Label: Aguirre Records

Enhet For Fri Musik周辺好きは是非!!2023年重要作漸く入荷!!7つのヨーロッパレーベルが手を組み共同で出版した、Nina Harkerの片割れApolline SchoserとフレンチベーシストThomas Coqueletによる男女コンビKOUの1st LP。いきなり日本語のナレーションに始まり、以降ギターの爪弾き、ボーカル、シンセ、フルート、ピアノが唐突なドギツイ音響加工と共に放たれる最高にぶっ飛んだオブスキュア・フォークミュージック集。[I'm Not Sitting In A Room]なるアルヴィン・ルシエの面白オマージュや、ジョアン・ラ・バーバラ風のヴォーカルを取り入れたDIYポップまで、しっかりとしたアヴァン精神も受け継いだ激推しタイトル。











New project by Apolline Schöser (half of Nina Harker) & Thomas Coquelet.

Apolline & Thomas have been performing since 2022 under the KOU guise with 24 electronic harmoniums. Producing dense layers of tones & overtones. On their debut album KOU steers in another direction. The harmonium appears occasionally, but more prominent are delicate guitar pluckings, distant vocal effects, synths, flutes, piano strokes, a touch of musical magic and Apolline’s jazz not jazz vocals.

As soon as the needle drops it’s clear we are jump-cutting straight to the other side of the mirror. Cats purr, a woman sings as if asleep, drum machines stutter and warp and Alvin Lucier is not 'sitting in a room that is not different to the one you are not in now’. If you’re already confused, join the club. But, it’s the good kind of confused, a bewildering experience akin to the first time hearing the Faust Tapes or watching Inland Empire. Wait though, as pigeons coo and the tape machine clunk-clicks a gorgeous weirdo version of Roger's and Hart’s Blue Moon emerges to let you know this isn’t just dada splurge, there’s a genius pop sensibility at work here too. Side two takes us further into the murk with mournful detuned brass, stoned Joan La Barbara-esque vocalese and a droning Farfisa hymn, before ending with another too-tempting snatch of DIY pop. Some of the references are recognisable. All kinds of 70s/80s European art prog - think early Battiato, Pierot Lunaire’s Gudrun, Lucia Bosè and Gregorio Paniagua's Io Pomodoro etc etc. There’s a strong whiff of 90s us goof-off surrealism too- Bongwater, Siltbreeze, Royal Trux’s Twin infinitives, the damaged folkier side of Alastair Galbraith, Half-Japanese, early Beck even all feel relevant.

Like an oddball group of friends you might meet by chance and end up weirding-out with for days, the minds behind this deliciously odd music allow you to stay for a while in their strange subcultural world. You might not want to live here forever but a short trip, while it lasts, rewires your brain for the better.

Played, written, recorded and glued at home and on the road by Apolline Schöser & Thomas Coquelet
Mixed by: Manuel Duval & Thomas Coquelet
Mastering: Marlon Wolterink
Typographies et maquettes: Apolline Schöser

In co-production with :

- All Night Flight (UK)
- Animal Biscuit (FR)
- BeCoq (FR)
- El Muelle 1931 (ES)
- La République des Granges (FR)
- U-Bac (DE)