Jean-Michel Jarre - Oxymore (Album Review)
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- čas přidán 25. 08. 2024
- I don't know what I expected out of Jarre in 2022, but casually dropping his single most obtuse, abstract and experimental album to date at age 74(!) sure as heck was not it.
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Favorite Tracks: OXYMORE, NEON LIPS, ANIMAL GENESIS, SEX IN THE MACHINE, BRUTALISM, EPICA
Least Favorite Track: ZEITGEIST
Overall Rating: 7.7/10
All ratings based purely off of personal enjoyment at the time of this video's upload and either end in .0, .3, .5, or .7. Take nothing I say too seriously.
JMJ has gained a reputation throughout his multidecade career. Everybody knows what a typical jarresque style is, so when he breaks out of it there's a ton of reviewers squirming while talking about the album. If this was Amon Tobin's latest, people would label it as a "more accesible" Tobin's output and probably be much more positive about it.
I'm a huge JMJ fan. For me, it was (mostly) his music that got me into electronic music in the first place and I'm probably your generation, so I might be more opened to him sounding different and more modern than most of his older fanbase.
This album was already performed live in January in VR & French radio and us, the fans made recodings, so I've already heard this album (in a bit lower quality) many-many times before it's release. And yes, it was very challeging at first, but its experimentalism and complex sound always drove me back to listening. And slowly, it started to become one of me favourites from him. Now, that I've heard the final, album versions, I would say it's probably my 7th or 6th favorite studio album by him. And I'm saying this as someone who listened to all of his albums for many years. (My top3 are Zoolook, Equinoxe and Metamorphoses, Oxygene is 4th.)
When I've heard it, I remembered you saying that you liked JMJ to try bold new things, so I guessed that you'ill probably like this one. My guess was that you'll rate it 8.3 or 8.5, but of course, with this level of experimentalism it's really hard to guess how much one will like it. Also: My favourite track from the album is actually SONIC LAND. :)
I thought you're going to mention that OXYMORE means oxymoron is Frech and the albums starts with "burning fire in pouring rain" in Agora, a literal oxymoron.
Damn the OGs are really pulling out some great albums this year! Tangerine Dream, Klaus Schulze (RIP), Eno now Jean! That’s class
JMJ has mentioned Eno having remixed one of the Oxymore tracks
Wow! Thank you so much! you made me discover his new album and it's freakin good!!... I was a fan all thru the eighties too, making electronic music myself and I'm so happy for him I was worried that it would be melodically cheesy a bit but it's not!, Really awesome!! Congrats JM Jarre!!
Love your channel man!
Listened to this one as soon as it came out, and I honestly think it’s pretty damn great. Even though it’s not exactly as good as the Oxygene trilogy, I am still somehow encapsulated by the dark and bruiting atmosphere that Oxymore delivered. Shoutouts to the title track and Brutalism for being the best tracks here, as the former really reeled me in for what was to come and Brutalism for demonstrating this album’s atmosphere the best here.
Really great album that continues to show that Jean-Michel Jarre continues to stay strong even seven decades into his life. Looking forward to whatever he releases next!
I have watched almost all of The Wonky Angle videos, and for the first time our opinions matched completely. Thought it was worth mentioning.
Thanks for posting! I had no idea this was out, and I am currently obsessed with it. Reckon musiq concrete can be created with digital recording equipment, and not exclusively magnetic tape, as its focus is not on the recording medium, but on what is being recorded, ie concrete sounds.
I’ve honestly never thought about listening to this album. I think I should check it out.
Dont bother its terrible.
@@paulcollins5586 just listened to it now and can confirm it's bad!!! and I've been a fan of JMJ since watching Destination Docklands 1988 as a kid.
I think the decline of JMJ was around Metamorphoses
but this new album takes the cake for meaningless noise.
After listening to it, you won't remember ANY of the songs, there's no melodies or big hooks.
It sounds like some one just browsing and clicking through loops from a modern sample pack, one sound after the other and just twiddling the left and right pan knob back and forth.
It doesn't really sound that cutting edge either if it's trying to be. imagine like.... 2nd rate aphex twin stuff.
@@xsm5525 amazonia is worse.
@@paulcollins5586 not actually heard that but I'll take your word for it!
If you love Zoolook. You love Oxymore to.
Exact...and also amazonia
Love your show! Love your Kraftwerk tee-shirts. Would you mind sharing the source? Cheers. Keep up the good work!
I got this shirt off their merch table when I saw them live in Chicago this past June, this is the closest match to what I have www.klingklangkonsumprodukt.com/en/t-shirts/#cc-m-product-6594038013
Great detailed review, I more or less agree with your assessment. Impressive piece of production, but for all the dizzying Atmos surround effects, spatiality and crystal clear production, emotionally the album is as flat as a wallpaper. Not gripping me in the slightest. I'd appreciate this album more on it's merrits if it was officially conceived and labeled as a Dolby Atmos promotional piece.
I did like it but its a bit of a mess. The mix sounds a bit cluttered. It could have used a bit more space.
I just listened to a few tracks and like it a lot so far, a very pleasant surprise to hear something not so conventional from him. The album cover reminds me of Paul Jebanasam's Continuum which is a fantastic piece of music.
Hey Tommy, do you think you’ll cover Mount Kimbie’s double album coming out this Friday? Bit of an undertaking with being a double feature, but I thought it might be a nice way to add discussion on a fairly influential duo (at least back in the early 2010s) to your channel catalog.
Tommy, would you like to hear a collaboration album called "NFT" between JMJ and BT ? :D :D
ok if we're being completely honest, I might lol. if it were released as an NFT exclusive then no it wouldn't be worth it, but if such a collaboration was released on normal streaming services without having to support them through any crypto-related methods then I'd still go out and listen without hesitation, that team-up would be too intriguing for me to skip over entirely even if the title would suck lmao
@@TheWonkyAngle My question was just half-serious, but thanks, I agree. Jarre promised to do an Electronica 3 right before the pandemic, then it was postponed (because he wanted to meet the artists in person), now I don't know if it was completely abandoned or not, but if not, I have hopes for such a collab.
(Actually, BT went one of the Electronica Tour concerts a few years ago, they met and took a picture, they are fans of each others work.)
Yay no slush :D
How strange. He must have died.
Holy shit it's FlyLo!!
@@a_silly_birb yes the one and only :)
is he banned or something :(
@@ahmetcankirmizi I hope not
Here before brendawg comments wonky slush
wonky slush
Great Composer
Hey. I don't know if you take suggestions, but would you ever do a review of any Skrillex? I am very curious to see what you think of dubstep.
And what do you think of Wolfgang Gartner's Weekend In America? Maybe even some Danger? (I apologize if you've covered those before, I haven't seen ALL your videos.)
But, I have been watching you for a few years. Good to see you're still alive and active
I do generally like Skrillex and definitely have nostalgia for that era of EDM, though my only prior review of his work is this one from 2018: czcams.com/video/A91zgw89Hd8/video.html
@@TheWonkyAngle Very cool. And I saw from your 100 best albums comp you really know everything
Have you ever seen the Jean Michel Jarre AERO Concert? It was my Introduction to him.
Nice. Few things
Musique concrete doesn't need to be tape based, in fact it started with vinyl manipulation causing loops. I doubt that digital doesn't count.
Classic Jarre always is referred to being melody driven, but people forget that oxygene wasn't the first album, plus even oxygene has not melody at all in some of the tracks like 1 or 5.
Plus his classic sound wasnt that that extreme produced and layered, and in fact all the oxygene albums are made with a max of 8 tracks, which comes from the fact that his home studio in his kitchen in 1976 was a 4 track recorder and he has 2 hands so... 8 tracks at maximum
OPN - Replica or R+7 review please?
When I saw the title I thought "oh God he's done Oxygen yet again" well...he most certainly hasn't...instead ya get massively overloaded sonic blocks of concrete being smashed into each other. Total miasma...I'll have to listen to it a bit more to try and untangle it.
Oxymore means oxymoron in French. He probably used this title partly as a joke, to trick people into assuming that it has something to do with Oxygene, while the album itself is the least Oxygene-like in his whole career.
Harry Potter 30 years later🧹
wonky slush
and suddenly, Teo and Tea is no longer the worst album.....
damn
Its terrible. I like experimental but this is tedious.
Unaudible for me.
I think his career's having a mid-life crisis
nah that's more applicable to what he did in the mid-later 2000s
@@TheWonkyAngle totally agree. Although he did some great stuff with the Oxygène 30th anniversary release (2007) with playing the whole album integral with some variations (variation 3 being one of the best things he did).
But the 00s and early 10s were harsh for jmj fans in general. There was extensive touring during those years though.
Teo & Tea's followup was Electronica 1 and that had 8 years between them...
No mate, disagree. That happened with T&T and Electronic Nights or should I say Nightmare!!
@@Zeibekkikina At least Electronic Night gave us a listenable version of Together Now and a pretty good track called Paris Underground. And after that came Metamorphoses, which is a solid album.
T&T is indeed the mid-life crisis album.
@@leesmapman4764 I agree with you about Metamorphoses
I have tried many times now to like this album but no, it is just not happening. It's so boring and sounds really old, in a bad way, not in a nostalgic way. He is still stuck in the 1990's and seems unable to leave that era and do something truly incredible.