2023-05-30 02:21:00
Are we done with the “containment albums” ? Not quite. Three years after the first restrictions caused by the pandemic, after the isolation of almost all artists, there remains a handful of non-essentials who have not yet shared the fruit of their confinement, a bastard creative period for musicians. To deliver Baltimore, their first joint package, Fuzati and Le Motel have been patient, perhaps preferred to wait for the eruption of album releases following the resumption of activities to calm down a bit, so as not to be drowned in the lava and in the mass. At the cost of independence, the Versailles rapper and the Brussels producer have above all bought this luxury of time, which others, more subject to the imperatives of rendering, have lost. “We both have jobs on the side, so our life isn’t just about music, forward The Motel. It gives us great freedom, it remains our thing and no one has decision-making power over it. So, exit the innumerable industrial commands.
industry folle
Fuzati has been strolling for almost twenty-five years in French rap, masked, and therefore free. In the twilight of the 90s, he founded the duo Klub des Loosers with DJ Orgasmic, then invited a flock of rapper friends on the album the Club of 7 in 2006, building a reputation for himself as a vocalist and vocalist. Add to that some tensions between the representatives of what the press has very clumsily baptized the «alternative rap» and you get the impression of a somewhat dodgy misanthrope, who seems difficult to work with. However, this is false. Fuzati just wants to do her thing without being too bothered. “You must not become the whore of your music, he explains calmly. When it’s your livelihood, you make decisions that are influenced by your need to eat, by the business. And I don’t blame the artists who do that at all. The industry has gone crazy, you have to release something every six months so people don’t forget you, post stories on Instagram… Our approach to music is just different. It’s not false humility, but after twenty years of career, I still haven’t got used to the idea that people listen to me. I make music for me. And this album, we did it for us. We like it and we’ll see if it works or not. If it doesn’t work, who cares.”
Ce «on» therefore includes Le Motel, alias Fabien Leclercq, Belgian electronic musician with a touch of travel who dabbled in rap while working with compatriot Roméo Elvis, among others. Fuzati and him, separated by a good generation, met in 2018 in Brussels after a concert. Two years later, while France and Belgium are confined, they are bored. The rest is classic: they exchange music, reflect on common pieces from a distance, record each on their own and create, step by step, Baltimore, album centered around the theme of travel, then impossible. Fuzati’s writing becomes more contemplative, “more poetic”, but remains damn faithful to its aesthetics, to this phrasing of always which is recorded almost in one go. “And the takes are long, adds The Motel. Those that ended up on the album are often the first or second recorded. I read an interview with Billie Eilish in which she explains that her sound engineer cuts out every word, every sound of every sentence, that there are twenty versions of every syllable…” And Fuzati, laughing, adds: “Yeah, but she sells more than us.” It’s only played to a few hundred million listeners.
Eyes blinded
If Fuzati is a rapper, he is also a great fan of jazz, music that he plays during his DJ sets called the Very Jazz Club, or that he reissues via his label of the same name. Lately, he’s mostly been listening to ’60s records from Blue Note. “But I totally differentiate between jazz and rap, I compartmentalize thoroughly, he specifies. When I listen to jazz, I am a listener. Jazz-rap has been so done and well done that I don’t want to rub shoulders with it.” All the same, these very slight shortness of breath, these few phrasings next to the rhythm present on Baltimore wouldn’t they be indicative of a free approach, leaving room for the unexpected and imperfection? From a jazz approach finally? Fuzati answers in the negative: “Imperfections are not inherent in jazz. Back in the days of Blue Note, recording studios were very expensive. When the musicians came to record, they had the afternoon to capture the album. It was the same with all the music of the 60s. You came, you did your two takes, and you had no time to do it again. Today, we have so much time that it can take you four years to release your music. But having too many choices can also kill something.”
For Le Motel and Fuzati, this joint album is more than an album. Following its publication, they invested the Brussels art gallery Alice for five days, installed airplane seats there, invited the public and blindfolded him before sending him Baltimore in the ears. “It’s a project that can be listened to in one go under specific conditions, which was created with this in mind”, explains The Motel. They nourish the hope of being able to make the concept travel to other cities in Europe. But come up against the conditions of independence, having to manage everything as a small team, to do a little with the means at hand. “Freedom always has a price, concludes Fuzati. If you want more money, from the best studios, you can go to the big record companies. On the other hand, other people will have the right to look over your music, which may seem normal if they put money into your project. We make niche music. Not that we want to do it, but it happens to be like that. If you are aware of it, there is no point in trying to find another model. You have to be lucid. Pressing vinyl, organizing a listening in a gallery, recording, it requires being rational. Everything is paid for, therefore, and knowingly.
#Fuzati #Motel #chamber #rap #Liberation