Superflu
Et Puis Après, on Verra Bien
V2

Describing the first album of Superflu, released this autumn, isn't very difficult: a lot of sweetness in the present musical world, dominated by electronic music and noisy guitars.

This album is a real pop album, but not any "variety pop". One can be indifferent to it after the first listening, but that's just because we don't enter the universe of Superflu like any other pop group. It's an atmospheric record, but it isn't atmosphere music. It's graceful, with sensible words surrounded by a minimum of notes. Which is necessary to accompany delicate talk. The lyrics, with a rare emotional accuracy, are centered around the first meetings between a woman and a man, meeting new friends - Lettre à Ton Nouveau Fiancé, Elle et Lui, and Métropolitain - and separations, in brief a mirror of everyday life. As the singer says: "The fact that we sing in French get you in front of a literal reality ... I prefer the precision to the elitism".

Superflu is a band with 5 members: Nicolas (vocals and words), Sonia (vocals, drums), Sébastien (guitar, piano), Gauthier (bass, drums) and Gilles (violin, piano). Nicolas has evolved in the musical world for 10 years, first as the singer of the band Les Fleurs (The Flowers), influenced essentially by French groups like Gamine and Katerine. The references of Superflu are however few. There are only, as I remember, a few songs released on compilations. The most significant is the song Les Cartons, which was included on the compilation Panorama released by the label Le Village Vert - reviewed last year here at the Kafé - " ... a heady pop song which we can't get rid of ...", I wrote then. Now we should hope for an interesting first album.

Indeed, we aren't disappointed. After becoming impregnated with the sweet melancholy of the 12 songs, close to folk-American bands like Calexico, Palace, or recently the last album of Mercury Rev (Deserter's Songs, also released by V2), it's very difficult to come back to the present musical reality. It's a very acoustical album, dominated by the slow tempo of the guitars, the violin, the piano (except perhaps on Dieu que Cette Nuit est Belle and Elle et Lui), accompanied by Sonia's and Nicolas' vocals. Et Puis Après on Verra Bien is produced by Christian Quermalet and Dominique Brusson, musicians of Married Monk, with certainly an influence on the final result. In fact, this music allows us to listen calmly to the words with sometimes a bitter taste (1976, Les Cartons, and Monsieur Paul). A concept close to the intimate sound of the albums from Dominique A and his companion Françoise Breut.

On stage the band is also very unobtrusive, like being afraid of audience noise. Superflu is a careful band, and also has a good taste when choosing their live companions. After the support-job for Autour de Lucie for their first concerts, they will soon perform with Calexico and Mercury Rev in France, and also soon abroad?

Copyright © 1998 Patrick Dubail