B i o g r a p h y       

When Lightwave meets Zazou...


Hector Zazou is a well known character of the Paris scene. He is a
bit Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, since in the early 90s he was a well known
journalist, and, under the name of Zazou, a veteran of the new music scene,
who had already recorded a very impressive discography. We met him thanks
to Serge Leroy. Zazou enjoyed "Nachtmusik" and he even wrote a review in
the French Keyboards magazine. His review started as "here is the first
record of electronic music of the XXI century..." No need to say that we
became great friends!

 A few months after, he called and asked us to contribute to his new album:
"Les Nouvelles Polyphonies Corses." An exciting project: Zazou worked in 
Corsica with native singers recorded a capella in churches, and then, in
Paris, he created all the musical background. Major artists were involved,
 such as John Hassell, John Cale, Ryuichi Sakamoto. Lightwave was
asked to bring analog synthesizers in the Studio Davout in Paris, and to
create various soundscapes. Zazou recorded them on a multitrack digital
machine and added the Lightwave touch to various parts of the album. 
The result was splendid, and as a matter of fact, the album won an Award 
at the "Victoires de la Musique," the French version of the Grammy Awards.

Working with Hector Zazou was very exciting, and we began a close
collaboration. We rented together a large space in a factory, and we
created a common studio called "Les Nouvelles Musiques Electroniques." 
We regularly met Zazou's usual collaborators, sax and flute player Renaud Pion,
trumpet player Christian Lechevretel, guitar player Kent Condon. All of them
became friends and worked with Lightwave on specific projects or concerts. 

Zazou helped us to change our focus and to create a new approach to music
and production. He gave us a strong artistic input, and the concept as well
as the artistic choices for albums such as "Tycho" and "Mundus" were 
discussed with him. He even played on "Tycho."

For Zazou's next project, "Sahara Blue" (1991), we were involved
again as sound designers. Zazou invited us to build up our whole set up
(all the modular synthesizers) in a studio in Paris. At the end of the day,
he told us: "Are you ready, guys? Ryuichi Sakamoto will be in the studio in
five minutes, and you will play with him." We said, "Hey, good joke, Zazou,
this is funny!" But it was not a joke, and five minutes later, Ryuichi came
in the studio and sat at the grand piano. Zazou said: "OK, now, just
improvise, the digital 48-track machine is recording". We started typical
Lightwave atmospheres, with many spatial sounds, and Sakamoto started
playing in a classical way and then, opened the piano, and played with the
cords of the piano, hiting them, scratching them in order to produce
concrete sounds, treated by echoes and reverbs. The music became totally
atonal. It was rather unusual, strange, weird and experimental. The
recording of this session was used as a soundscape for various parts of
Zazou's album. We were credited for the music of a piece with David
Sylvian. Unfortunately, David did not like the final mixing of his voice,
and after a legal action, Zazou had to release a second version of his
album, where David Sylvian's voice totally disappeared. He was replaced
with Brendan Perry from Dead Can Dance, and Lightwave sounds remained on
the new track. The first version, however, with the Zazou / Sylvian /
Lightwave piece, is now a collector's item, and seems to be still used as a
soundtrack by various TV and radios.

Following the "Sahara Blues" studio sessions, there was a 24-hour long
concert in Paris, and we joined Zazou for one of the craziest live
performances we've ever played. 

In 1996, we contributed to the sound design of Zazou's "Songs from the Cold Seas",
his third release for Columbia Sony (link). It was an extreme album and 
most of the pieces went through several different versions.
Lightwave sounds were used on several tracks, among Inuit songs and folk
songs of the Northern countries, recorded by Zazou during an expedition
around the Arctic circle.

Lightwave's sonic trademark got a wide international exposure thanks to
these three albums. We learned a lot about production, mixing, composing,
thinking about music.

In 1991, Zazou produced a special Lightwave album: "Dance with the Gurus."
It was an ambient-dance oriented album influenced by KLF and The Orb.
Psychedelic and atmospheric tracks were mixed with house music. Rhythms
were programmed by Christian Lechevretel and Lightwave, and
saxophones, trumpets and guitars were mixed with electronic instruments.
There were some great pieces, such as "Todol Bardo," with nice sequences.
An American singer was even involved on two tracks (could you imagine
Lightwave's music with rap songs? No? Try again...). The album was devoted
to all the main spiritualities of the world, from Zen Buddhism to Islam.
Samples, fields recordings, radio voices of evangelists and preachers
created specific backgrounds for each piece. This album was never released,
but we still have the tapes. Some pieces, however, sound old-fashioned
today, and the whole project had a rather unusual color for a Lightwave
album.