SPIRIT OF '76
Mar 1, 2007 12:00 PM, By Ken Micallef
There is a bit of irony that surrounds the success of Air, one of France's most popular musical duos: the literal and perceived nature of the group's sound. Whether blasting Pink Floyd fantasies in their late-'90s live shows or composing puppy-love make-out messages in the studio, Air's Jean-Benoit Dunckel and Nicolas Godin are typically regarded as electronic maestros of the first order. Fans and critics alike adore the duo's use of classic synthesizers and contemporary drum machines, as well as the tweaked and twisted vocals (think 2004's “Run”), which sound like textbook examples of the Pro Tools cut-and-paste aesthetic. But the audience's perceptions aren't always the same as the artists' intentions.
“Our music is not electronic,” Jean-Benoit Dunckel (keyboards, vocals) says, asserting his card-carrying musician credibility. “It only sounds electronic because we use computers to record it. “We use live drummers as well as the Elektron Machinedrum, and we will often play a loop that sounds like a sequence.”
Although Air does embrace much that modern technology has to offer, Dunckel and Godin are old-school musicians, whose fourth proper studio album, Pocket Symphony (Astralwerks, 2007), longs for the good-old days. “This is probably the last time we will record in the old-school way, with a beginning, a middle and an end,” Nicolas Godin (bass, guitar, vocals) explains from a Manhattan hotel. “Everything is changing, and nobody will record that way anymore. So this is our tribute to that era, the idea of conceiving a record as a trip, like when you had vinyl with an A-side and a B-side. The CD arrived, and that was forgotten.”
DANCING FOOLS
Pocket Symphony is largely a return to the sound of Air's debut EP, Premiers Symptomes (originally an import-only French singles collection, reissued on Astralwerks, 1999). To a large degree an instrumental album — except for appearances by Pulp's Jarvis Cocker and the Divine Comedy's Neil Hannon (as well as Dunckel and Godin's demure vocals) — Pocket Symphony may be the most subtle, sedate and soothing album of the duo's 12-year career. And while Dunckel and Godin admit to a warmer embrace of Pro Tools technology than in the past (“You can travel everywhere around the world just carrying some files — it's great,” Godin marvels), their heart is still in live performance.
“On songs like ‘Napalm Love’ and ‘Redhead Girl,’” Godin explains, “those are all live. It is the piano and the bass playing the same thing all the way through the song. We play from beginning to end even if it is the same notes and patterns. You can hear it. It is the same chord but never played exactly the same way. [But] we do overdub because there are only two of us.”
“We need to touch,” Dunckel says. “When you do music, you have your body, and the way you play is like a dance. I don't know why, but humans feel that. Music is made for humans, and when it is a computer, it doesn't sound the same; the feeling is not right. You have to really play it. Your body has to appropriate and condense the instruments to put them into the music. And then it is possible for the people to understand it.”
CUSTOMS AND KOTOS
Appearing a bit rattled after a U.S. customs ordeal where Air's passports were confiscated and hole-punched, Dunckel and Godin are understandably tired. Dunckel is the cool, collected type whose expressions never betray his emotions, while the painfully thin Godin displays a keen sense of humor.
“Two years ago, someone came on the tour bus and took our passports,” Godin recalls. “When we brought our new ones, U.S. Customs said, ‘These are the stolen passports.’ So they destroyed our passports.”
Luckily, the Internet saved the day. “They finally Googled us and realized we were who we said we were,” Godin says. “They were laughing, the problem was resolved, and then they said, ‘Come on. Why are you with a stolen passport?’ They still didn't believe us! But we are glad to be here; we could have been in jail.”
Produced by the returning Nigel Godrich and recorded at Mayfair Studio #2 in London, Revolvair and Gang in Paris and Air's own studio in Bastille (soon to be uprooted to Paris and renamed Atlas Studios), Pocket Symphony benefits not only from live performances and witty guest-vocal turns, but also from Godin's embrace of the Far East. Returning to his childhood love of discovering new instruments, Godin played the Japanese koto and shamisen on Pocket Symphony, bringing an exotic air to the duo's retro lunar tracks, especially the humming “Mer du Japon.”
“When I touched the koto — oh my God,” Godin says with a laugh, “I'd forgotten how cool it was to play something new. It was very flexible, and we used it on a lot of songs. Every time you hear a harp, like on Jarvis' song, ‘Hell of a Party,’ that is the koto. It took me 10 minutes to learn how to play it, but it takes a long time to find the right balance of position and sound. [As for] the shamisen, it's like a banjo that you play with a stick. It is really hard to play.”
WORK FOR HIRE
Pocket Symphony's instrumental focus was also influenced by two recent projects with old pals. Air wrote and performed the music for Charlotte Gainsbourg's 5:55, where they played a mostly subordinate role. Air was also hired to compose the soundtrack to the Sofia Coppola film, Marie Antoinette. (Although their tracks for the movie, save “Il Secondo Giorno,” were ultimately rejected and then reworked for Pocket Symphony.)
“Those experiences made us more confident on guitar and piano,” Dunckel says. “We were forced to play in the studio, and that made us better. Since Nigel was there, we had nothing to worry about, not about the production or keyboards or what beat we would add. We were just concentrating and focusing on the way we had to play together.”
“When we recorded our early singles,” Godin adds, “we had this weirdness. We recorded in our living room. We didn't have much money. Our weird music was part of our charm. So now we have accepted who we are. With Charlotte Gainsbourg, for the first time we did a real album. There was a singer, a producer, a lyricist, and we did all the music. We did a classic album. Wow. For us, we don't need to do that, but now we know we can.”
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