INVASION PLANÈTE LIVE IN BORDEAU
A video I found a while back of Porn.Darsteller & La Seduction Des Innocents (aka Le Syndicat Electronique) live in Bordeau, France, recorded in 2004. Two of my favorite electronic musicians — I would kill to see a show like this live.
These guys were very influential in introducing the ‘minimal wave’ sound into the electro scene, and for me personally it was thanks to Invasion Planéte that I discovered artists like In Aeternam Vale, Echo West and Bakterielle Infektion, which opened up the doors to this whole new (to me) genre.
Porn.Darsteller and La Seduction Des Innocents Live set tracklisting:
Porn.Darsteller:
L’Ingénue
Holocaust
Wedding Day
La Seduction Des Innocents:
Le Menteur Étendu
Strawberry Flower
MERRY XMAS
Merry Xmas babies.. I love you all oh so tenderly
THE MEN WHO KILLED THE BEAT
Horfe & Tomek x Le Syndicat Electronique.
Two of my favorite writers on some hardcore street level bombing shit with a soundtrack from one of my favorite electro musicians. Best thing I have seen on Youtube in a long long while!
Le Syndicat Electronique – The Men Who Killed The Beat
Horfe & Tomek getting teenage kicks
YVES SAINT LAURENT
Yves Saint Laurent 1936-2008
A rare photo of Yves Saint Laurent sketching up a design — a true master of his trade at work
TEENAGE JESUS & THE JERKS – ORPHANS
Teenage Jesus & The Jerks – Orphans
The anti-everything of No Wave was a collective caterwaul that defied categorization, defiled the audience, despised convention, shit in the face of history, and then split — Lydia Lunch
Lydia Lunch is fucking badass. It’s hard not to be inspired by someone with such a fuck you, anti-commercial, DIY attitude. An angry — and intelligent woman, she is predictably hated by many but in my opinion Lunch was, and is one of the realest people in music, straight up legit.
I came across Lydia Lunch by chance, I first heard the name after seeing her in the film clip to Porn.Darsteller’s Brigitte, in which a scene of a nude Lydia writing lustfully on the floor from Richard Kern’s film Submit To Me Now loops hypnotically on a TV screen. Sometime after I saw an LP of her first solo album Queen of Siam at a record fair and though I hadn’t heard her music took a chance and bought it. I’ll post something from Queen of Siam later but as you can guess ever since then I have been a huge fan of her work.
Orphans is the opening track of the pink EP from Lydia’s first musical venture Teenage Jesus & The Jerks. One of the most important names in New York’s short lived but influential no wave scene, Teenage Jesus’ sound is an abrasive, all-out assault on the senses. Though they are probably not too familiar a name outside underground circles, and despite leaving only 18 short recorded tracks they were a huge influence on later post-punk bands including The Birthday Party and Sonic Youth as well as the burgeoning noise scene.
I think the film clip posted at the top was made by a fan but unfortunately I don’t have any more details.
COPENHAGEN TRAINS – VANDAL TACTICS
Copenhagen Trains: Vandal Tactics film trailer
Copenhagen Trains – Vandal Tactics (A3)
So I think I must have watched this trailer about a hundred times by now. Copenhagen Trains: Vandal Tactics is a soon to be released graffiti movie documenting the train scene in Danish capital city Copenhagen, and in particular a tribute to the 2nd generation S-Trains of Copenhagen, those infamous red steel monsters that were the object of desire for generations of writers all across Europe and the world, the last of which was retired from service in 2007.
Nearly 10 years in the making, Vandal Tactics is the fourth and final edition of the Copenhagen Trains series, which started out on VHS tape in the mid 90s. The series has featured all the greats of the Dansk graffiti scene as well as countless guests from all over Europe and the world.
As well as fucking dope Dansk graffiti footage, Vandal Tactics also has an amazing electro soundtrack produced by some of my homeboys in CPH. The soundtrack was written and produced especially for the Copenhagen Trains DVD, consisting of 10 tracks of dark and heavy analogue electro. The drums are raw and lo-fi, and all synth parts are hand played giving it a tense and edgy feeling which perfectly capture the atmosphere; tracks “so fat you can almost smell the rusty tracks and feel your fingers stick to the cap”.
Copenhagen Trains: Vandal Tactics OST 12″ on Cytown Records. From my collection
The soundtrack was released as a 12″ on Copenhagen electro label Cytown Records (who also released an AMAZING Nancy Fortune track produced by The Seducers along with several other great 12″s)
The DVD will be released soon, I for one am hanging out for my copy! A little bird also tells me that I will soon be interviewing Copenhagen graffiti God Cave for Cold Crush. So you know the motherfucking scope, stay tuned for the rawness baby!
Official Site: www.copenhagentrains.com
LES INVALIDES – AU REVOIR
A couple of weeks back my homeboy Alex Nôrinh sent me some tracks from a new 12″ he had picked up, C’est Passé by Les Invalides. It was released earlier in the year on obscure Polish/German label Automatik-Datamatik as a super limited single sided 12″ of only 77 copies (including 22 extra special white vinyl editions, one of which I am dying to get hold of!)
C’est Passé instantly caught my ear — three electro-wave tracks with an unmistakeably warm analogue sound, minimal but well-written step sequenced bass and drum machine rhythms with some possibly hand-played synthesizer parts layered on top. I was already enjoying the first two songs but the third, Au Revoir really grabbed me. A bare CR78 drum pattern backing a slow, romantic and melancholic synthesizer track. Beautiful.
Once we got over talking about how great the tracks were, Alex and my discussion instantly turned to who these ‘Les Invalides’ could be! Our first guess was that it must have something to do with Invasion Planéte. It fit the bill perfectly — minimal analogue electro/wave tracks, pressed on a limited 12″ with little to no information existing on the artist. The Invasion Planéte music and newer releases on Musamore and Zusammen are always shrouded in as much mystery as possible, but of course a little hunting around the net couldn’t confirm this either way.
I got in touch with Interfunk, who runs the Automatik-Datamatik label — but typically, predictably, as it was always going to be, he wasn’t able to tell me much more:
“Les Invalides are a forgotten Parisian synthesizer group started in the early 80s. They sent me these tracks from a recently discovered tape which had never seen the light before. It’s also a mystery for me…. I don’t know if there is more stuff still existing. I was told that a vocal version of Diable Danse has been recorded back in the old days, but I have never heard it… they tell me a lot of tapes with the old recordings are lost, so can’t say if there will be discovered one day to release another 12″…”
Sooo, the mystery remains unsolved for now. In fact the most I can tell you about this record is the impressive list of vintage analogue gear that was used in producing the tracks, boasting:
Roland: CR-78, Jupiter 4, Juno 60
Promars: System 100M, System 100 (Model 101 & 104)
Moog: Minimoog, Prodigy, Satellite
Arp: Sequencer, Odyssey, Axxe
You can buy the 12″ (a few copies left on black vinyl) directly from Automatik Datamatik. They are a completely independent and not-for-profit label working without a distributor, so show some support for great underground music and pick up a copy.
Oh yeah, if anybody can shed some light on Les Invalides or has some music for me to listen to, hit me up!
POP YOUR CORK
I can’t quite put my finger on why this may be, but every time I see Scarlett Johansson in this ad it makes me want to drink Moët. Like pretty badly
