I’ve always found odd why pro rock was so very appreciated in France. Despite the fact that I cannot come up with an explantion, Sahona makes that idea stronger, that France is a house of prog, and mostly of experimental rock in general.
Percursors of a more melodic voice, and with a very «Musey» attitude to them, Sahona managed to impress with very strong track, especially in the post-prog scene, where it’s easy just get lost in new tracks. Just trying to grap the 1st chords.
Unlike that, Sahona opted to create focused, simples song structures and composing the elements along. «Little Jack» for instance begins with a high melodic guitar chord, very catchy, that builds up along with the voice, almost like a pop song. This kind of approach is unusual in new bands, where it’s common for one just to express the idea with as many notes as they can. On the other a very simpler album with very-focused songs is easier to grap, hence more adhering to listeners.
Another manifestation of this idea is the short-tempos of the songs, with a slow distortion to the 6-strings, like in «A Modern Sleepng Beauty». The incursion of prog in fantastic world is not new, Muse did it in their «This could be Wrong», or Dream Theater in «Forsaken». Both unpretentiously directed to new teen fans.
This culminates in what is strange in prog that is very short, almost unvisible intrumental sections in songs, that explains the average track duration of 4 minutes. The only track that elevated the guitar (wtih the exception of keyboards) was the 1st released single «Caight in Heaven» that has a very graspy, adrenaline-driven riff, that functions as a re-kick into live performances.
Another good surprise, is the balanced presence of keyboards, that are not-so omnipresent, but surface with precision when needed, very «à la Muse». The voice hover, although well-suited, keeps very motone all alog the album, and stopps the songs from a certain progression.
We wouldn’t strange seeing these folks from lining-up as openers for a Steven Wilson tour.
