Contents
Interview Baden Baden
Interview Adam Kesher
Interview Black Box Revelation
Baden Baden
A: Alexandre (Icky Thump)
E: Eric (Baden Baden) – G: Guillaume (Baden Baden) – Gab (Baden Baden) – J: Julien (Baden Baden)
A So the first question is going to be whether you’ve found a new explanation for Baden Baden because last time you told me that,…
E What did we tell you last time?
A Bah that there was none, well not one
E Really? Who told you that?
A It’s you!
(laughter)
E So since then we’ve been working a lot on the question. Because at the beginning, when you’re looking for a name, you’re very instinctive, and unconsciously we came up with Baden Baden. It sounded really good, without really knowing why. And as we kept asking ourselves the question, we started thinking, why Baden Baden? And now I don’t know if we know much more, but…
Gab Bah it evokes a lot of things, the sound is pretty, it flows well. We liked the redundancy of the double word Baden (…) Baden too.
G And it doesn’t put too many labels on it. You can imagine all sorts of things, and you don’t necessarily know what the music might be about. And you have a very, very wide range of imagery.
A Is it because your father was in Baden Baden?
G And yes too.
E He’ll love my dad
G (laughs) that’s good
E Because every time I talk about him,… but no, it wasn’t me who came up with Baden Baden, because when we were looking for the name, I think it was Guillaume who said Baden Baden, and everyone liked it. And it spoke to me, because my father, when he was very young, lived in Baden Baden, and so in his imagination it remains an extraordinary childhood memory. So I’ve always heard about it without ever having been there.
Gab Yes, it’s childhood imagery…
E A place, a country I’ve never been to, and so you fantasize about it, and it fits in well with the music.
A And now with the EP we’re going to talk about next, last time I asked you if the tour was going well. Because last year, it seems to me, you were preparing for it.
G Actually, we’re at the beginning of our tour.
A Yeah with last night and all,…
G Yes
E Actually, we’ve got a lot more structure in our heads than we did a year ago. Because last year we wanted to make an album, do a tour, do lots of things. But since we’ve been working with a manager, Simon. He’s helped us a lot, in terms of organizing a medium-term plan for the band. It’s about doing things in the right order, i.e. releasing an EP in…
A In November
E A seven-track… Six tracks, so it’s a good start, a good support, it’s a good recording experience through this first EP. And then, ideally, we’d like to do an album next year, with ten or twelve tracks. And this EP gives us a framework for doing things in the right order. And now, with him, there’s a ten/fifteen date tour.
A And what are the approximate dates?
G There were festivals this summer
J Yes, we’re doing another one here, Les Nuits de Champagne, it’s an Off festival.
G Otherwise we did Rock en Seine in August, the Plage du Glazart,…
Gab But other than that, we’re opening for Shout Out Louds three times, then we’re opening for Kaolin as well, and that’s that…
J Then we have solo dates…
Gab Yes, and solo dates too
G Basically, we’ve got about fifteen dates up to mid-December, and the aim of these dates is to make a big splash with the EP, and to make sure the live shows go off without a hitch.
A So can you tell us a bit about the EP?
G Yes, a little (laughs)
E There’s nothing secret about it!
J There are six titles. Three titles that have already been revealed, and three more yet to be revealed. And in Itune version
Gab Digitale (laughs)
J We can have one more piece
G It’s a song that’s very close to our hearts, and we love playing it live
Gab Of these seven tracks, two are in French and five in English.
A And which title, precisely,…
Gab Last Song
G It’s a song we’ve had since the beginning. It’s one of Eric’s pieces, which is very close to his heart, and which we all love very much. It’s very post-rock, it’s been setting the mood for a very long time, and on stage, yes, it’s a song we like a lot, and we play it for seven minutes, seven/eight minutes, and it really sets the mood.
A And writing songs in both French and English, does that allow you to reach a wider audience? Because we really get the impression that some bands choose one language and stick to it.
E Before the band, I used to write in English/French, but afterwards, when we started the band, we tended to write in English, for the sake of consistency and so on. In fact, the first time we sang a song in French, it was a cover of Emily Loizeau’s “L’autre bout du monde”, and we really enjoyed playing it. The more we got into it, the more we thought it was a pity not to sing in French, because it’s a different kind of pleasure to write.
Gab It’s a different kind of pleasure for Eric to write, but also for us to play the songs and compose in French.
G You’ve always written a lot in French too, so it’s quite natural.
E Then it happened naturally. Before the band, the songs I wrote in French sounded different, I don’t know why. That’s why we started in English, and then little by little there was a coherence that came about, in French as well as in English, so we went for it, or maybe in our heads too, we stopped stopping ourselves.
A Yeah, I was thinking of Plasticine, who really didn’t like doing the cover of Bitch in French.
G Yes, but it mustn’t be under constraint. We’ve always been free, there mustn’t be any artistic constraints…
A Ouai, à la José from Stuck In The Sound, who feels much more at home in English… But apart from that, I had a question: why aren’t the twins on the myspace page anymore?
(laughter)
Gab Actually it was a photo booth, it was the same person, so two photos. But it corresponds to a period in the group. At one point, we had a bit of a crush on this photo, this person, who was a bit of a “mascot”, the emblem of the group, but we moved on to something else.
E It may come back
G It corresponded to a whole imagery, a retro and nostalgic image, which we liked a lot when we wanted to develop the band’s concept, and today, as we’re releasing the EP, we have very beautiful visuals around it. And there’s a graphic designer who worked on it, did the cover art and so on. They’re really beautiful.
Gab We’ve gone off on a different tangent
G It’s more homogeneous.
E And as the band’s music progresses over the years, so does its imagery.
G We’re in the process of talking about making a new video clip.
A Yeah, I really liked BookI’ll put it up after the interview. By the way, what’s your best memory of a stage performance?
J My best memory is of Sare, we played there this summer, in the Basque country
G Oh yes, me too, me too!
Gab It was really nice.
J It’s behind Biarritz, so we ended up going up into the mountains near the Spanish border. It’s an association festival, and they’d set up a stage on the property, of,…of people,…
Gab First edition
J And it’s crazy, the scenery, the people, the whole thing, it was just great! We all really enjoyed ourselves in Sare.
Gab It really was an idyllic setting
G It was really in the middle of nature, there was nothing, a house, a garden…
Gab Super well organized, really nice.
G In the mountains!
Gab We gave a great concert. Everything to feel good
G And a truly international audience: French, Spanish, Basque, English… And they spoke every language
E You could really feel the confidence, that evening everything was super positive, super calm,…
Gab The setting was really magical, like this, in the mountains,…
G It was the USOPOP festival, U-S-O-P-O-P (laughs)
A And your worst memory?
E Ouhou, don’t be mistaken (laughs)
Gab Y en n’en pas, on les oublie!
E In retrospect, I’ve always enjoyed doing it. Afterwards, it’s true that sometimes you play in less-than-ideal conditions and you don’t feel at ease.
G And that’s a drag. But it’s true that the memory forgets bad dates… Even crappy concerts are fun.
A Oh no, not necessarily “rotten”. Just Anoraak, who broke his tibia on stage.
E Who? Anoraak?
A Yes
(laughter)
G Poor guy, it’s horrible! And what do you do then, stop the concert?
A I don’t know, are you falling?
E It’s pretty special (laughs)
J It’s horrible.
[Short discussion about Shout Out Louds, who they are, and where they come from, then,…]
Adam Kesher
J: Julien (Adam Kesher) – G: Gaëtan (Adam Kesher) – Y: Yann (Adam Kesher)
(c) Maciek Pozoga
Black Box Revelation
A short interview in a radio studio before leaving for the hotel. Or how to do a 20-minute interview in five!
A Who’s who? And who does what?
D I’m Dries, the drummer with Black Box Revelation. I’m a drummer, and it’s my life.
J And I’m Jan Paternoster, the guitarist, the singer, one of the two members of this fucking band.
A And how did you train him, since when?
J Before The Black Box Revelation, we played in various bands, but we didn’t really enjoy it. We started a project, and after a year it started to take shape. We were freer and had more fun. We’re not going to say that everything was launched at once, but with the album and some good dates, it really helped us to get going.
A Yes, but it doesn’t say why Black Box Revelation, so why?
D We flew to China and had an accident. We found a strange black box, as if emptied. We recovered the data, and listening to it we discovered a multitude of sounds. And that’s the story behind our name.
A And does your first album come out of the box in the same way as your second? Are there any differences?
J The latter is more psychedelic and bluesy, more live-oriented too. Whereas the first one was more garage rock. This new blues is more direct and straightforward. And by going in this psychedelic direction, we’ve taken a more Back Box Revelation route. Yes, more us. It gives us more freedom. We really like that vibe. The new blues is a lot more like us, yes, a lot more!
A And the tour goes well?
D Yeah
A It’s often “Sold Out” according to the newspapers
D Tonight? Or always? It really depends on the country. In Belgium almost all the time, in France quite often, and in the rest of Europe it happens. But in Paris it’s sold out, yes.
A So all’s well
D Yes, it’s great, we’re touring Europe making music.
A And in the USA?
D We’ve done some big showcases and festivals over there, and it’s very good for live shows to go to the USA.
J We’ve been from LA to NY, and we’ve played in venues where the Rolling Stones themselves have played, which are great experiences!
A What’s next for you?
J A third album, and creating a lot. Staying in the studios, looking for new sounds, new styles, new ways of making us evolve. And then, back on the road!
D ON THE ROAD! OH YEAH!
A Oh yeah! And what’s rock? What’s rock’n’rolla?
D Huuum! It’s yeahhh! It’s awesome.
J Staying at home making music, and loving that life. We’re two guys and, well…
D We’re just two, two guys making music and it’s already crazy.
A And when you’re fifty, what will you be doing?
D Music! (laughter)
J We’ll try to stay in shape by eating vegetables (laughs), but OUR vegetables. And we’ll make “jam, a little jam house to sell jam”. (In French during the interview).
A And before we finish this quick interview, what would you like to say?
D Go online, check out our myspace page, and enjoy the moment with our music.
Baden Baden
Adam Kesher
The Black Box Revelation
Alexandre Fisselier – [email protected]
Mathilde François
ICKY THUMP
Robin Adili (Icky Thump)
Cette publication est également disponible en : Français (French)
