Originally released on 1992 and 1995 by Hyperium the second and the third album of Rise And Fall Of A Decade now hit the shelves of the music stores again thanks to Ars Musica Diffundere, Black Rain's sub label. Unfortunately NOISY BUT EMPTY and YOU OR SIDNEY see the light just after the death of Pierre Francois Maurin-Malet, the singer and the writer of the trio. The releases reprint the old albums without adding extra tracks but they have new cover/booklet graphics which enrich the reading of all the lyrics included. Rise And Fall Of A Decade formed on late 80's in France and they have been a good example of how a new wave band could play a wide range of styles. On NOISY BUT EMPTY, for example, you can find acoustic ballads ("Children die in in silence"), romantic tracks with heavenly voices which duet with male vocals (see the opening "Suicided youth"), guitar driven new wave tunes ("Grandest illusion"), romantic piano little suites (the opening part of "Lost cause") or semi classical/folk extravaganza ("Cube like people" and the following "Girls of the ninetie's"). Also the following record YOU OR SIDNEY has similar sounds but there's an overall dark feeling (like the beautiful opening "One of these days" which recalled me the Cocteau Twins of "Head over heels" mixed with the pop sensibility of A Flock Of Seagulls) which make it sounds a little different respect the previous one. These two albums made me discover a band I missed during those years and who had quite a following in France and listening to their tunes I realize why. The only weak point of these reissues is that the sound sometimes is a little distorted (you can hear it mainly on crappy speakers and headphones because on my stereo it wasn't too bad), probably because of a wrong gain setting during the mastering.