Rob Price
Gutbrain Records
rob + gutbrain.com = email

2014 January 17 • Friday

Here's still one more instrumental rock LP from Canada, Les Diplomates Vol. 1.

I like this one a lot. The sax and trumpet blend nicely. The guitarist is good but the wind players do most of the work.

They boldly start out with a more or less morose tune, "Ce Monde". It takes guts to put something like that as the first track of Side A.

This is followed by "Ne me laisse pas l'aimer", which is like a dance tune played much too slowly. I think this is my favorite from the whole record. It's rare that a piece of music is languid and infectious.

Things get relatively normal after this with "Oops (Part 1)", which has a "What I Say" groove. "Tijuana Surf" is like a perked up version of "Blue Moon".

The side closes with a kind of gruesome number, "Las classes del cha cha cha", in which the band unwisely takes a stab at a vocal number.

Side B begins with "Green Onions", not essential. This is followed by "Why Not Tequilla" [sic], decent but uninspiring and not having much to do with "Tequila".

"Aventures dans les iles" is the theme to the TV show Adventures in Paradise, nicely played here .

Then there's "Je deviens fou", a percolating sort of tune. Things get wrapped up with the somewhat sinuous and intriguingly named "Torpedo cha cha".