Original album art by: Anne Careil. Handmade collage by B.
Radical Kitten are a rrriot post-punk, queer feminist band from Toulouse, France. We caught up with RK’s Marin (bass-vocals), Marion (drums) and Iso (guitar-vocals. Très bien!
ALL: Hi! We’re Radical Kitten, a post-punk-rrriot band from Toulouse! We formed two and a half years ago and we just released our first album Silence is Violence.
How did you first discover music?
MARIN: I was very young, my uncle played guitar really well and even sang with his dog (and it also sang!), I think it marked me.
ISO: very young too, I come from a family of classical musicians and started playing an instrument at an early age.
MARION: As a child, I was surrounded by my father and his sisters who played folk songs and sang together at family gatherings. We had instruments at home: violin, piano, drums, banjo, auto-harp…
What did finding the underground Riot Grrrl feminist punk movement mean to you?
MARIN: It was really nice to discover a scene with people I could identify with. I think the Riot Grrrl movement showed me that women could also play music on their own, to have this kind of insurgent energy, these powerful personalities at a time when the pressure of the codes imposed on women was very important, it opened the field of possibilities and it was an important discovery for the teenager I was, even if musically I always remained much closer to hip hop.
ISO: As a teenager, I listened a lot to Nirvana, and that brought me to the Riot Grrrls (and to many other excellent bands by the way!). I always liked raw and/or energetic music, most of the time with women singing, and hated rock bands of old macho guys! Even if I didn’t identify myself directly with the Riot Grrrls musicians because I didn’t consider myself as a girl (without putting then the word trans on my identity) I was, obviously, very touched and concerned by their words and their rage (which are still completely up to date!)
MARION: I actually don’t identify too much with the Riot Grrrl movement as I never really listened to it. But I admire those women who, at one point, even in underground music circles, had to shout out loud that they were able to make music as well, put their rage on the table and took the space they deserved and needed. It surely inspired other women until now to make music the way they want, not necessarily with a sensual aesthetic or whatever, just to be musicians.
What inspired Radical Kitten to get together?
ALL: We don’t pretend to do more than just enjoy making music together, we are lucky to have this musical and friendly/human connection, it’s hard to find!
You’re from Toulouse, France; what’s it like where you live? Is your song ‘I’m Bored’ about where you live?
MARIN: In fact, this song wasn’t about Toulouse but about the city where I come from even if to tell the truth in France at the moment with the confinement, I imagine that we’re really starting to get bored everywhere!
Recently you released your album Silence is Violence; where did the album title come from?
MARIN: The title refers to the silence that invisibilizes social problems. It’s also a nod to the album that is anything but silent!
ISO: The title of the album can be understood in many different ways, that’s also what we liked. When we chose it, last February, we didn’t yet know that it was starting to be one of the slogans of the Black Lives Matter movement…!
What kinds of things did you find yourself writing about for the new album? Do you have a process for writing your lyrics?
MARIN: The lyrics come spontaneously after the instrumental part. I compose them like a musical instrument, my approach is more rhythmic than literary.
For the subjects I am very often inspired by personal stories, dramas. It has often been a good way to move on. We also deal with political subjects: coming out (‘Blind’), fed up with work (‘Say Shit’), transphobia (‘Shitty Questions’) of which Iso also wrote the lyrics etc…
Songs ‘Say Shit (to your boss)’, ‘Sorry’ and ‘Full Circle’ were originally on your demo Contre nature han that came out last year; how do you think the songs changed from being on your demo to being on the full-length album?
MARIN: Clearly…. the tempo!
MARION: Those songs were released just a few months after we started to play together. That was the very beginning, so since then, we improved in lots of ways. For the full album, we knew better what sound we wanted, and had a much better look at the whole thing.
Can you tell us about recording Silence Is Violence? You recorded at La Grange Cavale with Manuel Duval, right? What was one of your favourite memories from making it?
MARIN: Recording in socks next to the wood stove that was heating with the view at the field and of course spending time with the kittens and our great hosts!
MARION: When we recorded the voices at the end, it was funny (and a bit sadic, I admit) to hear Marin singing with her raw (nude?) voice, without any effect and no music. It was a bit like a little kitty trying with all his strength to be a tiger. I also loved to watch how the whole recording was driven by Manuel, see how to use the software, and all the technical parts.
ISO: I very much appreciated those moments when we prepared the meals all together with our adorable hosts, and enjoyed them together (the French side!). The emotion on the last day to hear for the first time our compositions with such a sound, and also a huge laugh when that same evening we listened again to our very first rehearsals with notably the song ‘I’m Bored’ in an embryonic state and at a ridiculously slow tempo!!!
Who did the cover art for your album? It’s really beautiful! What can you tell us about it?
MARION: Thank you! Anne Careil did the cover art for the album. We actually recorded the album at her house and we got along well. We learned that she was a great graphist and drawer, she made the cover arts for Rien Virgule (her band with Manuel) for instance and it’s very cool. Her website can be found here. We asked her to make ours, she was very thrilled at this idea, and paid close attention to our “expectations” while keeping her own style.
What have you been listening to lately? Is there any other cool bands in your area we should know about?
ISO: I’m currently looking back at the Raincoats’ discography, which I really love! For more recent stuff: Sweeping Promises, Cheap Meat, Special Interest, Immigranti, Lithics, Romain de Ferron.
Cool bands from Toulouse: Docks – a great shoegaze slow-core instrumental duo, in which plays Manon, from Hidden Bay Records, super cassette label.
Petit Bureau – a post-punk duo that has just released a great first album.
The Guilty Pleasures – a very cool surf post punk band which has also just released its first album, and in which Emily plays, from the very cool label Dushtu records (and who had recorded the demo for us too!).
BooM – super power-violence noise band, in which some friends from the Pavilions play, the place where we rehearse.
For the Riot Grrrl style, there is Trholz from Toulouse, and from Bordeaux, Judith Judah and LKill.
To finish, it is not a Riot Grrrl band but we recommend you very strongly to listen to La Chasse de Marseille!
What’s something that is important to Radical Kitten?
ISO: Having fun playing together.
MARION: Getting famous!
MARIN: [Laughs at Marion’s answer]!
ALL: What is really important for us is… cats!!
Is there anything else you’d like to share with us or tell us?
ISO: We dream of doing a tour in Australia, I’m just saying!
MARIN: As Iso said.
MARION: Here is a very nice recipe I’d like to share with you, it’s a Turkish soup or “mercimek corbasi” very easy. In a big saucepan, you sear with olive oil, a big onion, a big potato, 2 regular carrots, tomato pulp, some garlic. Add some spices: cumin, curcuma, paprika, chilli. Then, you put 500 grams of coral lentils and water. If you find dry mint to add, it’s perfect. Mix it and eat it. Bon appétit bien sûr!
SLIFT’s music takes you on an epic journey to the far reaches of the Universe and back! Their latest slice of heavy sci-fi psych-rock album Ummon is excitingly one part Homer’s Odyssey and one part sci-fi trip. We interviewed guitarist-vocalist, Jean F. to find out more.
SLIFT are from Toulouse, France; what’s it like there? Can you tell us about your neighbourhood?
JEAN: Toulouse is a beautiful city made of red brick, and there are a lot of musicians here. Many very good bands, one of my favorite is Edredon Sensible, they are two percussionist and two saxophonist, They play a groovy and heavy trance, with free jazz elements. I think they will release their first album this year. There’s also BRUIT, evocative post-rock, and Hubris, krautrock warriors. We have a bar (Le Ravelin) where psych and punk bands from all over the world come to play. It’s the last bar in the city to regularly book great bands that play loud and fast. Many venues have closed, the city’s politics sucks and prefers to set up hotels in the centre of town rather than clubs and venues. But I hope things will change in the near future.
What have you been doing today?
JEAN: Today, we are going to pack vinyl to send them as quickly as possible despite the health crisis. Post offices are idling right now and that makes things more difficult. And then, as we are out of town at the moment, we are going to walk in the hills. We play a lot of music as well.
Two of you are brothers (Rémi and Jean), you met Canek in high school; what kind of music and bands were you listening to growing up?
JEAN: When we were kids, our parents listened to the Beatles, and a lot of blues, like John Lee Hooker and BB King. We’ve always loved the blues. Personally, I like the idea that we are still playing the blues with SLIFT. A different blues, but a blues anyway. In high school we listened to a lot of punk stuff, Rancid, Minor Threat, then Fugazi, No Means No and Melvins. In the van on the way to the rehearsal room, Canek’s father introduce us to South American music, psych stuff and jam bands. And of course we are extremely fans of Jimi Hendrix.
When did you first start making music yourself? You played in punk bands?
JEAN: We started playing together in high school. Rémi was still in college, we played punk in Green Day mode at the very beginning. It’s all good memories! We quickly started to add instrumental phases in the compositions. Then we played in different bands before meeting again and forming SLIFT.
Who are your biggest music influences?
JEAN: The Electric Church of Sir Jimi Hendrix.
Photo by RABO.
What made you start SLIFT?
JEAN: We came from punk, and after discovering Hendrix, we started to lengthen our songs, to stretch the structures and especially to jam. It was 4 years ago, we wanted to start a band and play these new songs. We did not know at all the modern psych scene, when we had the chance to attend at the last minute a Moon Duo concert in a museum in Toulouse (we grabbed the last tickets by begging the porter to let us in). This concert was an important event, it was just after leaving the museum that we decided that we were going to record and tour. After that we have of course dug up the modern psych scene, there are so many great bands! People often associate us with this scene, and it’s very cool, but to be honest, today we don’t listen to bands like King Gizzard or Oh Sees anymore. We are more on the groups which, I think, influenced them. Like Amon Dull, Can, Hawkwind, all the 70’s German scene, 70’s Miles Davis, electronic and prog stuff. Among the current groups, we really like the Doom scene, and we particularly love a trio of English bands: Gnod, Hey Colossus and Part Chimp. We listen to a lot of film music. I would love so much that one day we have the opportunity to make one!
What does the band name SLIFT mean?
JEAN: SLIFT is the name of a character from a novel, La Zone du Dehors by Alain Damasio. Read it, you wouldn’t regret it. This author also wrote a masterpiece, La Horde du Contrevent. Probably my best reading experience.
How do you think SLIFT’s sound has changed over time?
JEAN: At first we just wanted to play a lot live, so we recorded quickly, and we composed quickly. Today and for the first time on Ummon, we took our time. The composition method has also changed. On our first two recordings, we all composed together in the rehearsal room. Now I mainly compose on my side, which allows me to go to the end of the ideas and to have a precise vision for the album. Then we test the songs in rehearsal and in concert, we jam the songs, and we talk a lot about where we want to go, what sound, what we are talking about. Personally, it is for me a more accomplished and coherent record, because I have the feeling that we have put a lot of personal and honest things in it, whether in the music or in the concept and the conception of the album. And in terms of sound, we often listen to new things, so it’s always enriching the way we play music I guess. Maybe in two years we will make an album with only percussion (… still with fuzz haha).
You are influenced by cinema and books, especially science fiction stuff; what are some of your favourite books and films?
JEAN: La Nuit des Temps – Barjavel, Rick and Morty, Hyperion cycle – Dan Simmons, Le Dechronologue – Stephane Beauverger, La Horde du Contrevent / La zone du Dehors – Alain Damasio Alien / Prométheus.
Your album Ummon is s real journey for the listener; what inspired the songs themes? It tells a story? It’s a concept album?
JEAN: It is mainly inspired by Homer’s Odyssey and science-fiction trip. The first part tells of the titans’ ascent from the centre to the earth’s surface. The construction of their Citadel on a drifting asteroid, then their departure towards the stars in search of their creators, a journey which will last forever. The second part talks about Hyperion (a Titan born in a Nebula during the endless drift through space) and his exile from the Citadel. After wandering for millions of years, he will return on Earth, alone, then dig the Son Dong’s cave with his bare hand. Hyperion rests at the far end of the cave, and its body will be the breeding ground for life which will soon climb out of the abyss and cover the Earth.
Where does your fascination from space come from?
JEAN: When you are a child, space is synonymous with adventure and wonder. Growing up, what I find cool is that it’s probably endless.
Can you tell us a little bit about recording it? It was recorded at Studio Condorcet by Olivier Cussac, right?
JEAN: You’re right, it was Olivier Cussac who recorded it, and we both mixed and mastered it, we wanted to have as much control as possible over the sound of the record. Olivier is a very talented musician, he play a lot of instruments, and he’s a very good arranger. He mainly composes film music. He has a fascination with vintage stuff, so his studio is a real museum. It is a dream to be in a place like this. He liked the album project a lot, so we took a full month to do it. The atmosphere was super chill, we had the best time!
What is your favourite thing about Ummon?
JEAN: It is a team effort. We feel fortunate to work with very talented people who passionately love doing what they do. Guthio (who designs the clips and makes the video live), Olivier, Philippe Caza (who designed the artwork), Clémence (who came to sing), the fearless Vicious Circle Records and Stolen Body Records. Hélène, who made so that everything goes well and that ensures that we never sleep on the floor after the shows. And the coolest thing is that these people become a friends.
What do you strive for when playing live?
JEAN: We try to never do the same concert twice. Some pieces are lengthened. We don’t want to recreate the record on stage, its two totally different listening experiences. The record, you can listen to it at home with headphones, it’s an intimate and personal experience. Concerts are an experience of the body, it’s about feeling the volume and the vibrations and seeing humans playing live music.
Original photo by Josephine Fournis. Handmade collage by B.
French band Mary Bell’s music is a combination of classic punk rock, American hardcore, grunge and Riot Grrrl. We spoke to them about what Paris is really like, got some insight into each member’s history of musical discovery, what they do outside of music, how they pulled through a controversy surrounding the band’s name and of new music in the works.
Mary Bell are from Paris; can you tell us a little bit about where you live?
VICTORIA: I’ll start with the positive things: Paris is very beautiful, it’s thriving in culture, you can go to a different gig every night, things to do and to see are really endless. It’s what keeping me here: as a hyperactive person, I constantly need new things to do and things to see, and Paris is the only city in France that has lived up to those needs. Still, Paris is quite small compared to other European capitals, so I think the DIY punk scene is quite small as well. That means that you easily get to know the other bands and that the different music scenes tend to mix with one another, which is a good thing, to my mind. Otherwise, Paris is a tough city to live in: the population density is very high, gentrification is everywhere, the cost of living is skyrocketing… A lot of people, especially young workers or students can’t afford to live in Paris anymore.
TRISTAN: Yes, gentrified, expensive, violent for a lot of people, especially if you have not a lot of money. What you notice the first when you come here is that there is a lot of impolite, not friendly, stressed and aggressive people, because the “everyday life” in this city makes you become this way. Everybody is always running and there’s no room for everyone in the transportations, and if you want to come home after a long day of work you have to walk on other people to do so… It does still shock me after living here for more than 10 years. But I guess it is normal for one of the most crowded place in the world (people per square mile: 55,138…). And it does rain a lot and the sky is almost always grey. Everything here is grey, the sky, the buildings, the pavements, and it makes you become grey too. I guess this is one of the most greyish city in the world too. The good side is that it is not that hard to find a job here compared to somewhere else in France, and there are a lot of shows and exhibitions happening. But forget about the romantic bullshit.
ALICE: I live in the countryside, two hour drive from Paris, in the “Center” region of France. It is beautiful, this is the “King’s region”, there is a lot of castles from the Renaissance area and a lot of forest… But it’s REALLY CALM. I go to Paris when I want to see shows and friends!
What kind of music and bands were you listening to growing up?
VICTORIA: Growing up, I was listening to lots and lots of music, different styles, different eras, and most of it I’m still listening to now. I had the chance to grow up in a musician family: I listened to classical and baroque music (Bach, Marin Marais…), pop, new wave, rock, hard rock… And then, at the beginning of the 90s, grunge exploded and it totally blew my mind. I listened to bands such as Nirvana, Hole, Babes in Toyland, Melvins, Soundgarden on repeat. Those bands still stick with me nowadays. At the same time, I was really into hip hop and French rap. One of my favorite bands at the time was the French band NTM (it stands for “Nique ta mère” which you can translate to “Fuck your mom”, haha). I discovered punk and hardcore music a couple of years later while hanging with some skateboarders at a party. Again, it totally blew my mind. I was already what you can call a music digger, as music has always been the most important thing in my life, and so, started digging into punk and hardcore.
ALICE: I went to music school, I listened and studied classical music, specifically Baroque. At home my parents were listening to Led Zeppelin a lot, The Doors, The Beatles, Pink Floyd, we danced on Madness… Then I took my big sister’s CDs, I mainly remember screaming to Hole and Nirvana, but also dancing on Madonna and Ricky Martin… At 11, I discovered internet and Sum41, Marylin Manson, Avril Lavigne… Hahaha. I was living in the suburbs, at fifteen I went to school in Paris and discovered the Punk scene.
TRISTAN: I feel like I’m still growing up, so I don’t know what you mean exactly in term of period. So, when I grew up the most (in height) I think it might be when I was five to eight or something, the bands I listened the most were AC/DC, The Cure, Helloween, Sex Pistols, Bad Manners, Deep Purple… Just stealing my parents’ old tapes and records in the attic. A lot of “bed jumping” happened for me as a kid on these things.
GAÏLLA: I grew up listening to what my parents were listening to. Artists like Jimi Hendrix, Led Zeppelin, Jefferson Airplane, Grateful Dead, Zappa, and a lot of blues and jazz too. And I feel like it really impacted me. But during my adolescence, like a lot of teenagers, I wanted to listen – to try – every kind of music. I listened to rock in general, metal/ heavy, punk, grunge but also Hip-hop/ R’n b etc.
Photo : Céline Non.
How did you start playing music?
VICTORIA: I started playing the piano at an early age, and then the viola da gamba, but stopped everything when I became a teenager: the academic way of learning music was becoming a real pain in the ass for me. At that time and since then, most of my friends were musicians, and were playing in bands. And all of them were guys. I could have picked up a guitar, but somehow, being a girl, and having internalized a lot of fucking sexist ideas, I didn’t feel legitimate to do so and even thought, at some point, that it just wasn’t for me. What a bunch of bullshit!! But I guess those crazy ideas kind of stick with you growing up, even when you start to realize that it’s not true and such. While getting deeper into Feminism and meeting more and more female musicians, a lot of them reclaiming from the legacy of riot grrrls, I realized that I could grab an instrument as well and start a band. By the time I realized that, I was 30!! Yes, I guess you can say that it took me some time to get accustomed to the idea… The cool thing about all this is that as soon as I started playing the guitar, I knew exactly what I wanted to play, what I wanted to sound like, and what it was gonna be for me.
ALICE: My big sister was singing in a professional choir, my parents did the same for me and my little brother. I started by learning the piano at 6, then at 10 I went to “half-time teaching music school”, school in the morning and music studies in the afternoon, every day from the age of 10 to 18. Then, at 16, I started screaming. I have to say it was not really good for my lyrical voice, which I gave up on at 18.
TRISTAN: My mom offered me a guitar when I was in primary school. I was too scared and shy to ask to or begin something like this by myself, but was always listening music, so she just bought me the piece of wood and gave it to me. I never stopped playing since…
GAÏLLA: I tried playing bass when I was +/- 15 because my dad was a prog rock and jazz bassist, but I wasn’t very studious. I liked it but it wasn’t really my thing. And at this time, drums looked out of reach for me, so I put this idea aside. But when I turn 26, it feels like an urge to play music again, especially drums, it feels like it was “now or never”. So I took a few drum lessons, and a few days later, I met Victoria and we started Mary Bell.
How did the Mary Bell get together?
VICTORIA: We started playing with Gaïlla while both learning how to play our instruments. After three or four rehearsals, we decided we wanted to have a band, and started looking for musicians.
ALICE: I saw an announcement Victoria posted on Facebook, “looking for a singer”, I was shy to but I answered because I really wanted to sing in a band and I liked the bands she mentioned as references. I passed an audition, we played “Rebel Girl” from Bikini Kill (which is too high for my voice by the way), and a composition she and Gaïlla made. I also played the bass but it was so, so hard for me to play and sing and the same time!
TRISTAN: Playing guitar, they were searching for a girl to complete the band, I’ve insisted a lot and it finally worked out as a boy and as a bass player. I was like, “let me join you, I can play some really dirty bass, and I can record the band too”, and blablabla… I don’t even know why I wanted that much to be in that band in the first place. I was homeless at the time and searching for an additional band to have fun after a long day of work before sleeping who knows where. But I don’t regret my insistence in joining it at all, for what it gave us in terms of records, tours, and funny times. (Haha…)
Photo: JetLag RocknRoll.
Can you tell me something interesting about everyone in the band?
VICTORIA: Gaïlla is a huge fan of Mariah Carey, Tristan is a highly trained virtual plane pilot and Alice bakes amazing carrot cakes.
ALICE: Ok, this is very interesting: Victoria’s zodiac sign is Scorpio, Tristan had a chicken pet when he was little, Gaïlla has her driving license but don’t let her drive!! Hahaha
TRISTAN: Vicky can tell what your future is with tarot, Alice knows a lot of weird medieval music stuff, and Gaïlla can sleep up to 23 hours a day when we tour!
GAÏLLA: We all love listening to horror/crimes podcasts while on tour but, I don’t really remember because I was sleeping.
Your band is named after a British serial killer from the ‘60s; how did you find out about her?
VICTORIA: I first heard of Mary Bell while reading Crackpot from John Waters, where he cites the Mary Bell case as one of his obsessions. Somehow, Mary Bell being a child at the moment she committed her crimes, it really interested him and I totally can understand why. There really is something striking in the Mary Bell case, her being a child, her murdering two children, her trying to manipulate people in thinking that another girl committed the crime… She was just 11. Children are believed to be innocent at that age. Anyway, I think we all thought it matched well with the idea of our band.
Mary Bell was forced to cancel a concert in the UK in February last year following outrage from the families of Bell’s victims and other locals; how did this situation impact the band?
VICTORIA: It all started when a lousy so-called journalist wrote a piece about us claiming we were making lots of money from the name ”Mary Bell” + getting fame out of it (uh hello, we’re a DIY punk band, we’re not making any money…) The worst is that she reached out to the families of the victims to have their say about it (I guess otherwise, they would have never heard of us…). They went to their local MP to send a lot of letters to cancel all our shows in the UK… We had no choice but to let go, and take the shitstorm, the insults and the death threats (which we used to receive daily on our Facebook and YouTube pages). What a time…
ALICE: Victoria worked a lot for this tour, I was really sad but really angry for her because of all this work and efforts being ruined because of this sensationalist press. (Who’s really making money out of people sadness?) We still had a great time with our few concerts, meeting amazing people and having very interesting talks about England and safe spaces.
TRISTAN: Oh yeah, and I get beaten in the middle of the night coming home from one of these shows, by a bunch of crazy guys with knives and no t-shirt in the middle of winter. UK is a very nice place currently, it is really a giant safe space, safe from common sense. I hope it will get quickly better for them and our friends and family there in the future, but it does currently look bad, with clowns at the head, and a lot of racist and violent people. The shows we did were good but when talking to locals, I can see that the country was a mess in the middle of the Brexit thing and it was not an easy time for them at all. So yes, it was a little bit weird sometimes during the tour.
At the end of 2018 you released EP HISTRION on it there’s a song called ‘I Used To Be Kind To People In Crowds, But That Gave Me Murderous Tendencies’; what sparked the idea to write this song?
ALICE: Within a week, a friend of mine lost her daughter and another one had a stroke. It was so sudden and unfair, my friends and I suffered a lot. I’ve always been the “nice person” holding the door, smiling to people, saying hello to my neighbours, never complains… But the day after the funeral, one of my neighbours screamed at me because of my car. First, it was a nonsense, secondly, the fact she was so concerned about this tiny little shitty thing made me furious, I screamed at her, she didn’t say anything, she thought of me as a little smiling girl and was visibly shocked. I pictured my friend losing her child and people complaining to her about everyday problems, it made me furious… And “gave me murderous tendencies”.
GAÏLLA: It’s a really powerful song, and very intense – overwhelming sometimes – to play. I think Alice put the right words on a feeling mixed with hate, frustration, helplessness that we all felt once in our lives.
Your drummer Gaïlla has done the artwork for all your releases before the latest one which is by artist Stellar Leuna; what made you choose her for the art?
GAÏLLA: I studied graphic design so I started working on MB visual art pretty naturally. We love esoteric-witchy-weird stuff so it fitted well. But we also are big fans of Stellar Leuna’s work, she’s really talented. Her art perfectly reflects our music too: It’s dark and goes straight to the point. So we asked her and sent her our music. She loved it and got inspired by it and… ta-da! She did an amazing job, we were thrilled.
Have you been working on any new music? What can you tell me about it?
VICTORIA: We’ve been working on new material since the release of HISTRION, and we currently have 12 new songs we were supposed to record in April, and release on vinyl later this year… Unfortunately, due to the COVID-19 pandemic, all our recording projects are on hold. We’ll see how it goes…
ALICE: New things: donuts, trains, cats.
VICTORIA: Yes, the themes tackled in our new songs are very eclectic!!
What’s your favourite things you’ve been listening to lately?We love finding new music!
VICTORIA: I’ve been listening to lots and lots of music since the beginning of the quarantine… I think you can all find them easily on Bandcamp. Bands like Slush, Gaffer, Cold Meat, Nightmen, Thick, Lizzo, Malaïse, Mr Wrong… Also, please check out my friends Bitpart and Litige who both released records this year on Destructure Records.
ALICE: I mostly listen to podcasts because I need to hear people speaking during this confinement! I really have phases… Today it’s raining so I’m listening to Douche Froide, Traitre, Litige… Yesterday I spent the day listening to rock steady (guess the weather), but sometimes I really can’t bear it. (Apart from Phyllis Dillon I’ll always love).
TRISTAN: a lot of Australian bands actually, I guess you already know them all (Civic, Eastlink, UV Race, Destiny 3000, Cuntz, Venom P Stinger, Gee Tee, the Stroppies…) Aside from that : Destruction Unit, Slippertails, Sun Araw, Pussy Galore, KARP, Part Chimp, Marbled Eye, Lungfish, Red Aunts, Poino, Liquids,… Not new stuff, but these are a lot in my ear currently and I am not in a ‘music searching’ period.
GAÏLLA: Like Alice, I mostly listen to podcasts lately. And during the confinement I listen to really chill stuff as Julia Jacklin, Angel Olsen, Beat Happening, Hope Tala, Cate Le Bon, Part Time, Charlie Megira, Deerhunter, Homeshake, Los Bitchos, No Name and some jazz/ classic rhythm and blues and some 70’s folk music.
Outside of making music what do you do?
ALICE: I’m a music teacher, I don’t do anything outside of music. Haha. Just kidding, I live for food, we cook a lot with my boyfriend and love to have home-made fancy dinner with a lot of red wine. We’re doing gardening too, crafts activities (I made my own garden furniture and I’m really proud of it! Haha). I’m still studying musicology, I love to learn and research new things, I read and cuddle with my cat Mystic.
VICTORIA: I’m currently the International Digital Communication manager for a NGO. That sounds really pompous, but really, my job is great!! Also, with a friend, I’m running women and non-binary people empowerment workshops through music, it’s called “Salut les zikettes!” which I guess you can translate to “hello, musicians!”.
TRISTAN: I work as an IT engineer five days a week, aside from that I drink a lot of beers, like to read technical stuff before the beers, and more “artistic” stuff after, with my cats not far from me. I cook a lot too, and like to eat really tasty food.
GAÏLLA: I’m a graphic designer but I started to study jewellery recently and I hope to do that full time at some point.
Gimmie Gimmie Gimmie Zine 