21 Love Hotel - Extracts from Black Box and Other Stories

Tracklisting: 1. Ennui 2. Gabriella's Wings 3. Lonely Lady 4. X-Mas Night

Hypnotized, almost crying, moved; that's how I felt after listening to the 4 tracks of 21 Love Hotel's Extracts from Black Box and Other Stories... Nowadays, as purity and sensitivity seem to be buried under trash and mud, each lightning source is more than welcome, and this amazing and wonderful duet makes this tiny light shine to our eyes, bringing its melancholy and purity into our desperate hearts.

In order to explain how 21 Love Hotel are able to do so, Let's have a look at the intimate mood their songs are filled with. Music is slow and calm, simple and plain. from single acoustic guitars (X-Mas Night) to soft strings settings (the absolutely wonderful Gabriella's Wings), no artificial tune overthrows each song's simplicity. As for latest Dead  Can Dance albums (and 21 Love Hotel's concept often reminds us of Lisa Gerrard and Brendan Perry), and more particularly, Towards the Within, music is calm and cool, and not overdubbed  by unuseful sounds. Songs like X-Mas Night and Gabriella's Wings say it all: slow guitars and string arrangements are here to create an aerial and ethereal mood, and bring rest and peace to each listener.

But more than this musical basis, a few other arrangements reinforce and give a kind of stability to each song, in a relaxed and continuous way (metronome rhythm in Ennui, tiny bell in X-Mas Night). They also bring originality and musical poetry to the songs, by hypnotizing and letting the listener enter this calm and peaceful world.

And then appears Clémence's remarkable voice, bringing a complete homogeneity to the music. Sometimes sweet and confident (Gabriella's Wings), sometimes bluesy and hurt (Lonely Lady), we can't but be impressed by the way she uses her vocal chords, and lay her voice on each tune. Whether singing in French (Ennui) or English, she uses her vocal abilitites to give sense to inspired and dreamy lyrics, and gives a new dimension to the text (Ennui was inspired by a text from French Symbolist poet and essayist Maurice Maeterlinck (1862-1949)). She sometimes looks like a female equivalent for our beloved Jeff Buckley, in the way she plays with her sweet but powerful and fragile voice (Lonely Lady). She also sounds melancholic and hurt, sweet and intense, almost crying (X-Mas Night).

Voice and music then create a dramatic and theatrical universe. 21 Love Hotel's songs could be used to create a movie soundtrack, thanks to this amazing ability to give birth to musical images into the listener's soul, and remind us of impressive movies and directors; David Lynch (blues guitar and hysterical solo in Lonely Lady) or Baz Luhrmann (X-Mas Night). Pictures are running through our minds, as Clémence's voice is whispering to our ears...

These amazing songs are also meant to be played live, in small rooms, keeping their intimacy and given to a hypnotized and fascinated audience. Such a sweet and dreamy music shall first remain close to a few people, then spread to listeners loving peaceful and intelligent music.

All is is great sensitivity and art of writing, peace and rest. 21 Love Hotel will certainly become and remain one of these great, aerial and mysterious bands that keep us aware of what feelings and art should forever be...

Slug