red
room
a place where music lives
Red
Room is a collective, a consciousness of music's potential to progress
to the next plane of creativity. Born in France, Red Room is a world
unto itself. Though the personnel is French, the point of view is global
with lyrics presented in whichever language suits the song and mood.
The lyrics might be in English, French or Portuguese but Red Room's
lingua franca is not from any one place in particular. Red Room is a
band and a state of mind; it's about a relationship between three people
and the rest of humanity. At its core are three Parisians in their very
early 20's, the alchemist Maxime Lebidois and his sonic cousin, Jean
Francois Blanco plus Camille Vizzavona who, truth be told, would prefer
it if you call her Cammy. Joined by a number of guests in performance
and in the studio, this musical menage a trois is much more than the
sum of its parts. Max and dj (Francois) grew up together in Montrouge,
a working class suburb a few kilometers southwest of Paris. There, they
became entranced by the sounds and approach of such ground breakers
as Portishead, Morcheeba and Massive Attack, to whom they have already
been favorably compared. They soon dedicated themselves to changing
the paradigm of contemporary music in the new century. While still in
their teens, they set out on their own musical journey. Max became an
accomplished bass player and drum programmer while dj F (pronounced
"D'jeff"), a self -proclaimed geek, took to the guitar as
he mastered programming and keyboards. The idea was to present music's
emotional force within the context of an entirely original sonic architecture
combining technology and passion. They call themselves Red Room, an
homage to film directors Stanley Kubrick and David Lynch. The musical
landscape they created is, in fact, highly cinematic. Their songs are
both atmospheric and evocative. You can see their music while you listen
to it. While they labored on projecting their singular musical point
of view, dj F and Max reached out to Cammy who they met once they immersed
in the Paris music scene of the late '90's. She was fed up with the
haute bourgeois background that spawned her and struck out on her own
abandoning Paris and family for New York where she sold hand bags to
make ends meet. All the while, she immersed herself in the club scene
there eschewing rock ("it's medieval from my point of view")
for the vitality of the drum and bass/trip hop movement. The three found
that in writing together they had developed a new musical language for
themselves. In the studio, they reinvented a French musical history
that never really existed. Their frame of reference is, almost defiantly,
their own. In early 2000, they started recording at their basement home
studio and soon came up with master quality work. They recruited the
cream of the Parisian and international avant garde music scene to help
realize their vision. Sneaker Pimps' producer Clive Goddard, remixer
Amon Tobin/Ninja Tune, Clifford Gilberto, vocalist Nili Ohnyon and others
pitched in and the result is something entirely new while evocative
of eons past. Tracks such as "Le Paradis," "Winter in
Paris" and "6:30 A.M." caught the attention of club dj's
and radio programmers and a growing consciousness of Red Room's is the
happy result. Speaking of Paradise, one French music monthly noted,
"On first listen, one is as impressed with their perfect technical
mastery as their canny ability to transform the synthetic universe into
a new musical Eden." Welcome to Red Room; welcome to "Le Paradis."
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