There are, so the story goes, sea birds that reveal themselves only at times of approaching storms. This story though, is a little more complicated. For some, the pipers riding the deluge, yet for the mariner the prophets in the lingering final moments of calm. Thus, ultimately, are they the creator or created if the existence of one requires that of the other?

It is this Mediterranean Sea that Oiseaux-Tempête chose to roam. In 2013, on a trip to Greece with artist Stéphane Charpentier, they returned with an account of the political upheaval and spread of discontent which is now so easy to follow two years later. An album of tension, cinematographic as it rides the storms which it documents. A disc positioned, ultimately, in the statement.

Ütopiya? not only continues this work, but it extends it. The travels move this time to Istanbul and Sicily providing the food for its urgent energy and indomitable drive. While the structures still hint at moments of post-rock, they go further now, almost into the area of free-jazz yet without loosing a directness rooted in punk (highlighted perhaps by the presence of G.W.Sok from The Ex). In addition, the bass clarinet of Gareth Davis references both the roughest of experiments of Akosh Szelevényi and of The Stooges Fun House.

More or less anchored in Paris, Oiseaux-Tempête is the result of the meeting between Frédéric D. Oberland & Stéphane Pigneul (members of both Farewell Poetry and Le Réveil des Tropiques). For Ütopiya?, the group is expanded with the addition of bass clarinet virtuoso Gareth Davis (a regular collaborator with Elliott Sharp and Robin Rimbaud (aka Scanner).