Paris can be an intimidating city when it comes to navigating independent music, especially since there’s really no other city like it in France and “electro” tends to drown everything out. Wandering into the small boutique called Balades Sonores can be like opening the door into another hidden Paris. For one of the biggest cities in the world, it offers an unmatched intimacy and not just because the place is really tiny (in the typical Parisian style of ultra-small shops and elevators). Located in the area called Pigalle in the 9th district of Paris, it’s crammed full of music and oddities like crocheted pillows that look like vinyl records and T-shirts custom made by the shop’s house designer and artist, Chicamancha.
Monday, July 14, 2014
Thursday, July 12, 2012
The Real Fairy Tales of Fanny Roz
Photo by Konstantina Tomoska
Once upon a time there was a musician named Fanny Roz. Her story involved snail races, tree houses, smokey French jazz bars, magical beaches in Chile, and a tale of two cities. It was the best of times…yeah, okay, it all really sounded like it was pretty much the best of times…
The whole story of how a French musician that studied in Toulouse ended up on a label in Barcelona (Bcore) is one that Roz has nicely divided into four chapters and posted to her websites. She has just released Prend Son Souffle et Saute!! (“take a breath and jump”) and just as her tale has many parts, each track tells a different story. She sings them while plunking a piano or plucking a guitar with a myriad of tempos, shifts, and vocal oddities tht make it hard not to think of Regina Spektor. The influences of the two places are evident all over her record, as it’s sung in French with a few dashes of Spanish.
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