Peter Thelen Exposé, sept 2005, USA reviews on “Les Contrepoints Cardinaux” (Kein & Aber records, 2003) L’Ensemble Rayé has over the course of numerous releases developed a unique approach that is at once fun, accessible, and completely unpredictable, covering a wide (I mean a really wide) spectrum of instrumental styles (elements of jazz, classical, chamber, folk, country, Hawaiian and a lot more), all mixed together in unique ways that will boggle the mind, while staying away from certain ones that would allow them to be pigeonholed in any way. Additionally, everything is played so exceptionally well and superbly produced that their music is truly in a category of its own, utilizing every kind of instrumentation and approach imaginable. On the fourteen tracks of Les Contrepoints Cardinaux, the band’s two main “guitarists” (actually two very diverse instrumentalists who play anything with strings or key) Cédric Vuille and Jean20 Huguenin trade off most of the compositions, with a couple by woodwind player Pierre Kaufmann, an arrangement of Satie piece, and a Robert Wyatt cover Left on Man. Numerous other players figure into the sound as well, on piano, accordion, drums, additional guitars, violin, trumpet, etc. etc. Some tracks are neary solo pieces, while others feature various subsets of musicians, as required to achieve whatever and they are aiming for. This one is truly impossible to categorize, but one you’ll want to keep listening to again and again. Exceptional!