Underwater Pilots is the project by the German duo Manuel G. Richter and Grégoire Vanoli. Signed to the Funker Vogt owned label Repo Records, their very first release "Tranquil places" offers electropop with a fair amount of complex structures and danceable beats. We dragged both pilots out of the freezing winter water for some comments.
Manuel We like music with 4/4 beats like used in trance for example but I
also like intensive listening music, soundart, neue musik and jazz, just
everything. We prefer good music of all styles. In the pop, future pop
and electro scene are many good, fat sounding productions, but often
one can hear that it's just the new techniques (computers and software)
what makes it. Many releases are just boring after 3-4 titles, because
the real musical feeling is missing.
Grégoire My favourite electro-sound is psytrance (FreQ, Cosma, etc). What I
really like in this kind of music is that it has a four on the floor
beat and a complex network of sounds laying on it. It just doesn't get
boring. I love music in which I can still find new elements and musical
relationships after having heard it 20 times...
Sideline The tracks "I will fly" and "Ice cream" are less
conventional, yet very powerful. It is my guess that
you have been listening more to bands like Blancmange
or Men Without Hats than actual the contemporary
synthpop we know from Iris, De/Vision or Wolfsheim,
right? "Tranquil Places" is not just another synthpop
album, is it...?
Manuel I know the music of Wolfsheim but haven´t got
any records of them and of De/Vision I only know the
new album and I was surprised, it is fucking good.
Very good and clear songs, wow. But I never heard
Blancmange and don´t know much of Men without Hats.
Most of my record collection is about experimental and
intensive listening stuff or just normal music, a lot
of electronic but less synthpop. "Ice Cream" and "I
Will Fly" ... sure we didn´t care about anything while
composing these tracks, we just wanted to find a good
sound for our idea. And we wanted to create a style
what can be played at home and perhaps in a club, too.
Grégoire Hehe, yes. Producing "I will fly" was like an odyssey. We went
through about 4 different versions until we agreed with the song. And to be
honest, if we hadn't released the album I'm sure it would sound
different. Man, am I glad we released it... And no, it isn't just another
synthpop album. It's our album.
Sideline What do your eating habits have to do with music? I found it rather
odd to read that Manuel is a vegetarian living on musli and salads and
that Grégoire is fond of beer and pizza... The UP sense of humor?
Grégoire Well. Having a piece of pizza in one hand, a control of a synth in
the other and a beer in the third, wow! That's sound!
Sideline The overall sound makes me belive that you guys are
soundwizzards, there are not that many sounds if not
any that one hears often. What does production mean to
you? Is the band in fact a live band as well?
Manuel Until now it was just a studio project but we
want to go out on stage in 2005 and will begin to
prepare within the next months. Production means to us
to give every song-idea the sound it wants to have. We
try to follow the music and not to press the music in
a specific (sound-) form.
Grégoire Yip. For me, writing a song is a long and
slow process. I often hear a few bars as a loop and
after two or three minutes WHAM, yeah yeah yeah that's
it! And with a big smile in my face, the song goes on.
And that makes me happy. So for your question what
production means to us: To feel better.
Manuel But first of all we tried to write good songs.
I really don't know if we reached this goal. Maybe
we'll find out by playing them live. But in general I
think that you can play a really good song in every
style you want. Have a look at Sting for example. He
plays his songs as rock, reggae, blues, jazz, just
everything, and it works. And yes, we like to work on
sounds and we spent many hours on that.
Sideline Can you tell me something from your background,
relevant studies or so? What other bands have you been
in?
Manuel I had drum lessons for 8 years. Between 1988
and 1997 I played as drummer and electro-man in rock
and pop bands, experimental and tribal bands. I did
some electronic projects. Since 1997 I create
experimental music, did many concerts and some
releases with my solo project xabec. I am music
therapist and I love music and sound. Every sound can
be music, sound is a form of communication. With music
we can tell things what we never could describe with
words.
Grégoire My first real instrument was a piano. I had
lessons for about 9 years. Aged 14 /15 I teached
myself guitar and bass playing. And then I got an old
computer from my dad. The first thing I then bought
was a sound card... oh oh.
My first band was a rock band. We started with playing
covers and later to compose our own music. Really
wasn't easy because everyone of us had different
ideas. Then my brother Raphael started to play in a
funk band called Café Mix.
I often had sessions with this band playing the bass,
I was the sub bassman for concerts. With this band I
really got lots of experience. In '97 I met Sebastian
Scharner, and we reactivated his old Fusion band
Xerck. Btw with singer Tim Fockenbrock / Ravenous.
Unfornately that band existed for just 5 months
because almost every member moved to another
town for studying purposes or things like that.
2000/01 I recorded a few songs with Tim but until
today they remain unreleased. Except one that came out
on the dedon sampler.
In the last five years I worked on many songs on my
own, in styles from ambient over psytrance to pop â...
lots of them with my brother on guitar. I think I'll
make a big release one day...
Sideline The press release states that you got to learn about each other
via a re-mix, tell us something more about this 'encounter'...
Manuel Oh it was nothing special, we just re-mixed an
old tune of Grégoire's former psy-trance project.
Grégoire For me it was the first hands-on contact
with analogue modular synthesis.
Sideline Cute to see that your site is optimized for the Mozilla browser
Firefox... Why this very open declaration of war so to
speak?
Grégoire Hehe. In the beginning I had some problems
with the Opera browser... The site didn't show up
correctly and so I wrote that note in the start page.
I was a bit angry, yes. Things got more and more
complicated, and in that moment it felt (a little bit)
like a declaration of war... Later I got the problems
fixed, but I didn't remove that note. Maybe i's time
to do so... By the way: I have been asked to put our
songs on our website. This will be part of the next
update. We also think about putting small samples/
segments on our site for remix purposes.
Sideline I must admit that I had never heard of you guys
before, so how did you end up on RepoRecords, the
playground of Kai and Björn from Funker Vogt? What do
you expect from them? What do they offer that made you
sign to Repo?
Manuel I know Kai from school-times many years ago.
Over the years we met here and there. He did very
rofessional work for Funker Vogt in all this years and
when we started with our project I contacted him at
once. Why work with a bigger and anonymous label when
I know what professional power this small one has?
Sideline You are joined on the label by another exquisite act
that draw my attention, Birthday Massacre, a
completely different style yet it offers a very nice
diversity to the label. Do you see this as an
advantage and why?
Manuel Oh I don't know. The label is still at its
beginning and maybe they want to check out the
resonance on the different styles. I like that. In the
moment many (big) labels try to sign only bands in a
very small bandwidth. With the first release the
complete marketing front stands up. CD, web,
promotion, merchandise and everything and if it
doesn't work there will be no second or third cd. No
one has time, no one invests time and no one wants to
loose money. But by all this they ignore one fact:
wich good and now successful band had their break
though with the first cd ? We need time and love to
develop - like flowers need water.
Grégoire I like their music. I'm glad they're on the
same label.
Sideline Was it easy getting signed for you?
Manuel Yes and no. We had contact with the label since
we did the first demo. At that time we had no promise,
but we informed Repo of every step and so we came
together.
Sideline I have the vague impression that you don't really have
a soft spot for the dark electro that is getting
popular once again, I mean that your music seems to be
too stylish for that... Am I correct?
Manuel Hmm, I like dark electro a lot and I can truly
imagine to play in that area. We use elements of that
scene and the actual sound aesthetic, because I really
like it. Many people, agazines and dj's locate us in
the future pop area and that's totally ok to us as a
start point. But for us that is just one aspect and
not everything. I don't know how our style will
develop and we are 100% open to work on it and change
things. We don't do only future pop or whatever. First
of all we want to compose good music with interesting
sounds and arrangements, nice melodies and some power.
We want to hear the songs a hundred times without
getting bored. I wouldn't say that we are too stylish,
some other acts are more modern and stylish.
Grégoire It's not that dark in my head. But I don't
think our music is more stylish than other ones, this
depends on ones point of view. Our lyrics talk about
feeling a bit depressed. In my eyes every human is
depressive from time to time, thats absolutely
natural. But for me it is important not to let that
feeling getting too strong. For me, making music has a
great part in this. If I reach only a few people with
this intention, I'm really glad.
Thanks a lot for the interest in our music and the
interview. Greetings, Manu & Grégoire.
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