How was the beginning? and what are your tips for the beginners?
I started music when I was 7 years old with classical music. Then I moved to Acid Jazz- Funk in the early 90’s, I was playing clavinet and rhodes in different band. Than I came to House Music by listening to some great artists as "Chemical Brothers", "Daft Punk", "Basement Jaxx" and a lot of artistes from Chicago and Detroit. I started produced some electronic music under the name "Stan De Mareuil" on my own label "Lafessé Records". I just had a ASR10 and I did everything on it (Sample/drums/bass). Then I could buy (with the money I get from the first records) more machines as an EMU 6400/bass station novation and some other cool stuffs :)
Why did you decide to stop your previous projects and create The Supermen Lovers?
The records I did under the name "Stan De Mareuil" were based only on samples and I wanted to do another project with more real instruments as I could play piano, guitar & bass.
So I started the project "The Supermen Lovers" with the idea to do something closer to real Funk. I did several songs with always the feeling of doing "House Music" by using some little samples but with the opportunity to play real instruments and put real voices on it. So some track as "Starlight ", "Diamonds for her ", "Hard stuff" and "Family business" were born in this way.
"The Supermen Lovers" gave me also the opportunity to do some real live with it. Not DJ but to bring on stage instruments and sequencers. I played a lot in funk band before doing electronic music and I wanted to have that feeling again : play real instruments on stage.
* Your sound is obviously influenced by the late 70's/early 80's music (like disco and funk) . Which french disco/funk albums do you think everybody should listen at least once? Which are your biggest influences? What do you listen in your home?
When I was kid I used to be a Huge fan of "Pink Floyd" then I moved to funk and disco at the age of 14. The first Funk record I heard was a « Fatback Band » album. I think the one with "Keep on stepping" in it. I discovered black music with artists as James Brown, The O’jays, The Ohio Players, Parliement and Funkadelic and many others…. Then I went to a more "White Funk" with band as " Average white band", "Rinder & Lewis", "El Coco" and some others guys… They made me go to Disco Music. After that I went to house music. And I m still fan of all artists in this period. In France there are now some great electronic artists from the "French touch" period as "Daft Punk", "Etienne de Crecy", "Alex Gopher", "Demon ", "Pepe Bradock" and label as "Roulé ", "Crydamour" " Versatile" and many others… I think everybody should listen to their albums. They are the base of the "French Touch".
Now I m listening to a lot of Nu disco, electro, and still old funk.
* "Starlight" was a huge success, can you tell how you made it and how it impacted in your life?
I began to started on a loop with a sample in it and a drum beat I did on it. Then I found the bass line and all arrangements around as Strings and Rhodes. I was working with a few machines (That I mentioned before). The melody of the song came straight to me as I was listening to the instrumental of the track. The male voice and female voice came straight to my mind ! I will always remember that moment. Then I had to find the voice that could fit with the track. I began to record first the female vocal with Nili. then I met Mani Hoffman and he did the male voice.
The track "Starlight" became popular very fast. It was everywhere a few weeks after I released it…That was incredible. It gave me the opportunity to release my first album "The Player". Then "The Supermen Lovers" became as famous as the "Starlight" and I could begin to produce a lot under this name.
* How does your creative process work?
It depends… I can start from a beat drum or a bass line or a sample. I have no automatic process. If I have an idea which come to my head I m going to play it and build a track around it. Or I can listen to a song and hear a little detail that can be a sample…than I build a track too around it. No rules !!
What do you use to make your tracks? What is your favourite set-up to make your DJ sets and play live ?
I m still a huge fan of Analog machines. So I m using a lot of hard ware as a Mackie 32/8 to mix and DP4 ensoniq/ Alesis reverb for effects. I m not fan of soft ware for keyboards. I m using Nordlead3/Nordstage and moog. I have a gibson stander for guitar and Jaguar Fender bass for…bass. And I m doing all audio sequences on Ableton Live.
I m doing most of the time Live act and I m just moving my studio on stage ! That s heavy… but that sounds great :) I m not alone on stage. I come with a guitarist and saxophone or trombone.
I m doing to a lot of Vocoder and I have different ones : Korg R3 and a Roland SVC 350. But I just bring the R3 on stage. The Roland is an antiquity.
I used to be addict to ASR10 Ensoniq and EMU 6400. But now I m done with it. I m on Nord now. Nordlead/Nordstage/Nordrack !! Love what those guys are doing :) those keyboards are really funky. But I have to say that a moog is perfect for electronic bass line. I just discovered a few months ago the Virus Indigo access… and I have to say that it rocks !
In your opinion which are the biggest differences between today's production compared to when you started?
Everything has changed. When I began to produced music I used only MIDI. Everything was more simple because you get less choices. There was only one way to produce electronic music : You use sampling machine connected in MIDI with drum station (MPC or others) and you mix all that on a mixing table with effects.
Nowadays everybody can produce music at home. I don t say that it will be good production every time but everybody can try to do it. And that is a good thing because as there are more and more producers you always have to be better.
You already worked with great artists like Rick Bailey (Delegation) and Norma Jean Wright from Chic, what's your dreams collaboration/partnership?
To work with such artists was a great experience. There are so many artists I d like to work with. That goes from Sade to Boys Noise !! Kate Bush, Conann Mockassin , Beck , AC/DC and many others… I could do remix for them and why not make a track fro them !! ;)
How do you define your music?
Electronic funky disco Pop Music.
*Which are your favourites places to play?
I love all kind of venues. Small ones, big ones. I love little club where people are close to you when you play. I love big festival when you see a huge crowd banging on your music.
In fact I love places where people are happy to hear my sounds.
*How do you think the place you live in has influenced in your music?
What is favourite thing about Paris? And what do hate about it?
Paris is a special place. I m not sure I will have done the music I did and I m doing in another city. Paris is full of paradoxes. Full of happy people and full go edgy people. I m born in Paris, has always lived in Paris… and perhaps will die in Paris.
I know the all city ! Even when I m going far from Paris more than a week, I m always so happy to be back ! Paris is my town. Sometimes I hate it, sometimes I love it !
Anyway … I have Paris in my heart forever.
*What were the weirdest and the funniest things that ever happened on a gig?
Ouch !! yes I have one souvenir which is funny and weird. I played in 2002 for the MTV five night stand in London. The guys in backstage has put all my machines under canalisation, and some water fall on my machines. When we started the show and that I pushed the button "Play" on the MPC (Sequencer) the all mixing table Mackie 16/4 almost exploded and a big smoke came out from it. So I was playing in front of 4000 thousand people and on air on MTV Europe and I just got a hi hat going out from the Mackie… I managed to fix it in 4/5 minutes but you can imagine my feelings during this time. I felt minutes were years… After I fixed the problem by using another Mackie on stage the show has been perfect ! ;)
*What do you know about Brazilian music ? When will you come to Brazil?
I d looove to come in Brazil ! To play my music there would be so cool !
Those guys know how to deal with drums and percussions… We all should go one times there just to learn how to dance ;)
*What do you think about music industry piracy?
Now artists are getting their money from gigs and other stuffs like synchronisation etc… It didn’t destroyed the business, it has changed it. We have to focus on different things, to spend more time in working on our gigs etc….
For sure I d rather like that Artists still get money from records sales… But it s life and when you can not doing something else than music… you don t think about that.
*Do you think that services like Deezer and Spotify can kill the habit of buy music?
Yes. I think that streaming is going to kill the habit of buying music. To have a song or a track in your computer or in your cloud seems to be the same things for people. And streaming is less expensive.
And more than that, it won t take any place in their computer. Everything will be on the website.
But there will be still people who will keep buying music. That is sure too….
*How do you see the popularisation of music making, especially with mobile devices like the iPad and iPhone?
Everything that is making you more creative is a good thing.
But you have to keep in mind that you have to give good production quality to people.
*What is your motivation?
I want to see people happy when they hear my music. I want to see them loving each others, kissing each others on my music. I want them to be someone else on a dance floor when they heard my music.
I know how to make people dance, how to make them forget their daily problems. Perhaps one day I will know how to make them cry… ;) But for the moment I m better in making them dance !
*What do you think about the music future?
I ve always been someone optimist. I think everything is changing all the time and humans know how to adapt. Why we should think that bad things are coming..?? We have more and more artists because of the web, we have more and more kind of music, of style.
Yes the music industry is changing. Less records sales but more concerts, more contact with fans on internet.
Let s make music and the rest will come !
*What's next?
There s an album remix which is coming out the 17th of november called "Alterations". It s a compilation of remix I did for other artists : Donny Hathaway, S express, Jupiter, New Order, Bart & Baker, Spiller etc… That album is also including a cover from the belgium 80’s hit "Beats of Love" from "Nacht und Nebel".
I m also mixing right now the 4th and new album for "The Supermen Lovers" . That will be released in 2015. There will be a lot of surprise in it with great featuring !
I m actually doing a lot of live too and the next gig is in Paris the 15th of November at the Social Club.
I ve just signed on my new label "Word Up Records" 2 artists : Natty Fensie, a belgium girl who is singing too on the new TSL album. There s a new EP coming out soon for her. And a french band called "Leonard",their first single will be out soon with a remix from "Ness".
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