In this world of musical fickleness and stupid trends, at least we can count on one thing that won’t let us down: Varsovie. The French band delivered last month their fifth album, entitled Pression á Froid in which they include nine magnificent tracks full of passion, sharp guitars and deep verses. Before doing the review, I have listened in a row to all their albums: État Civil from 2008, its follow-up, L’Heure Et La Trajectoire which was released after a few years, in 2014, Coups Et Blessures from 2018 and L’Ombre Et La Nuit, all recommendable acquisitions for the lover of the most angular post-punk. In these fifteen years, they have polished their style, album by album, and the culmination of that evolution is this Pression á Froid, full of literary references in the poetic lyrics, providing the literary quality required by the music, more complex if possible than in the past. It is again published by Icy Cold Records and is available on cd, vinyl and digital download.
Pression à Froid starts with a song we already knew “Perspective Nevski”, which was released as a single. It is a sample of the band’s powerful and passionate style that bursts into an impressive break and ends on a high note. Varsovie proves they are at the top instrumentally in this brutal composition in which both the abrasive guitars and those rhythms so characteristic of Arnault Destal remain fixed in your memory.”Pochoden Cislo Jedna” is about the self-sacrifice of the young student Jan Palach and features a sharp bassline that carries you throughout the track. The guitar keeps your attention all the time while the keyboards add a vibe of danger. We get abrasive guitars again on “Synesthésie”, with another phenomenal job by Arnault on drums. “Artefacts” is an intense track, with really powerful percussion. “Sous Les radars” is incendiary post-punk at its best, “Une Force Dehors”, on the other hand, tries more to create tension and succeeds. As always Grégory Cathérina dazzles us with his singing. “Structure” sounds more upbeat, with the classic guitar sound of the band, a pulsating bass and moments of great emotion. “Pression á Froid” continues featuring great guitar work and it’s another great composition. At the end, we have “The Ghost of Kyiv” an instrumental track accompanied by the recitation of the poem “Oi u Luzi Chervona Kalyna” by Ukrainian poet Stepan Charnetsky describing the Mikoyan MiG-29 that shot down six Russian planes during the offensive of February 2022. A good closer for the album that demonstrates the amazing instrumental level of the band.
