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Album review


Rinôçérôse

FutuRINO


Paris 

06/07/2009 - 

On their 2005 album, Schizophonia, Rinôçérôse broke their habit of producing purely instrumental tracks and invited half-a-dozen vocalists into the studio. The collaborative experiment produced such satisfying results that the duo have used the same formula again on their new album, FutuRINO. But this time round Montpellier's foremost electro-rock act have gone upbeat, replacing dark brooding atmospheres with hedonistic pop anthems.



Patrice "Patou" Carrié and Jean-Philippe Freu, the two complementary halves of Rinôçérose, have never believed that music is a question of hitting upon the right notes and the right beats. To them, making an album involves a meeting of minds and a quasi-visceral bonding between singers, producers and themselves. The duo's fourth studio album, FutuRINO, involves more vocals than ever before, singers guesting on all tracks apart from the instrumental Mind City. But while Rinôçérose have adopted a classic pop format on FutuRINO they have kept their distinctive electro-rock flavour.

Following his impressive performance on Bitch on Rinôçérose's previous album, Jessie Chaton (the glam-rock frontman of Fancy) lends his vocals to two tracks on FutuRINO (the dance-driven Touch Me and My Cadillac). Rinôçérose also tried out a bunch of newcomers on their fourth studio offering, the stand-out star among the new talents being Luke Paterson who puts in a show-stopping performance on Panic Attack.

While the Montpellier-based duo have remained loyal to their usual producer John Palumbo (who masterminded half of FutuRINO), Patou and Jean-Philippe have branched out on their new album to work with the 'crème de la crème' of producer talent all the way from London to Lausanne. Putting together the Italian electro-punks Bloody Beetroots with Mark Gardener (of Ride fame) on Where You From? was a sheer stroke of genius!


Despite the fact that Patou and Jean-Philippe upped the number of collaborators this time round, FutuRINO remains a surprisingly coherent work. However, this does not mean that the duo made any effort to stick within one genre - one minute they're going full-blown electro with Ninja (from the GO Team) on Time Machine, the next they're belting out rock guitars on Head Like a Volcano! Rinôçérose's fourth album, mixed by Alex Gopher, is a resounding success - largely because beyond the gizmos, the technology and the special effects all the songs on FutuRINO revolve around brilliant melodies!



 Listen to an extract from Time Machine