So far the name Nicolas Bernier popped when doing collaborations with other people, so Les arbes may be his first solo release. The title means the trees and, well, ok, its also a collaboration, even when only through the visual side, with Urban9. A set of card by him is part of the package. So far, also, we thought of Bernier as a laptop musician, but for this release he has expanded his methods of musical expression to using piano, vibraphone, guitar and even brass instruments. Other than his previous works too this seems to be less a work of improvisation and more a work of thorough composition. This is where digital music and acoustic music meet and melt. Glitchy rhythms, sounds of crackle, but also warm guitar parts, brass section and sustained strings. Not right from the start and not all the way clear, but as things move along, you could almost as suddenly find yourself inside a modern classical piece of music, in // Piano or // Spleen, with flutes, crescendo violins and piano. This is quite an amazing CD, with great ideas, perfect execution, nice packaging and a way out of the locked in microsound artists. Bernier plays microsound, mixes it with real instruments and comes up with something new.