The
last year , we discovered and loved a great new band named Minuit Machine! After listening to their songs - non stop - ,
we needed something more from Minuit Machine... And here it is.... Enjoy the interview of Helene De Thoury & Amandine Stioui!!!!! These girls are
adorable!
Onyria: How did the ‘Minuit
Machine’ name come up?
Helene
- I became totally obsessional with this name
search for more than one month. Thinking about it all the time. All I knew is
that I wanted to find a good association of two french words that would
represent the music we play. One summer night, when I started to fall asleep,
it came up suddenly. It was an evidence! Minuit Machine (Midnight Machine) and
I was so relieved!
Onyria: You came for a concert in Athens in June..
Which were your impressions?
Amandine
– First of all, I loved the city very much. There
is something both peaceful and mystic in this town which made me feel good
instantly! Also, the Death Disco is a great club and everybody treated us with
a lot of kindness and respect. So actually, I really enjoyed playing in Athens
and I hope we’ll come back soon!
Helene - I think that we both felt in love as soon as we arrived in the city
center. There’s something really magical in Athens. Amazing architecture with a
lot of vegetation and flowers everywhere… We were very proud to play in such a
beautiful city and the people there are amazing!
Onyria: Your music
experiences the previous years?
Amandine
– I had my first band when I was 19. The music we
were playing back then was very influenced by “The Cure” and “Depeche Mode”.
Then, I had other projects, like synth pop or pure rock bands.
Helene - I sang during 8 years in a electro industrial band in Paris and when
we splited up, I decided to move to London. But I couldn’t stop playing music,
so I started to look for another band, more 80’s / post punk. I joined Phosphor
(coldwave) as synth player and we played around 2 years together.
Onyria: How did you meet/cooperate?
Helene - A few months before Phosphor ended up, I moved back to Paris and I
was travelling every month to play with the band. It was working pretty well
but I began to feel frustrated to not have my own project in my city, that’s why
I decided to start a new band. I composed a few songs in the summer 2013 and in
september, I posted an ad online to find another member for Minuit Machine.
When Amandine sent me her voice on Agoraphobia, I almost cried because it was
exactly the singing and the kind of lyrics that I was looking for!
Amandine –
Things hadn’t worked out with my previous band and I missed making music a lot.
So I decided to search for a new project. I went online on a website
specialized in music ads saw Hélène’s ad. I listened to the demos and I knew it
was exactly what I wanted! So I contacted her, wrote Agoraphobia and sent it to
her. I was really anxious about her reaction (I kept checking my inbox every
two minutes!!!) and in the end, when she told me she liked what I did, I was
over the moon.
Onyria: Which are your music influences?
Favorite artists.
Amandine – It’s a very difficult question for me to answer… I would say, my
all-time favorite artists who influenced me a lot, and whose music I still
love, admire, and always will are: The Cure, IamX, Pulp, Pink Floyd, Depeche
Mode, the Velvet Underground, Ultravox, Roxette, Erasure and Jack White.
But I
also listen to lots of more recent artists such as: Sixth June, Zola Jesus,
Austra, Warpaint, Beach House …
Helene - Xeno&Oaklander, The Human
League, Depeche Mode, The Frozen Autumn, Gold Zebra, Linea Aspera, Tears for
Fears, Turquoise Days…
Onyria: How do you see the future of
coldwave / synthwave scene? Do people respond to that kind of music?
Amandine – I
believe cold/synth/minimal/dark wave music is timeless. It is not just a trend;
otherwise I think it would have died years ago. Great 80’s artists left us an
unlimited legacy and I sure hope future generations will not give up that
legacy and that they’ll keep on making music strongly influenced by the 80’s
New Wave without altering or spoiling it.
Helene - I
deeply think that this scene is not going to die but it’s going to evolve. For
now, only a few bands are really reinventing new genres but there will always
be some new « … wave » categories and I’m sure that we’re going to be
really surprised about what people will do in the near future after digesting
all the strong influences from the 80’s and 90’s, helped by all the amazing
gears that we can find today.
Onyria:
Tell us a few words about your upcoming album.
Amandine – It
will be available on the 6th of October on digital supports and then
on the 13th of October for the vinyls. We’re really excited about
this album and looking forward to sharing it to the people who have been
following us since the beginning of Minuit Machine. For me, it marks an
evolution, both in our music and in my life. I learned a lot about myself while
I was writing the lyrics, and trying to find the best way to express my
emotions. The lyrics are dark, harrowing but sometimes full of hope. That’s why I would say Live & Destroy is
extremely ambivalent and paradoxical.
Helene - We
put so much in it. So many efforts, work, emotions, sometimes fights, sometimes
laughs and a lot of excitement. We are very proud of this album and we really
hope that people will enjoy it!
Onyria:
Which ambitions do you have for the future?
Helene -
We’ll begin the composition of the second album very soon. We already have lots
of ideas for it so we’re looking forward to starting! In november, we’re going
to tour in Europe to promote the album but we really hope to tour worldwide one
day, maybe for the next album?
Amandine – I
feel already so lucky and grateful for what we already have that I have trouble
thinking about the future. Right now, I want to focus on the release of our
first album, and our upcoming tour in November! After that, of course, we will
be working on a second album!!
Onyria:
Favorite quotes.
Amandine – “A possibility to create a melody you will
remember and sing inside in your soul. This is what the music is for me, not
the sound itself.” – Vince Clarke
Helene -
« Carpe Diem. Seize the day, boys. Make your lives extraordinary. » -
John Keating in Dead poets Society
Onyria:
Tell us 3 wishes that you have for the world (humanity).
Amandine – I
believe our humanity is doomed, but let’s pretend we can make wishes :).
I hope our future generations will still have
dreams, and that they’ll believe in them.
I don’t believe in politics anymore, but I hope
that one day, we’ll have leaders who truly want to make things better for
everybody and not just themselves. If it happens, I would be the first one to
support them.
I hope one day people will understand that selfishness
and greediness are a plague for humanity and that if they replaced it with
kindness and devotion, our world might still have a chance to survive.
Helene -
hmm I totally agree with Amandine but I’ll try…
I hope that the sun will blow up when we will already
have found the way to live in another solar system
I hope that apes never realize that they are more
powerful and as smart as a lot of us (Yes, I saw the last The Planet of Apes
movie, really good!)
I hope that everybody can make wishes and imagine it
could become true
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INTERVIEWS
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