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When I started working on my 8th album in August 2021, I was freshly out of making my 7th album, The Tunnel and the Clearing, which I had finished a mere 8 months earlier. The pandemic and my decision to retire from live playing shortened the promotion cycle, so I went back to the studio, eager to start something new. I had a rough concept in mind, that of exploring the notion of “reality”, a theme I often thought about given how my life – like so many others – felt “taken over” by the digital realm.

At first I gravitated towards making songs that sounded a little like The Tunnel, still singing, using the Yamaha Reface-YC organ through the Grandmother, and the Elka Drummer One. But little by little – and you can see this if you have a look at my archived stories LP8-1 and LP8-2 – I became consumed by synthesis. I had so much to learn and explore that in spring 2022, I came to the conclusion that 1) I didn’t have enough hours in the day and intellectual energy to keep up the “level” on all of my instruments 2) the album was going to become thoroughly indigestible if I kept everything 3) synthesis was a much more subtle and efficient tool to explore the notion of different shades and dimensions of reality. So I made the drastic decision to reduce the setup to just the Moog Grandmother going into either the Moogerfooger MF-104M Analog Delay or the Roland RE-201 Space Echo. As always when I make drastic artistic decisions, it was a relief, and this tighter focus enabled me to finish the album a few months later.
The idea of the suites is loosely based on baroque and classical music, each movement having chords and motifs in common with the other movements, but using different synthesis settings, to explore this idea of “the same thing” (in this case, notes) *not* being the same thing (a different sonic embodiment). I will do a detailed video on the sounds of “Subterranean”, but I think the 3 movements give you a great idea of how this concept is materialized in the album.

I worked for 14 months non-stop on this 8th album, 8 months have now elapsed since I finished it, so to say that sharing the first tracks with you fills me with joy is an understatement. It’s my first instrumental album since 2007’s Les ondes silencieuses, my first double album, clocking in at 58 minutes, my love letter to synthesis in the shape of my beloved Moog Grandmother, a love letter to music in general for helping me to navigate the waters of life’s complex, multifaceted reality: mine, yours, everyone’s.

I hope you will enjoy the 3 movements of “Subterranean”, named in reference to how deep the subconscious and our emotions run. The first movement made me feel like I was playing guitar in a rock band again, the second like I was almost making music for the dancefloor (*almost*) and the third like I was suddenly touching something very fragile, that might possibly break, and that was trying to come up to the surface.

You can read more about the album and preorder the gorgeous first vinyl edition (and the CD!) via the Thrill Jockey website (CAN SHIP FROM THE US OR GERMANY – PLEASE DISREGARD THE UK AND ROYAL MAIL MENTION AS THIS IS A WEBSITE ERROR) or Bandcamp (SHIPS FROM THE US ONLY!)

Words cannot convey how privileged I feel to have had a one-off collaboration between two immensely talented Mexican visual artists, Andrés Gómez Servín @gomez_servin_andres for the artwork and Daniel Castrejón @dnks_mx for the layout. Andrés did the artwork of my previous album The Tunnel and the Clearing and I knew I wanted to repeat the experience, but I have also long admired Daniel’s impeccable design for his Umor Rex label, so it is an honor that both accepted to work together on this, to produce this gatefold edition printed on reverse board, with full colour inner sleeves, with a very special first edition of metallic gold vinyl for the Jour (Day) sides and metallic silver for the Nuit (Night) sides.

Last but not least, incredibly for someone who had decided to stop playing live back in 2021, I am going to go on tour, starting in the US! Many European dates are still to be added, there will be updates very soon! Head over to my SONGKICK for all details and tickets.

It’s been such a long wait for me, but on 7th June you will finally be able to hear the first songs (literally the first, as it is the suite of 3 movements that opens the album) from my new double album Thrill Jockey Records

Expect a tour announcement pretty soon afterwards, with more dates to be added later in the year. Apart from the US where I will be doing a traditional “condensed” tour, the idea is to spread the dates over fall, winter and spring 2024 so that it’s not too hard for me physically and psychologically, and so that I don’t leave the kitties on their own too often and too long.

In the meantime, I have just made available on Bandcamp “Conditional”, the song I made to betatest Moog’s Moogerfooger plugins, as a free or pay what you want download.

On the new album I don’t sing, so this was a great opportunity to do something different and sing lyrics that hold a lot of meaning for me.

“Conditional” is about a deeply-seated psychological mechanism at work in almost everyone, myself included: the tendency to make one’s sense of “happiness” conditional on a particular desire being fulfilled. The idea that once you get a certain something, either material (objects – for musicians typically an instrument or piece of gear -, a house, a specific living place, a travel experience, etc) or immaterial (a relationship, a career or work achievement, a certain physical appearance, a physical ability, technical proficiency at a skill, perceived wisdom or intelligence or any other quality, etc), *then* you will be happy. Of course the wheel of life spins in a different way… Making this song was part of an attempt to both accept and overcome this very human aspect of myself.

Photo by Luis Torroja

PS: I make my own clothes: Grainline Studio Hadley top in Metermeter sanded cupro, self-drafted shorts.