Paris With a Parisian

Yodelice comes back with a soulful “Square Eyes”

After” Cardoid” in 2010 which shaked the French music scene, Maxim Nouchy, aka Maxim Nucci, aka Yodelice, strikes again with a new eerie album.

It’s amazing how a Banlieusard, born in Créteil in the late 70s, can grasp the spirit of anglo-saxon music. Of course, Yodelice studied in London, and goes back to the UK regularly. But there is something more. Something in his soul, that makes him create like a native these typical ambiances of Americana sounds and Liverpool pop. And it that sense, he is rather unique.

His music mixes so many influences and instruments that listening to Square Eyes, you will recognize about 20 different artists, from David Lynch to Beirut, from Men at Work to Interpol. You will hear blues, rock, funk and techno. But at the end, only one sound will remain, genuine, typical, undefeated. It’s the Yodelice sound.

If the music is obvious and amazing, the guy is harder to seize.  Coming from the mass media (His first “job” was to arrange the songs of the winning team of Popstar, a French version of Pop Idol) and having worked with big big names ( Vanessa Paradis, Calogero, -M-), he seemed to have a hard time scoring for himself. Until, like Stefani Germanotta, he got possessed by another being. A sad clown, a weird soul that came out of a lost dimension to give him the strength and the doubts to raise and step on the stage. That’s Yodelice.  With a tear painted on the cheek and a mysterious Baron Samedi look, Yodelice ate Maxim Nucci (just like Lady Gaga ate Stefani Germanotta) and is making his way to the music Hall of Fame.

Square Eyes is like a long lost road at dusk, crossing eleven different landscapes. “Fade Away”, the first single released, is just like an 1980s car bowling through forgotten Lousiana towns on a highway.  Further down the road, “the Answer”, with its simple tune, is like a sweet promenade in an old convertible on a sunny evening in Kent, with a smile of cosmic happiness of just knowing that it is not the answer that matters. “I worship you” takes you on a restless race in a ghost town, which turns out to be a funky labyrinth, where the prayer becomes a spell of insanity. And the road goes on and on, in dust and heat, probably back to that crossroad in Mississippi where, indeed, Maxime Nouchy must have met Yodelice…

If  Square Eyes doesn’t offer tunes as catchy and emblematic as “My Blood is Burning” on Cardoid, it is in itself a whole piece of art, where each sound makes sense with the rest. The haunting drive in Yodelice’s anima is by far best expressed in this latest effort.

Wanna try? There you go:

Yodelice: Fade Away

Yodelice: The answer live