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Halloween — Psy-Ko
(Musea FGBG 5075, 2025, CD)

by Jon Davis, Published 2025-04-28

Psy-Ko Cover art

Music fans who paid attention to progressive rock in the 90s were likely aware of the French band Halloween. We certainly covered them here at Exposé, first covering their third album, 1994’s Merlin, following that with reviews of the reissues of their first two albums, Part One (1988) and Laz (1990), their live album Silence… au Dernier Rang! (1998), and their entry into the new millennium, Le Festin (2001). On that run, they established themselves as purveyors of a distinctive variety of dark symphonic progressive rock, moody and powerful, especially when fronted by the vocals of Géraldine Le Cocq, who joined on Merlin and was with the group intermittently from then on. It’s now 2025, and Psy-Ko appears out of the blue — apparently Halloween struck up again in 2020, and this is their first new release since then. No doubt everyone’s first question is about the personnel for the album. In the fold we have founding members Jean-Philippe Brun (violin, guitar, vocals) and Gilles Coppin (keyboards), drummer Philippe DiFaostino, who’s been on board since Laz, Le Cocq (as previously mentioned, singing since Merlin), and two newcomers, Romain Troly (bass) and Cédric Monjour (guitar). Fans of the group’s mature sound will not be disappointed. Psy-Ko is very much a Halloween album, full of eerie moods and minor chords, but without any real touches of metal in their darkness. While there aren’t any guest musicians, the core group fills out the sound, with plenty of overdubbed backing vocals, multiple violin parts from Brun, and of course, lots of excellent keyboard work. The eight tracks are spread across two CDs, though the total is only 72 minutes. That’s a lot of music, but there are no duds in the set. A particular favorite is “Plume de Plomb,” which features an especially tasty vocal arrangement. “Nostalgie” is a fifteen-minute piece that starts with ambient sound effects, then jumps into an instrumental section full of crazy rhythms and angular lines, somewhat like King Crimson with more emphasis on keyboards, and then goes into a slow, dramatic section that takes up most of the track’s length, only to finish off with a lovely acoustic-guitar backed section with violin and spoken words. It is much to the band’s credit that I find the vocal sections compelling even when my limited knowledge of French is exceeded. We’re only a few months into 2025, but I’m confident that Halloween’s Psy-Ko will be solidly among the year’s best progressive rock releases.

Filed under: New releases, 2025 releases

Related artist(s): Halloween

More info
http://halloweenprogrock.bandcamp.com/album/psy-ko

 

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