Canterbury is not far from the French coast – less than a hundred kilometres away. Yet if we change our unit of measurement and calculate the distance in wavelengths rather than miles, the proximity becomes far greater, or at least it has been ever since the first arrival of the Soft Machine. One of the many close encounters that followed came about thanks to the second album by guitarist Patrice Meyer: Dromadaire Viennois, released in 1987 and long since consigned to the limbo reserved for out-of-print records. Meyer is a guitarist endowed with a highly personal and remarkable technique. He took his first musical steps in 1973, playing with several Alsatian bands, beginning with his older brother’s progressive rock group at a time when the genre was at its commercial and artistic peak. He subsequently moved into ensembles more closely aligned with the emerging jazz-rock movement, before collaborating with drummer […]
