Kim (no last name) had been releasing recordings for four years prior to the appearance of this 30-song double-CD at the end of 1998. It was the fifth album from this singer, songwriter, and multi-instrumentalist from Bordeaux, France. His prolific output (he has released more since then) doesn't seem to have gotten the slightest notice in English-speaking lands, although he (at least on this album) sings in English. He's a pop/rock auteur, playing all the instruments and doing all the singing and sampling on this epic, in the mold of prodigies from the superstars (
Stevie Wonder,
Prince,
Todd Rundgren) to the lo-fis (
Stephin Merritt,
R. Stevie Moore). Like a lot of such one-man wonders, he's a bit of a stylistic dilettante, flitting from acoustic folk-rock, symphonic ambience, and confessional
Brian Wilson-esque piano ballads to dance tunes with echoes of new wave and synth-pop. And like a lot of these one-man wonders, despite the facility with all manner of technological trickery and instruments, at heart he's a pop tunesmith. The French accent on his vocals is a little too strong to be called "slight," though there's no trouble comprehending him; he overdubs backing vocals on top of himself deftly, often sounding as if he's dueting with a woman (though in fact he's singing with himself). He sounds a lot like a fey, more indie-oriented (and occasionally slightly off-key)
Ray Davies for much of the time, which is a pretty good icon to get compared to, though he's not in
Davies' (or for that matter
Merritt's) class. Still, his wistful and attractive tunes don't lack guts. There's a lot to chew on here for indie pop fans that don't buy into lo-fi wunderkinds that are too slickly power pop, or too detached and self-consciously clever.