Some covers are intriguing at first glance. Not that we're in a position to know the content behind them, but the eye perceives a black diamond whose reflections hint at the drapery of space and an acropolis floating in the void. The aesthetic could very well correspond to Grails covers or reminiscences of Sergei Paradjanov's Sayat-Nova. QOYA is not a first-time band from Grenoble, and they've managed to rectify the situation in a very short space of time. From the post-punk of their first EP, followed by the album Yokaï in 2021, the temporal and musical gap is a great leap into unknown, mythical, even mystical territory.
Karma responds to existential imperatives, a bit like a funnel into which the trio's shared inspiration is suddenly poured. An instrumental backbone sprinkled with vocals (the astonishing, ethereal Ghost), QOYA doesn't limit itself to post-rock, but injects its compositions with a blade of flayed doom, without ever lapsing into dramaturgy. On the contrary, in these ten laconically titled compositions, a whole palette of strikingly beautiful sadness unfolds; Mantra is an exact illustration of this, a condensed space blues. And then there's that ghostly voice of Quentin Chazel, which sounds like no other, if not the most personal and introspective of expressions. We have between our ears an immense album, where unpredictable bounces carry us away in a myriad of visions.
To the infirmities of memory, amnesiac cosmonauts, we try to reconstruct the dreams of our recent nights, our past lives. Anima prefigures the return of a journey into limbo, QOYA has all the keys in hand to unlock the locks of the soul. We feel the need, through every minute that passes, to prolong this state of buoyancy whose soaring keyboards of Timeless raise a cloud over a tenebrous song, which the instruments propel into a kind of foam. At this point, it's undeniable that QOYA is one of this year's finest surprises.
Breaking with oneself, with the superficial character and then, as time goes by, understanding that our destiny's final resting place is Sheol. More than a feat, Karma never tires, and we could return to each track indefinitely. With vocals akin to the psalmody of Dave Gahan, Sisters Of Mercy and poignant music, Amar Ruiz's rhythmic parts are metronomically precise and unpredictable, while Antoine Roux's melodic volutes soar high, QOYA has reached the summit of the cosmos, the cosmic altar from which the spirit momentarily rests.
