Dead Hollywood Stars

Gone West
(2002)
Go WEEEST! No. Gay propaganda as disco-pop this is not. Dead Hollywood Stars play country & western from the other side. The saloon is deserted, the dried bushes roll along Main Street, a door slowly creaks in the dry wind. There--a hesitant banjo riff. The echo of an automatic piano. The dead are waking up in the ghost town.
Dead Hollywood Stars succeed well at making dark ambient music based on elements from country & western music. Sometimes it's reminiscent of Neil Youngs soundtrack to Dead Man, other tracks lean more towards industrial ambient, and some tunes distort country music-sounds into melodic techno. Not only is Gone West based on an interesting concept, the result is really good
Note: Limited edition of 500 copies, sold with Junctions. Gone West is identical to the 2000 release, except for the last two bonus tracks. The titles of tracks 11 and 12 are inverted on the sleeve; the above track-listing is correct.
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Junctions
(2002)
"Gone West", Dead Hollywood Stars' first album released in 2000, had intrigued and seduced with its audacious mix of electronica and folk music. Unfairly under-promoted, this subtle UFO, who's got two already available tracks on the "Wagon Of Miracles" maxi, is reissued in a CD bonus format of a limited "Junctions" edition, the new fascinating release of the magical trio, Dead Hollywood Stars. Under this curious name are three exceptional people: John N. Sellekaers (Xingu Hill, Urawa, Ambre, Snog), Hervé Thomas (Fragile, Hint) and C-Drick Fermont (Ambre, Ammo). "Junctions" follows the "Gone West" line with more sound experimentation and textures' mix. Unprecedented crossover of blues (The Pure Voice and Back From Exile), of a deceptively groovy Black Lung (In The Abbey of the Psalms), of Megaptera (Noctuary) and of Front Line Assembly (Last Train To Aldebaran), we could easily classify this future classic with an Amon Tobin's or imagine it as the next Lynch's soundtrack, one of the track, Suburban Mystery, reminding us of the Twin Peaks soundtrack. Even if this album has an easy approach, it'll be better to let oneself carried by numerous colours of "Junctions" (you can easily go on a same track from a happy or tribal ambience -Singapore Sling- to colder spheres -Triangulating the Deamon or The Crying Indian-) and discover the richness of these fussy compositions that make of "Junctions" a precious and necessary album.
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