Les Revenants; The Returned, and Thou Have Returneth

I've always had a constant, unconditional love for post-rock, yet somehow Mogwai have always been one of those groups that I've felt have teetered on this particular fence.
Call me old fashioned, and yeah I feel a little bit like an old dog that you can't teach new tricks to; but after being introduced to this genre by God is an Astronaut, Pelican and the likes; I've always felt that it was more about the emotion through instrumentation that resonated this style rather than vocal projection. This is maybe why I've never considered myself an avid Mogwai fan - only occasionally listening to the songs which I can put my own words and emotions to, rather than trying to associate with the lyrics that have been placed before me. Nonetheless, I have always felt this band play beautiful emotionally-driven music that I'll always be able to relate to on many different levels.

Now this is more of a dual-reflection update rather than putting the spotlight solely on Mogwai, as it comes hand-in-hand with a new television series I've recently started watching. Some of you might know it, some not. Shamefully to say, I've been watching it on Channel 4 but was recommended it through word-of-mouth as it was apparently "down your street". The Returned is a French television show that has reached the UK solely through being subtitled for British audiences (once again, I am shamed but unfortunately my lack of bilingualism has given me the disadvantage of not knowing any of these otherwise brilliant foreign television shows.) Originally titled for it's primary French Audience, Les Revenants is still pretty fresh with its 2013 air release, and I would highly recommend it for anyone who hasn't seen it - however if you're like me and can't speak a word of French further than "voulez vous coucher avec moi ce soir", you're going to have to a hard time. Or you'll just have to follow my lead, and do what I've painstakingly had to, and grit your teeth in anticipation of every weekly episode (currently waiting on episode four right now.)

In a nutshell - and I won't leak any spoilers just in case, the series is set in a small Alpine village where tragedy has struck on more than a few occasions in its recent years. A coach carrying a major group of school children swerves off a high cliff; that sort of awful thing. Key themes to note here that don't give any fundamental plot lines away are that essentially the accidents that have happened - those which have resulted in lives ending far before they should have, are beginning to be reviewed. People who died before their prime with otherwise no knowledge to their short lives ending, are being resurrected from the dead without any knowing that they are no longer alive. Les Revenants, or The Returned as I know it, explores a bizarre consequence of the lives of people who have been affected by the loss of someone close, and how - as much as the mind longs for their return, everyday life is altered when the unaware dead try to continue to coexist with the living, oblivious of their own fatal circumstances.

As I watched the very first episode with an open-yet-sceptical mind, I couldn't help but notice how powerful the soundtrack was. It's hard to write about how it affected me without releasing any spoilers, but each song ran shivers down my spine and I made a mental reminder to look into the soundtrack afterwards. The music was intense, yet it felt fragile while in tune with its visual context. If anything, it was the music that emphasized the extremities of emotion in The Returned. Although I didn't know how to personally relate to most of  the themes that this series shadowed, somehow now I could suddenly understand them. The music fuelled my empathy for the characters in the show and how they grieved for the people they lost. The numbing shock they felt when those they had once hysterically mourned for, had returned to them.

Hit the break for the track, and a little more gushing.

I chose to write about the world today.

For the first in what seems like a very long period of time, I sank my toes into the sandy shores of a beach. It’s fascinating how the mind - through a fluid concoction of memories and images provided to us through films and photographs, conjures a standard picturesque idea of what one expects to experience in a place or time.

At this beach, I didn't see sandcastles or ice-cream trucks, nor did I see stripy deckchairs or picnic blankets. I didn't even see the sun, as it was too shy to greet me today, and hid behind the comforts of the thickly layered clouds that blanketed the blue sky above and around them. This beach was the polar opposite of what I’d allowed my mind to naively visualize for me in the many years of beachly absence.

 Although it’s June and what should be the peak of this year’s summer, there was a chill to the ocean winds that bit my cheeks and tore my lungs with every sharp breath inhaled. But standing on the steps that met the dunes; with the touch of cold grains of sand between my toes, I decided I preferred this new image of the beach to that I had once previously stored in my mind. I liked it like this; vast and empty. Only a handful of other people were here, but the salty breeze that I could taste just as much as I could smell covered their subtle footprints as they walked way out in the distance. The tide was already out, and the damp sand stretched out for what seemed like miles. One could only wonder how long it would take to touch the waters of this shore.

 I realized how easy it is to forget majestic beauty like that when you’re obligated to partake in the strict regime of social contribution. It seems as though there aren’t ever enough hours in the day to appreciate anything like that beach. Or maybe we grow accustomed to the idea that these delicate moments will always be there to experience; that our own constricted realities strapping us down to the consuming world can always be separated from us at another, less spontaneous point in time. 

And maybe there always will be another time. However, I know that even for that short fleeting moment, where I stood and stared out at the shimmering surface of the ocean into the horizon; I felt infinite, and that there was nothing that could ever change that.