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French TV — 15 A Ghastly State of Affairs
(Cuneiform Rune 519, 2023, CD / DL)

by Peter Thelen, Published 2023-12-26

15 A Ghastly State of Affairs Cover art

It’s been a long road for this Louisville band, from their first self-released LPs in the early-to-mid 80s, through a long string of CDs released on the Pretentious Dinosaur label — which were really just self released as well. And here we arrive at album number fifteen, after all the lineup changes through the years, and finally Cuneiform is releasing this one; I’m not sure why it hasn’t happened sooner, as French TVs recipe of complex styled ‘difficult music,’ even if not quite RIO and closer to instrumental prog rock, certainly fits Cuneiform’s oeuvre to a tee, now as well as it did way back at the beginning. The band, this time out is bassist and de-facto bandleader Mike Sary, guitarist Katsumi Yoneda, keyboardist Patrick Strawser, and returning from a while long ago is drummer Fenner Castner; this core group composed all of the album’s five tracks. In addition, guest players Kenji Imai (flute), Ludo Fabre (violin), and Warren Dale (saxes) play on the album as well. I’ll tell you something else: the 18-plus minute epic that opens the album, “Every Morning, I Wake Up and Take My Hat Off to All the Beauty in the World,” is probably the finest work that French TV has ever produced, starting with a strangely beautiful chorale (keyboards I think), with a flute coming in a bit later, then an acoustic guitar and synth figure paves the way for a full band entry, building out from there, with regular change-ups in pace, meter, and style moving ever forward to the piece’s conclusion. Recalling when I first heard this, I had to repeat it about three times before I could move on to the rest of the album. Even after many plays, I have to resist the urge to play that first cut over and over. So what about the remaining five cuts, that account for almost forty minutes of playing time? Titles like “The Mayor of Ding Dong City” and “Baby, You Fill Me with Inertia” typify the purely instrumental humor that FTV has become known for, perhaps a touch of Zappa living in there, with busy, complex, challenging, and often bizarre arrangements at every turn that keep the listener on the edge of their seat. Ghastly? I think not, but then again that’s probably just part of the humor angle. A Ghastly State of Affairs is nothing short of superb.

Filed under: New releases, 2023 releases

Related artist(s): French TV, Pat Strawser

More info
http://cuneiformrecords.bandcamp.com/album/a-ghastly-state-of-affairs

 

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