The Venera 4 was a soviet probe launched, during the space race of the late '60s, to Venus and was the first craft to land on a planet of any kind and send data back to earth. It's also the name of a french four piece who happen to translate that one way trip to another planet with dense layers of melody and fuzz. It's working with the references of shoegaze and psych without quoting either of them directly.
"Seabed Terror" stars with the breathy massive space vocals from Morgane Caux who isn't even trying to draw a solid line lyrically, but create a purely atmospheric mood in her inhale and exhale. A rock steady beat gives this a mechanical undertone almost Joy Division sounding with a heavy shoegaze lean when this hits the chorus. Massive echos and delay on just about every layer, their feedback even has it's own special distance. Even closer to Jesus and Mary Chain, Venera 4's pop quickly establishes the melody while way underneath the fog hangs thick. It must be that focus on the guitar tones, the washes of distortion that remind me of the Scottish brothers along with this thin robotic percussion. It's a great contrast; the guitars and vocals are pushed into an inevitable place of improvisation and accident while those drums keep this pinned together with massive bolts so it doesn't just float away.
"Sun" opens in the middle of a long since damaged screeching loop of guitar distortions which continue to pile on as soon as they fade into view. A darting bass line takes liberties with that space that forgot a melody. When they abandon their haze to grind down to that bass and drums it's a great dynamic trick but it has to have that solid foundation they can dress up because the structure is there. The piles of guitars from every direction then are free to speed out across this landscape riddled with scaffolding holding the ground to everything else. Morgane feels even farther away and harmonizes subtly with herself creating vocalizations that aren't even lyrics; her own element of haze that isn't tied to context. A primal element from the singer. They seem to be blurring those lines of human and machines, distortion seems to be an analog invention, boosting the vibrating strings into fuzz but it's tied to an artificial electric signal while the vocal goes in an almost super human direction. The perfect soundtrack to that ancient piece of equipment, sitting on the surface of Venus forever.
Get this import from Requiem Pour Un Twister, the first 50 come with original photos of the band.
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