El-g

***“So….a couple years back, one of my favorite French labels – Le Villain Chien – released a single by a guy going by the name of él-g. I picked up a few – record unheard - for our mail order and when they arrived, gave one a spin. The sound was a combination of world-weary French pop and mellow psych. The record lived on the turntable for a few weeks. When the Belgian label Kraak announced it was putting out an él-g album, I said sign me up for some. I got a very small handful and offered them for sale. Of course, one found its way to the record player and what came out of the speakers was one of the best records I’d heard in quite a while. Like the 7” I previously dug, this album strode through French pop styles and dreamy psychedelia, but this thing was much better than the seven inch. It had a classic sound. I wasn’t alone in liking it. David Keenan of Volcanic Tongue called it “Ass-flatteningly great” and said it “combines the decadent French ballad style of Serge Gainsbourg with warped acid folk settings, Industrial electronics and the kinda schizophrenic approach to genre that defines much of Thierry Muller and Philippe Doray’s work.” Clive Bell at the Wire said él-g’s”freak flag is exhilarating”. And the few people who got the record from me, wrote and asked for more. After spin number 50, I said to myself, “Damn, there’s a whole lotta people on this side of the Atlantic that are gonna miss out on this demon, one of the best records of the last five years, me thinks.” So I wrote él-g and Kraak and asked if I could do an American pressing and they said “Sure good thing” and here it is. So what you get is all the above – with guest performances by the lovely Charlene Darling and Ignatz and Phil Todd of Ashtray Navigations. This edition on S.S. Records was remastered excellently by Paul Gold of Salt Mastering and has a slightly different cover and insert. And it is available at a domestic price.”—S.S.