colleen

I was so busy last month trying to get the master of LP8 finished that I didn’t realize that on 22nd October, it was the 20th anniversary of my first ever Colleen release, the Babies 7’’ on Parisian label Active Suspension. By a beautiful coincidence, I approved LP8’s masters bang in the middle of the anniversary date!

On 23rd October 2002, I also played my first show as Colleen at the Batofar in Paris, one of my favourite venues at the time… I can’t seem to find photos of that first show, an Active Suspension showcase, a label I had discovered through my favorite radio programme at the time, Helter Skelter on Aligre FM (thank you Viviane Morisson!!!)

By then I was about to complete my first album Everyone Alive Wants Answers, which was 95% sample-based, but I had already decided that I did not want to use a computer on stage (have stuck to that decision ever since) and that I needed to play actual instruments, which is why I took out my electric guitar again (soon to be replaced by my classical guitar at the next show). I had bought my first Boss Loopstation by then and my first Line 6 DL4 (which I had first seen used by label mate My Jazzy Child – who played with me on a couple of songs on that show – on an organ + delay combo, a la Terry Riley).

This proved to be a multiple turning point:

1) I had an actual physical record available, which was unbelievable for someone who grew up in the 80s-early 90s and could only fantasize about such things.

2) I had taken this first step of playing my Colleen music publicly for an audience, and it confirmed what I had felt when I had played small shows with my noisy pop/rock group in my late teens: I really loved it

3) This was the start of my live practice influencing my album-making: I went back to instrument-playing even though the Colleen project really was born from sampling.

The 7’’ has long been sold out, but is available digitally on my Bandcamp and all platforms.

“Babies” was included on Everyone Alive and I will always regret not incorporating “Good morning sunshine” as it’s one of my favourites.

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