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Brat repackingFrance’s Phoenix reboot and rise to rock stardom
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by ERIK LEIJON Based purely on the presumptuous title of their fourth record, Wolfgang Amadeus Phoenix, and the title of said album’s opening track, “Lisztomania,” it becomes evident French pop-rock quartet Phoenix aren’t afraid to mix and mash influences. Mozart and Liszt are about as diametrically opposed as one gets in classical music—the former a child prodigy and perhaps the most beloved composer in history, the latter a flashy virtuoso and lady magnet considered to be the world’s first true rock star. Phoenix fit the dichotomy well. Growing up in what guitarist Laurent Brancowitz calls “pretty much the most boring city in the world,” the Parisian suburb of Versailles, the longtime childhood friends educated themselves on a steady diet of American and British rock, hip hop and electronic records before trying their hand at their own unique interpretation of traditional pop. The musically bereft scene from which the quartet came did produce a couple of famous electronic duos: Air, who Phoenix played back-up for on a remix of “Kelly Watch the Stars,” and Daft Punk, who Brancowitz used to play with in a rock band named Darlin’. “[Growing up in Versailles] allowed us to do something maybe a bit different because we never saw the difference between making rock, folk or electronic music,” says Brancowitz. “For us, the only division in our music collections were things we liked and things we didn’t. “When it came time to make our own music, there wasn’t any period of reflection, we just wanted to make something pure, even if we didn’t understand the context.” After the heavily Krautrock-influenced It’s Never Been Like That was released in 2006, the group left their record label and decided to entirely self-fund the next record, feeling it was necessary to take time to recapture a certain childlike enthusiasm they felt may have been lost following their 2000 debut. From renting a boat and travelling the Seine river in Paris to recording in New York City, the group tried plunging themselves into new situations, hoping it would spark those dormant creative impulses. Wolfgang Amadeus Phoenix takes the childhood influences heard on their previous efforts and adds enough syrup and production layers to make it the ultimate dense, lovelorn pop juggernaut. It’s no surprise a fan-made video for “Lisztomania” featuring footage from famous ’80s Brat Pack movies, primarily The Breakfast Club, has become a YouTube sensation. “There was a feeling of a new beginning on this record. The first record was full of enthusiasm, the same spirit of experimenting we had as children, and on this new album, we had the spirit of being pioneers.” The band also brought back co-producer Philippe Zdar of Cassius fame, who worked on 2000’s United. The band is famously protective of their sound, to the point where, for a recent Saturday Night Live appearance, they mixed their own performance on stage, an unheard-of occurrence on a show notorious for terrible sound, and bringing in Zdar only came about after they started working in his Montmartre studio. “Every Friday, he would stop by to pick up records for his weekend DJ shows, and he always seemed to know exactly what to say if we were stuck or hesitating. Eventually we were looking forward to his advice so much, we realized he was involved in the process.”
WITH AMAZING BABY AT LA TULIPE |
