Track By Track: Apollo Noir - A/N

Music

Abstract and deranged, experimental yet beautiful, Apollo Noir's new album on Joakim's Tigersushi Records is certainly a shock to the system in the best sense. Across twelve tracks he delivers a genre defying assortment of music packed with obscurity and mystery. As a collector of synths and hardware the variety on offer across the record is vast and diverse. From gorgeous soundscapes to glitch like euphoria it is a mish mash of spendour.

Apollo Noir is the alter ego of French producer Remi Sauzedde, having grown up in the remote countryside his album sounds like it came from anywhere but.

He guides us through track by track below in a splendid fashion.

POST REJECTO

Spoken word / ambient satanico / new age / love and creation. The track actually starts from the howl, I wanted to scream once on my first album. This is my way of paying tribute to the American hardcore of the early 80s that changed my life.

Colour: A sort a of shiny cream.

Season: Fall in Paris.

Inspiration: Mutant, war, straight edge.

Setting: Written 3 days after Paris bataclan’s terror attack.

NAKE MOISE

Futuristic club. Ultra violence.

Colour: Orange.

Season: Summer in Amazonian forest.

Inspiration: Anticipation movies such as Her and Philip K. Dick Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?

Setting: Minimal setup: jp8 + tr909 + modular. I’ve Always been fascinated by what future could be… This song is my futuristic music utopia.

SAMHAIN

Song name in tribute to the group of Glenn Danzig and the Irish religious festival of the dark season. "Megalomania / epic" piece that ends in chaos.

Colour: Gold.

Season: Winter in howth, Ireland.

Inspiration: Ireland, danzig, megalomania and mental illness.

Setting: I've listen to a lot of music since my childhood: from grind music to minimalistic stuff or pop songs with universal melodies. This song is the blend of my influences.

CODING AUGMENTED REALITY

Song recorded in one shot. I wanted to keep this live performance aspect like CAN or NEU !. This is perhaps the only "dancing" track of the album as well.

Colour: A pastel pink.

Season: Spring in year 2036, in Tokyo.

Inspiration: Early 90’s warp records VS uzbek & rica magazine (anticipation / science / sociological mag)

Setting: Minimal setup: jp8 + tr909 + tr808 no mix take in one shot live.

PROJET

More a theme than a song, this track refers to the moment of my life when I really chose what I wanted to do with my life. It's a kind of picture. I would love to see people listen to this song in a huge space, away from any visual, sound and social pollution. It is my sonorous oasis.

Colour: White.

Season: No season.

Inspiration: Space & time.

Setting: This song was made an early sunny morning, the sun was waking up… it was like if I wrote the song for this moment.

I LOVE REAL MOUTAINS

A love song written for my wife in 2008 and finished in 2015 by having a computer read a poem that my wife had written to me. I love this contrast between very intimate poetry and robotic reading devoid of any feeling.

Colour: Blue.

Season: Winter.

Inspiration: My wife and my birthplace : « Les Bois Noirs »

Setting: That is how musically I would ask my wife’s hand again.

SHARED SYSTEM

Violence Ambient. I use the voice of Adam Bainbridge (aka Kindness) during his reading at the RBMA. A passage in which he depicts a facet of the music industry without tweezers (homophobia, racism …). Pogo / moshpit from 2 min 20.

Colour: Dark red.

Season: Fall.

Inspiration: Hope VS despair.

Setting: I was facing inequality & judgement. But I never want lower myself by being sad or violent, we gotta be optimistic.

DELUXE ACE

To be lost, both physically and psychologically.

Colour: Silver.

Season: Winter.

Inspiration: Black holes.

Setting: When I really get lost, I can’t get focused on anything and I lack of confidence. Not the happiest song I’ve made haha.

PROJET 2

A form of minimalism very assumed, where the method is almost more important than the finality. Title recorded live, two tracks. Space.

Colour: Lemon green.

Season: Winter by the sea.

Inspiration: Minimalism and brutalism.

Setting: When you live in a big city, sometimes you have to find peace to escape. This song is pure peace for me.

P.4.5.1.5

Cornerstone of my album. This is the song that prompted me to create the Apollo Noir and to write other songs. I wrote it the day after the attacks of November 13, 2014, Paris. It had been several months that I had not made music and it is with this title that I began to produce again. It was done very quickly and spontaneously. It was important to be fresh and fast, I like this step. The use of the TR808 and TR909 was mandatory for me on this piece. I wanted to use old instruments in a modern musical context. A mixture of feelings between rage and unconditional love have totally guided me to the writing of this piece.

Colour: Pastel red.

Season: Fall, Paris.

Inspiration: Hate, love, forgiveness, violence.

Setting: Wrote this song the day after the terror attacks in paris. We were in a kind of state of « war » , for the first time of my life I realized what this would mean and I was afraid of what the future would be for my daughter.

GIM KORDON

Tribute. Two parts: desolation and illumination.

Colour: Yellow.

Season: No seasons, timeless.

Inspiration: A sunny end of day in a smoky room, like in an 80s movie. And also by teenagers year in a noise rock band.

Setting: I first did that track for a present to a friend of mine. I’ve loved it so much that I’ve kept it for me.

FACT

I wanted to end this album on a tribal trance unhealthy and minimalist. I wish I could hear this track in a club and dance on it, but I think it will never happen.

Colour: Purple.

Season: What I imagine what a summer night in Berlin would be.

Inspiration: Modern Love records music minimalism and rawness.

Setting: Most of sounds of the songs are made with a TR808 running through a pitch pedal, that is how I started the song. The beat / bass made with the 808 only.