Soleil Zeuhl Festival, Paris Sept 18th

Hi Dudes,

The first dedicated Zeuhl festival occurred in Paris on Wednesday Sept 18th at Le Zebre hall, (a sort of Art Deco cabaret) about one mile westbound from the Père Lachaise cemetery. This was organized by the Soleil Zeuhl label boss Alain Lebon, and in some ways, the date was chosen to attract the very international crowd (coming from 13 countries) that was heading to this year’s 7^th Rio Festival in Carmaux the following week-end. Indeed, among the illustrious crowd were the giant (by talent at least) Udi Koomran, the label owner Steve Feigelbaum, the local writer Stéphane and Sylvie (from the Traverses magazine) and the well-known Aymerix Leroy (from the Calyx site and numerous books). Among the usual faces, were Ian NogBad, Lutz (the famous German photographer) and yours truly, but sadly our buddy Martin/Alucard could not make it. I’d say the balance was 50/50 between foreigners and locals.

The venue is a small club (around 110 seats, including a balcony) that seems to have a very eclectic programming, including jazz, circus acts and most likely Go Go Dancer (we are in Paris after all). The place comes with an excellent ventilation (I was rather worried the place would be a sauna after the first band) and an excellent sound-proofing. Although warned to be on time because of an extremely tight schedule (because the hall had to be emptied at 23h00 hours, bands included),  the doors opened a half-hour late (under intermittent rain showers), and the check-in was slow, since there were no printed tickets, just a list of names at the “gates”. Each band was allowed a 50-minutes set with no encore, and a short interruption with a minimal sound check for each band. This worked so well that the evening ended right on time, the last could’ve easily played an extra 10-minutes without creating a schedule problem.

The first band of the evening, Unit Wail, gave us a typical dark prog (somewhat similar to the now-defunct NeBeLNeST) with much Zeuhl into it.  The quintet chose to have the drums up front, but sideways (so the crowd could see clearly the skin-banging) on the left side of the stage. It was a choice that three of the four bands scheduled that night would also adopt. Oddly enough the keyboard player chose to set his wares on the floor and play on his knees. I felt sorry for his back. The band featured mostly stuff from their brand-new second album Retort, which was on sale in the hall. (6/10)

Up next was probably the most-awaited band of the evening, the extremely melodic Setna, which for the occasion had invited two members from Neom (singer-guitarist Yannick Duchene and Fender Rhodes player Caroline Suavage), but in the course of their set, a few more guest appeared, including a lap-steel player and two percussionists. At one point, they were eight on stage, but were the only band to have the drums at the back, but still on the left side, of the stage. They played all the material from their second album Guérison (out earlier in the year), which did feature Duchene. A very solid and almost-spiritual performance, with some incredibly delicate moments, especially the instrumental and percussion passage.