AQ&F – “2nd Life” | Progressive Rock Central.com

Arnaud Quevedo and Friends have returned with the follow up album to last year’s Roan. AQ and F, as they are better known, have released 2^nd Life on July 10, 2023.

Arnaud Quevedo’s band includes: Arnaud Quevedo on guitar and vocals; Anthony Raynal on drums; Noé Russeil on bass and vocals; Marin Michelat on keyboards; Eva Tribolles on double bass and vocals; Lucille Mille on flute and vocals; Julien Gomila on tenor and soprano saxophones; and Eloïse Baleynaud on lead vocals.

I liked AQ&F’s last album, Roan, mainly because it came around at a perfect time for me, when I was craving new music that represented a variety from what I had been listening to and reviewing. Well, they are back with this new album 2^nd Life, just in time for me to search for variety again.

This music is unique and wonderful in that it does not fit well in any particular genre. It is progressive music, in the fact that the tracks are long and ambitious musical journeys, full of multiple time signatures and changing rhythms and speeds. It is jazzy progressive rock that incorporates many of classic progressive rock’s essentials, like: dynamic keyboards, flutes, soaring and powerful guitars and bass, along with alternating drum flows. But you would never consider this classic progressive rock, unless you consider Frank Zappa classical. It is jazzy, free-flow fusion, progressive rock, if anything. But as someone famous once said, “What’s in a name”, or genre for that matter. Who always wants to play or draw within the “lines”? That’s no fun, eh?

Instead, AQ&F, plays around and outside the lines at times, and that helps keep you on your toes. It is fun music full of rhythm, if you choose to keep up with it. It is not really full of dynamic lyrics that will change the world or convey a journey, or for that matter a destination. However, the instrumental nature of the tracks, does in fact take you on, sometimes long journeys, for example: any of the set of title tracks, Parts 1, 2, 3, or 4, are full of emotional movements, and last near or over ten minutes each. The three other tracks on the album, “Any 2.0”, “No Soy Breton”, and “Ekinox” are full of lavish instrumentation and wild musical fun.

Pick 2^nd Life up and listen to this elegant, mostly instrumental journey and put your pre-conceived notions on hold; and just listen and absorb the intricate music that is being performed. I think you, will appreciate their ability to evolve and surround your ears with a different sound which will enhance your time invested.