouillette, unfortunately passed away not too long ago from the consequences of that terrible disease, cancer. Why is this so important? Two reasons, the first is that on A brand new Day we can still enjoy a number of contributions from Eric on violin and guitar, but mainly because the story of this concept album shows clear parallels with the struggle that Anne-Claire is having with dealing with the new reality after the loss of her partner. She, too, has had to accept that a new world has arisen for her. This leads us to the story of the main character on this album, Charlie, performed by Martin Wilson and he does a really fantastic job. He suddenly wakes up in a kind of dystopian world in which he has to find his way and search for his former soulmate Hope, who parts are sung by Helen Tiron. So you see the comparison.

Are we dealing with some kind of musical-like swoon story? Hell no, musically the registers regularly open up completely and we hear ripping guitars and heavy menacing keyboards. But these are interspersed with more quiet, narrative passages and occasionally fantastic guitar solos from Nine Skies buddy Alexandre Lamia. Wow, this man can really play. Steve Anderson (Grey Lady Down, the Room) also delivers a very nice guitar solo in On the Run.

You really have to, yes it is a must, listen to this album in its entirety to be able to fully immerse yourself in the story and atmosphere. You'll be rewarded with one of the most beautiful albums of this year and that's quite a statement, right?

Anne-Claire is of course the composer and keyboard player, but I'm sure she's not upset when I say that the real goosebump moments come when Alexandre is allowed to add his masterful guitar solos. Listen to the longest, and most beautiful, song from the album The Ballad of Peggy Pratt. After a threatening, dark start with an outstanding Wilson, solid guitar chords ad a dramatic feeling  and the song goes into the next gear to return to the atmosphere of the beginning. Just when you think the end is coming, the minute-long guitar solo goes through marrow and bone and is sooooo beautiful. There is another excellent solo in Sweet Confusion by the way, another highlight song from the album. A new Path is quite heavy and has an Arena vibe about it, great track too.

Anne-Claire is very interested in literature and you can hear that in her lyrics which are very intelligent and creative and deal with all kinds of emotions that Charlie and Hope have to undergo but that all of us will recognize. Fear, love, desperation and written in a way that is very empathetic. For the whole story, you just have to listen to the album with the lyrics aside. The beautiful angelic voice of Helen is a great contrast with the emotional vocal parts of Wilson.

Don't expect dazzling and virtuoso keyboard solos, it's more about creating an oppressive and dark atmosphere with huge dynamics and Anne-Claire succeeds in this very well. As stated before, there is a big disadvantage if you only write a review after receiving the CD and then listening to it repeatedly on a nice headphone set, namely that a lot of reviews have already been published and they are all without exception very positive. You would almost think that there is nothing left to criticize about A brand new World, but is that really true? Well, maybe a few small things. For example, there are a few tracks that touch me less and in which the melody is sometimes a bit less smooth. The rather long spoken texts, which of course contribute to the story, could also be a bit shorter. Personally, I'm not too enthusiastic about the frantic saxophone solo in the otherwise beautiful song Where have you been? but that's just because of my antipathy towards wind instruments and especially saxophone. Oh yeah, a few more guitar solos would be nice, sorry, had to say this.

But I can't ignore it, this album is really, really good and will compete for the top position of my annual list. What is also very good is the production that has been done by none other than John Mitchell and thus quality is guaranteed. I am very sure that Eric would have been very, very proud of the total package that Anne-Claire has made together with her buddies from Nine Skies, drummer Johnny Marter and bassist Alexis Bietti are also participating. Somewhat trite, but Chapeau!

The cartoon-like cover is effective and especially the colour scheme is striking and it shows the main characters looking at a destroyed world.  The digi booklet in which the CD comes is very basic, which is not a problem for me but for some it may be. Rumour has it that a sequel is already in the works so I would say bring it on!

Music 90

Cover 75