Le Noir Village by the French project Créatures is an unusual and ambitious album in numerous ways. Créatures is the solo project of a man who uses the name Sparda. The album (which is Créatures’ first full-length) tells the story of a twelfth-century countryside village that is attacked by terrifying monsters. As in an opera, all the characters in the story are enacted by different vocalists who act as first-person narrators to help tell the tale. The digipack version of the album will be accompanied by a 16-page booklet that includes, in addition to the cover painting by Simon Hervé, a different drawing in a medieval style for each of the album’s six songs along with the texts of this musical horror play.

But the album’s ambitions go further still. Sparda, who composed the music and also plays one of the vocal roles, performs not only guitars and bass but also piano, organ, ocarina, dung chen, singing bowls, gong, and the sounds of singing choirs. And he was aided in the production of the album not only by the 9 other vocal artists but also by other musicians (including drummer Ehrryk) who perform a further array of instruments that includes cello, violin, trumpet, darbuka, and more.

And if you’re not interested in hearing the music by now, that would be surprising. But what you hear may be even more surprising. We have the premiere of a shortened version of the album’s fourth track, “À l’orée du Mal, le Pacte“. Continue reading »