(Review from progarchives.com, progreviews.com)

Offering came to the world as one of Christian Vander’s post Magma projects, functioning throughout the later half of the 80s up till the early 90s Offering ventures into territory where only Magma’s ‘Merci’ dared the tread. While the 70s Magma revolved around a more classical interpretation, Offering shows Vander’s fascination with Coltrane’s acoustic inspired Jazz blossom into full realization. It takes a step aside from Magma’s tight formulas, introducing compositions of a much looser, improvisational design.

The first four editions of Offering’s work, captured across two double-album length CDs, are dedicated to Vander’s obsession, John Coltrane. Largely setting aside his drums, on the Offering albums Vander primarily takes up vocal experimentation duties alongside Stella Vander, these being a progression of the soul-scat style he was playing around with in Magma’s early 80s recordings. This vocal style, combined with the lengthiness of some tracks, is most likely to be the biggest obstacle for appreciating the contents of these discs. For many people these will prove to be simply too much to be able to take.

The title-track prologue is clearly styled upon Coltrane, with the distinctive, ‘wave’ of sustained chords that marked his music, and Stella’s voice evoking the free yet melodic quality of his saxophone. The prologue segues into “Earth,” which musically recalls Attahk in its buzzy bass grooves.

“C’Est pour Nous” is one of the stronger pieces and recalls “Üdü Wüdü” with a vivacious, Latino backdrop and playful vocal dancing between the Vanders. The short but sweet “Tďlďm M’Dohm”, with Stella doubling a beautiful piano melody, is another highlight.

At the end of the day? Likely to be appreciated exclusively by the hardest of hardcore constituents of Magma fandom.

Line-up:
- Christian Vander / lead vocals, piano, Rhodes, drums, bells
- Stella Vander / lead vocals, maracas & bells
- Guy Khalifa / vocals, flute, Rhodes, piano
- Simon Goubert / Rhodes & piano
- Pierre Marcault / percussion
- J.Marc Jafet / bass (2)
- Marc Delouya / drums (2)
- C.Martinez / trumpet
- J.Bolognesi / trombone

Track List:
01. Offering (1) – 7:56
02. Earth – 10:32
03. Joia – 17:56
04. C’est Pour Nous – 8:08
05. Love in the Darkness – 10:35
06. Tilim M’Dohm – 2:37
07. Mazur Kujiawiaki Oberek (Triptyque) – 4:59
08. Solitude – 4:07
09. Uguma Ma Melimeh Gingeh – 3:45

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