10 days of concerts, meetings, workshops dedicated to electronic music in Congo
Les Siestes Electroniques, what does that means? We don't understand ... to rest after having an "electronic" meal ?!
Les Siestes Electroniques is actually a French festival that has started 10 years ago.
When IDM was all over the place, we've had to rethink the way we're organizing concerts.
Watching a guy using his laptop, alone on stage... well it's kind of boring!
So we've tried to present this kind of musicians in different conditions.
What if those music would be played in an open air venue, at the sunset ?
Wouldn't be easier and way more fun to listen to it ?
We've then explore more aesthetics, using the same "recipe",
presenting new music to new audience at parking lots, subway stations, churches ...
And at the French cultural center, you'll understand that electronic music can be plural
It can be as hot as Coupé-Décalé played in the most sexy club late at night,
but it can also be very soft, gentle, calm!
Thanks you guys, we wish you good luck!
We're speaking with Guillaume Kidula, Douster and Jay Weed.
Meet them tomorrow at the French cultural center!
The musician, alone, in front of his laptop screen, moving his mouse...
it's kind of oldshool! we're now trying to find more intuitive way to do electronic music.
The gesture is now something that really counts for instance.
We think that with new tools comes new possibilities.
Our goal is thus to provide new tools and see what you'll do with them.
We're not here to say : "hey, electronic is cool, you should try"
We're here like :"we're making that music with those tools, what would you do with them"
I'm a computer engineer from Toulouse.
I'm in Congo to organize music softwares trainings.
The aim is to present several music softwares and see how they could match the local needs,
and then develop new creative approaches.
I'm Hugo "Douster", I came from Lyon and I'm a dj and producer of electronic music for about 10 years.
I'm Jeremie, I came from Lyon and I'm a music producer under the moniker of "Jay Weed".
I was first making rap music,
and thanks to travelling - especially in South America, I've started to integrate different kind of music into my own mix.
I really enjoy all kind of music, coming from all over the world...
I'm then always interested by discovering new aestetics.
I think that electronic music had become more and more democratic,
because you can now do almost everything by yourself!
Even a very low skilled musician can program some drum kit, a bass line and different kind of sounds.
The first edition of Les Siestes Electroniques in Congo, in 2010,
has made us realise that there is space for electronic music in Congo.
The Congolese are willing to discover new musics!
I'm especially interested by all the local underground subgenres of electronic music.
Here, there, everywhere, people are making electronic music nowadays thanks to the advent of the personnal computer.
Even if there is no pure electronic music in Congo such as house or techno,
there is Coupé-Décalé or Ndombolo which are typical African music styles made with computers.
It seems like we have a good team of local musicians around us!
Pretty much motivated and open-minded...
I think we won't face absolutely no problem working with these guys!
But maybe I'm wrong, who knows ...
Douster and JayWeed performs live at the Institut Francais du Congo.
When it started, you first ask yourself "wtf is this ?"
What we have here: only up-tempo music!
Tempo is beautiful, alright. Tempo is made to dance.
But it's speechless!
It doesn't make any sense! How can you understand music then ?
What is the meaning of this music ?
What does it says?
You must speak, you must explain!
You must have a topic!
Then people will understand! Then people will give a shout out!
Here it's just "TUKU TUKU TUK TUKU TUKU TUK"!
According to me it's a MESS! ...
Jean-Michel Jarre was playing melodies on his synthetizers,
but here it's way more percusive music...
and that's how it becomes universal!
We thus don't need to be introduced. Look at the crowd here, check tomorrow in the clubs...
Everybody stand up and dance:
Pure bliss, everybody's in trance!
I'm clearly unhappy! Everything they're playing is prerecorded!
They're actually not playing!
It's like if robots were playing for me!
True music need true musicians!
Musicians playing their instruments and you can say: this one plays this, that one plays that...
People showed up to discover electronic music,
and if there now get up it's because there is a message in this music! Something's happening!
There is a vibe, and that vibe makes the rythm.
Music is not just only words,
music is what you're hearing!
What matters is the groove, the feeling, that will move you even if there are no words...
There was a communion of spirit. You've made a success.
We lack that kind of gigs here! I really enjoyed it tonight!
Even if you aren't in the mood for dancing, you have to. Music is taking you.
You see, even if we're only discovering electronic music, people get that feeling of trance...
People were jumping around... "Hot ambiance!" as they say in the Antilles!
You'll definitly see a lot of "ambiance" with that music. It keep the tempo upbeat and there's no time to sleep.
While we discover that music, we make it ours.
We make it ours, and it gives us ideas!
It gives us ideas... and that's the beauty of it!
Do you have broadcast advertisment? Of course we do!
Being a congolese Dj is kind of hard. We have to work with very few...
We try to deal with what we have and with that we manage the best part of it.
Do you handle the aircon as well?Yes!
When i'm here, i don't play music for myself, i do it for the customers.
I have to play all kind of stuff as i play for all kinds of people
A DJ must try to know about all kinds of music.
Every week end, i go around the clubs to see the Djs.
If there's a good track i haven't got already, i take it.
Anyway, you go at friend's place and you have the Facebook, the internet, the Google and so on.
My music is the romantic Zouk. I really like the Zouk.
When i'm working the Zouk, i don't like to be disturb.
The R'nB. R'nB is where i can express myself totally, peacefully.
I see the girl dance, i'm in the show too...
So it's my favorite music, the R'n'B.
When i'm not here, there's no "ambiance" and it's the same when i feel weak.
That's why the people respects the DJs!
If you call a girl, she may not come.
But if I call a girl, she respects me, she'll come!
We aren't respected. People assume that we're weed's smokers,
or an illiterate, somebody that has no level...
Trully, people thinks that we do that job for girls!
Somehow it's true, but not only!
Girls come by themselves, to hit on you, in front of people!
They're like "You know I'll love you, here's my phone number, call me!"
You get numbers of course, but our purpose is still the love of music.
It's our job, we were born to it, we live with it!
Girls come by themselves, it's automatic!
Even if you don't feel like it, they'll come anyway to bother you, so you got to deal with it!
I start to work at 14:00, from 14:00 to 21:00.
So as soon as people enter the room, I start mixing.
When there's nobody I put mixtapes and I wait around,
when people enter, i set the dancefloor on fire!
The "VIP" starts earlier.
Let's say they start at 15:00 and close around midnight.
Nightclubs are different as they start around 20:00,
and till 2:00 or 3:00 at night.
Some people have that shedule: they start working around 7:30, and they finish at 14:00,
and every congolese like to have a bier before going home!
That's why we're opening around 14:00, to get that specific audience.
I won't play any scarry thing!
Cause you do not scare your audience!
I'll scare them enough!
Do you believe in Acid House's comeback?
Yes, we'll import the "neo-colonialist Acid House" in Congo!
20 years later, is about the right time for acid house in Congo!
Knowing that congolese may have problem to go around, as going around remains expensive,
we organised some kind of "tour" based on buses.
So we could bring a part of the audience from club to club.
It gave consistency to the party as well, as the audience could see Jay Weed and Douster's mix evolving through the night.
Excursions are made by daylight! It's now nightime, wtf?!
It's as we were going to some warlock!
- The Ministry of Foreign Affairs!- It looks like a club ...
- Of course, we're in Vegas!
- Men, it's no Las Vegas, it's Brazza!
I'm not sure that mixing electronic stuffs in some rock or pop club in France would work...
One chance out of two that people throw you tomatoes!
The idea was to face the reality of what is a Brazzaville's club, and to see if it could work somehow.
We've been in three different nightclubs, all really different from each other.
We started with "Le Plaisir", a kind of neighborhood club, with a much younger audience.
The ambiance was much more rough, with a funny Dj booth!
I loved the Dj booth there!
Sick light installation!
When we arrived the resident dj was playing local music, audience was enjoying.
We plugged in and Douster started playing Dancehall.
You have to know that Dancehall is not really well known in Congo.
In the Congelese clubs audience is used to listen to r'n'b, hip hop and coupé décalé, but clearly no dancehall...
So even this beginning was surprising for the Congolese crowd.
Mirrors are everywhere in the clubs. That struck me.
And people are dancing in front of those mirrors!
Everybody was in line, in front of the mirrors!
The best Congolese dancer came to the party! He's the father of the congolese Michael Jackson doppleganger as well!
And he has some crazy dance moves, believe me.
This guy has imported the Smurf dance in Congo!
"When music comes, rhythms diverge"
When Jeremie was playing, the "head" of the local djs guild had hosted the mix,
speaking about trance music and declaring some weird punchlines to the audience!
"The ambiance doesn't choose... you just have to live it"
"Tonight we have a special guest: the pleasure (play on words about the name of the club - le plaisir)"
There is a lot of white people tonight!
And I have had the feeling the white people were playing their white music ...
I come, i here reggae, your music, but it's not my style!
Le plaisir is my club. I'm going regularly to Le Plaisir.
I've thought I could go to Le Plaisir after a hard week of work in order to relax...
But you're playing your music and I'm not interested... at all!
When we arrived at the second club, the atmosphere was different.
First af all the light show was all about strobe, which is apparently a very trendy way of lightning things here.
The mixing desk was about this height...
So you have to get on two beer crates...
which were quite unsteady...
Me, Jeremie and a third guy taking care of lights: 3 people on 2 crates, it was little bit tight :)
It looks like everything is always thrown together at the last minute ...
When I was mixing, the light installation, with all the switchs on the wall you know, seems to have had a problem.
So a fourth guy came up to fix it... We were five behind the desk then!
The guy was pulling the electrical wires, making electrical sparkles at 20 cm of us!
And the night became more and more electronic as one goes along.
It became then more cutting edge, less casual for the Congolese crowd.
We've played UK Funky, then hard Techno and stuff like that...
At some point Jeremie was playing hard UK Funky and some Congelese MCs came up on stage and starts toasting!
And it was pretty good, it fits!
Some people even thought it was part of the original played tracks!
At the end Mad Michel, the boss of the Boyoma-Boyoma club, made us a surprise.
He asked to clear the dancefloor. Everybody stopped to dance.
And then cames 4 kids, 14-16 yo
They showed us some massive coupé décalé moves for about 25 mn, while the Dj was mixing super fast!
An ecstatic show! The strobes were flashing, the dance moves were extreme!
The atmosphere was definitively different compared to the European one...
Way more hot. An extremely reactive audience.
People that came to the Dj booth really made my night!
As for the audience it was 50/50 I would say.
Some people were quite curious, open to new sounds and jump into it,
but some others were more reluctant and sometimes quite unhappy about this "novelty".
But I hope altogether it has pleased most of them ...
At least we were quite happy about it :)
Generally speaking, it worked!
Of course we haven't been able to pleased everyone...
Then we went to Le Groove club.
When we entered the club, it was packed!
And when Douster and Jay Weed started mixing, people were watching, listening, but not dancing.
I've had the feeling the French djs didn't take care of the reaction of the crowd,
It looks like they were here to only satisfy themselves...
It was a little bit like they didn't care about what was there before they came!
So people started to leave the dancefloor... :)
Some went out, for sure, because it was so much "European", too much for them...
It didn't bother me. I was there because I was willing to discover.
And when you're looking for something new, nothing can bother you!
At some point, a bartender came and asked: "More African music! My customers are about to leave! I loose money!" :)
The Congolese when they get to club, they wanna see their tables full of bottles! They spend a lot!
They buy a lot of drinks!
The Europeans, they only buy a bottle of beer from time to time ...
Trully when we arrived at the last club, a little bit late, it may have been intrusive for the audience that was already there.
I didn't know how the resident djs of all the "VIPs" would welcome us...
You're a resident dj, you do your job and then come from nowhere young fellows that wanna play their music...
Fact is we've been very warmly welcomed by all the resident djs!
One of the main problems here is they just can't download tracks. Internet is too slow here.
So it's hard to get new stuffs to play...
At the end in Le Groove club the local djs wanted to get all the sound we've played!
So we've filled up a hard drive, half drunk at 5 o'clock... Quite a funny moment.
Inch Allah, one day, they will entertain their audience with all these weird "European" sounds they got that night!
My vision about Africa? It's a mess and i like it!
I've found quite happy folks here.
It feels good! Their open-mindedness is a blessing!
I must confess that I didn't knew much about Africa before coming here ...
but what I would remember is the kindness... and the smooth African way of life which suits me well!
Congo isn't an easy country to understand...
We speak the same langage, so we think we understand each other...
but it's way more complex!
Our cultures are different. Our visions of the world are different.
So even if we use the same words, the definition, the comprehension of it can be different.
Some aspects of the Congolese culture are quite close from the French culture partly because of the colonization ...
but there is always a slight difference in meaning that can create trouble even in really simple things.
For example, when I set up a meeting at 9:00
most of the Congolese think they have until 9:59 to arrive ... which is true!
Here you also have to get used to a "last minute" way to do everything...
Which would create much stress somewhere else but is just normal here! That's how things work here!
We've booked buses for the club night, for instance
I've had the firm confirmation only 3 days before the gig ...
Unbelievable in France, absolutely normal here! :)
The money issue is also quite hard to deal with.
You're in a country where most of the people live with very few...
But also in a country which has oil resources,
and fortunes are made on that material of course...
Next to this you have people that live with really hard conditions,
with no water nor electricity,
which can create some "kafka-like" situation sometimes...
The fact that there's almost no internet connexion or let's say no fast connexion is also a difficulty.
We're organizing an event in Congo from France,
But even being here, getting the flyer's artwork from France was some sort of complicate thing...
The congolese way to deal with the rain may be extreme: it just stops everything!....
When it rains the taxi cabs and buses almost stop circulating, there are floods everywhere ...
Time stops when it rains!
So I was expecting 2 or 3 participants today,
15 trainees were there, behind their laptop, ready to work, already tweaking knobs!
That's a clear indicator of succes!
Congo is always like that, like in a rollercoaster, you can be really disappointed or really amazed within the same day...
Performance of all the Brazzaville's workshop participants.
Arrival in Pointe Noire.
It's hard to fall totally in love with Pointe Noire..
The gap between the poor and the rich is too big.
We've been in the neighborhood, and where all the expats foreigners are living...
It gives you a weird feeling...
Here you have 1l of pure oil. You add this with coke and you can drive for 600 km :)
There are more foreigners... more money too... and loads of oil!
The Congolese oil is here!
So the relation with the local inhabitants is different, from what we saw in the clubs, at the hotel...
People are not as relax as in Brazza, they're seeing us, the white faces, as wealthy colonizers...
When you're going to club here, only the prostitutes speak to you for instance ...
Sunset DJ set at "L'escale d'Emex"
During at least an hour and a half, we thought: ok, it's dead, no one will come!
We could see people standing by their car, far away from the dance floor, waiting for something to happen...
We were far from our "sunset at the sea" fantasy!
Night and a huge shower rain felt at the same time...
Oddly enough people came at that very moment and started to dance their ass of!
And from there... It was massive!
We had great feedback from the people! But nobody gave us 5000F notes as in Brazzaville: our audience didn't look so rich actually!
But their unusual moves and choreography on the dancefloor were unmistakably a way to show their love!
The audience was some sort of weird "mash-up" as gathered at that moment the people that hanged around the beach,
the audience of inside the bar as it stayed open the whole time, broadcasting heavy coupé décalé,
pointe noire's expats and brazzaville's friends came as well... and finally kids!
Twenty of them came from a nearby youth club but above all we were join by all the street kids wanderer!
We ended up with a feeling that was much likely our french version of Les siestes:
a laid-back and easy going gathering, like a nice family meeting... It was a great moment!
In france we are all blasé, having that feeling that everything have been wrote, said, seen or done.
There's a refreshing feeling here in Congo, even if it's sometimes hard to introduce new things due to the weight of traditions.
Things are still possible here and new things are emerging.
I just hope that those congolese Siestes were not just about bringing something "cool" to the people... That we've been further.
As people and musicians we have collect a whole lot of positive thing: sounds, discussions, way to see life, music...
The sharing of all those ideas and sounds is a succes in itself for me, and it clearly moved me.
More than ever i think that the people from Brazzaville are welcoming and have this appetite for new things.
There are not so many roads here, it's hard to fly away, hard to use internet...
So sharing is crucial, talking is crucial!
The way people welcomed us, especially the club's DJ, that was awesome...
It clearly moved me!