Hailing from Toulouse, France, post progressive band Esthesis returns with their third album in a loose triloge, Out of Step, that follows The Awakening in 2020 and Watching Worlds Collide in 2022. Led by composer and vocalist Aurélien Goude, the album is a deliberate step to consolidate the project’s cinematic atmosphere and its blend of post rock and progressive elements.
Across nine tracks, with Fractured One and Fractured Two as chapter markers, the album traces the collapse of direct exchange in a screen age, an insistence to step outside the frame, the small solace of nocturnal walks, and an ending that turns toward the storm rather than away from it. Each song reads like a scene. "Connection" sets the social lens, "The Frame" questions confinement, "City Lights" offers nocturnal calm, and "The Storm" closes with release. The whole album is shaded in what Goude describes as a blue, nocturnal palette of midnight hues and grainy grays.
Musically, Out of Step moves between cold wave atmospheres and post rock expanses with an undercurrent of industrial tension holding it all together. Warmer textures counterpoint sharp percussive edges, while drums and programming steer the dynamics and guitars supply repetitive, hypnotic patterns. The result, as Goude puts it, is their most ambient and introspective record, one defined by contrasts between quiet, soothing moments and bursts of energy.
Inevitably, a few albums each year get lodged in my head. Some because they’re catchy, others because they create a mood and space that's singular in nature. Out of Step is the latter, an immersive album that hangs low like rainclouds against gray skies. It’s one that deserves time and attention. If you give it both, you will be rewarded with a listening experience you will not soon forget.
.jpeg)
0 Comments