Born in northern France, Le Goas has built an international career bridging European and American jazz traditions. A formative period in New York in the early 2000s saw him collaborating with musicians including John Abercrombie, Jean-Michel Pilc, Kenny Wheeler, Drew Gress, Ralph Alessi, Avishai Cohen (trumpet), Nir Felder, Kevin Hays, and Phil Donkin – experiences that continue to shape his writing and approach to ensemble music. 

The septet Pulse took shape during a 2021 creative residency supported by DRAC Bretagne, and brings together musicians Le Goas has collaborated with across multiple projects and eras. After a postponed 2023 session, the ensemble entered Studios de la Seine in Paris in June 2024 to record The Chaining Loops.

Musically, the album is driven by evolving forms built from interlocking rhythmic patterns, shifting meters, and long melodic lines that remain central even as structures grow more complex. Le Goas’ writing moves fluidly between groove-based propulsion and open textures, allowing dense ensemble passages to give way to exposed solo moments. Across the record, contrasting blocks of energy and lyricism are shaped into coherent, forward-moving narratives.

The album presents five compositions: The Chaining Loops, Direction, Friction, Fifteen Miles, and Light in the Sky. The title track unfolds as a wide-ranging piece built from recurring melodic and rhythmic cycles, with melody as its guiding thread. Elsewhere, Direction expands from lyrical clarity into increasing density, Friction explores rhythmic complementarity and shifting instrumental roles, Fifteen Miles contrasts solemn complexity with lighter motion, and Light in the Sky closes the album with shifting textures and an expansive final coda.

With The Chaining Loops, Olivier Le Goas affirms his place as a composer able to balance structural ambition with immediacy, creating music that is both meticulously constructed and vividly alive.