Even though I speak French I have never had the chance to interview a French band, this changed at this year’s evolution Festival. Nouvelle Vague were in the UK for a couple of days, and on the 21st of May they were playing on the main stage in Newcastle. After their mint set I went off to interview them.
As we were in England it seemed like a natural thing to start the whole thing of on the topic of weather. Apparently the day before playing Newcastle they were very much impressed by the amazing weather conditions that Manchester had to offer for a festival over there. Having lived through the ‘floods’ (imagine this said with a French tonality to it) in Glastonbury and a storm in Brighton, and many other unbearable wet conditions, this was an amazing rain free weekend. Ok not all rain free, later, after the interview, it did start raining a whole lot more than all the skimpy dressed people could deal with.
But weather is not the only thing that we talked about, after all this was an interview about music. Nouvelle Vague listeners are probably intrigued by how the band decides which girls to take on tour, after all the CDs feature many different vocalists. For the Newcastle date there was only one girl, Mélanie, present. She makes sure that the other girls cannot make it to the … Well she sang on the first album, at the fist ever Nouvelle Vague concert, and can sing all the songs anyways, so the question is not even raised anymore if she should come along or not. Maybe I should have done a bit more research, because during the interview I found out, that the French singer Camille used to be part of Nouvelle Vague.
The success story of Nouvelle Vague is rather particular. I wanted to know how they managed to get themselves accepted internationally as a cover band, as a French band. French bands after all are not generally know that much outside the language borders (please ignore Air, Daft Punk, David Guetta and others), and well cover/tribute bands do not sell that well either do they? Quite truthfully they admitted that they themselves cannot really explain where this success comes from, but they are happy about it. They are accepted due to the creativity that goes into the songs. Their success in France is not the same as it is abroad. This is due to the fact that they have not played that many gigs in France, people have the music but do not think of them as a live band.
Their covers are different; they are special, covers of songs that people might not know that well. Of course one is bound to know “Love Will Tear Us Apart” or “Just Can’t Get Enough”, but not necessarily the other songs that are on the albums. Mélanie pointed out that you listen to a Nouvelle Vague Album like you listen to the album of any other artist, as there is something new to be discovered. For example in “Guns of Brixton”, light is shed on the lyrics as it is sung differently. The original by the Clash is very contextual. Or in the song “Love Will Tear Us Apart”, the suffering is not felt the same way. It is a calm, melancholic song, but there is not the painful history that comes with it. Nouvelle Vague’s music is a tribute to the original. It is a means of letting the younger generation access the music made by the people that are 2 or 3 generations away from original artists.
The Nouvelle Vague albums are a mixture of favorite songs, and songs that seem interesting to be covered by Nouvelle Vague. The new album (Out 29th of June in the UK) features a cover of Magazine, who they adore, and they hope that this will get people to discover Magazine. The new album features some of the original artists in the cover versions of their songs.
We also talked about music in general. France did not have something like the Beatles, the French music scene evolved in a different manner (musical Darwinism I’d call this). Today bands such as Nouvelle Vague, Justice and Phoenix etc. are getting a lot of attention outside of France. We can never have enough music in our life! New Wave music was a niche market music style. It was not for everyone, it is the beginning of indie music (not the mainstream indie). It was an alternative to the existing society. Later on in the day I watched the Maccabees perform, they were of Nouvelle Vague’s liking, after all they have a New Wave sound to them. I’d better not tell you how they perceived the View…
Thanks a lot to Marc, Olivier, Mélanie and Gerald of Nouvelle Vague for this interview that was 27 minutes long, and was marked by overlapping conversations.
If you can see Nouvelle Vague live, then I advise you to do exactly that. If you will be in France on the 23rd of June then check them out in Paris.
Interview by Solveig Werner
