Rone & Friends

Album review

2020 was to be a big year for Rone. In March he had launched a series of prestigious concerts for his album Room With a View at the Théâtre du Châtelet in Paris, but these were soon cut short by Covid. Quarantined along with everyone else, the French producer decided to fight isolation by embarking on the first collaborative album of his career. This is a real producer's album, with the Rone touch, and a five-star cast. It probably owes a lot to the artists' empty schedules in 2020, but it also says a lot about Erwan Castex's growing reputation on the French scene.

It is the rappers of Odezenne who open on Sot-l'y-laisse and its huge wall of apocalyptic sounds, followed by the English dance/pop phenomenon Georgia with Waves of Devotion, on which we hear Rone successfully leaving his comfort zone. Next, he offers the first track sung in French in Savages' singer Jehnny Beth's career, the aquatic electronic ballad Et le jour commence, on which she adopts accents reminiscent of Aznavour. A l'errance with Dominique A playing a cheery arpeggiator is not bad either. Camélia Jordana is bewitching on La Nuit venue and Melissa Lavaux brings a bit of grace with Closer. Rone's final touch is even classier, with the diva Roya Arab on Twenty 20, which sounds like a prayer for 2021.  © Smaël Bouaici/Qobuz