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Interview: Armissan + Red Water
Fri 05 Oct 2007 Post by : invisible
Category : interview
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Issue 3
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Armissan is Sébastien (guitar, vocals; France), Bodo (bass; Germany), and Tommy (drums; U.K.). Red Water is Ramon (vocals; U.S.), Xiao Dong (lead guitar; China), Sébastien (rhythm guitar), Bodo (bass), and Tommy (drums). Four of the members spoke with us before dispersing for their summer hiatus. The interview starts off with us erroneously referring to Red Water as an extension of Armissan, at which point we are met with jeers and boos.
Sébastien: It’s not an extension. The bands have common members, but no band is an extension from another. It’s like a monster. Some people have a second head coming out from the neck.
Chengdoo: So what would you say are the major differences between the bands?
Sébastien: What’s different in Armissan? The difference is a difference of style—Armissan is like 90 percent of the singing in French language, and there it is! Armissan doesn’t play covers. There’s one cover … but we don’t play covers. The aim is to not play covers.
Bodo: The difference is I think Armissan is more substance, and Red Water is more pop. The point of Red Water is to be accessible to many, many people. … I would say Armissan’s music is more complex. Each song has at least five parts or something … and, uh, … and I mean Red Water, we have a song, which has also six parts or something, but … hmm ….
[Laughter.]
Bodo: You could sing along with the guitar … the bass makes it a little more funky. And Tommy adds some aggression. Tommy makes some sub-tile changes. How do you say?
Chengdoo: Subtle.
Bodo: Sub-tull changes.
Chengdoo: Subtle.
Bodo: Subtull.
Chengdoo: Subtle.
Bodo: Subtle.
Chengdoo: Do you consider the bands work or leisure?
Sébastien: With Armissan it’s not about, I mean it’s a little bit, about money, but these kinds of money shows, we do not really do. Armissan is meant to play in rock places like Little Bar. I’m not really entertaining and don’t make people sing along … I just sing the song. I’m a little bit boring on stage. [Sébastien later asks us not to write that he’s boring, but we ruthlessly ignore his pleas.] Of course it’s a hobby. Arty farty, yeah.
Chengdoo: Do you guys have other jobs? If so, what are they?
Sébastien: I teach French, and I help the students going to universities in France. In China, France might make a lot of efforts in China, more so obviously, than other countries, so we can take benefits because they can promote our band.
Bodo: For me, music is the greatest thing that could happen to me—except for love, of course. It’s on the same level. I made money with it, but it’s also fun for me; I catch two birds with one stone. … With Red Water we make a lot of money. They try to destroy our band with four, we make a new constellation or something.
[Confused looks all around until we realize he means “configuration” and is referring to the occasions when Xiao Dong has been asked by agents to not perform with the band so they will appear “all-foreign.”]
Bodo: The problem is that Xiao Dong is very important for the band because he plays [in] all the songs. Sébastien takes a rest, [but] Xiao Dong is playing all the time. Of course he don’t react good because he thinks the whole country don’t like him or something.
Ramon: Here there is a conflict, for some reason promoters don’t want the Chinese person in the band but for us he’s exactly one nationality. There are five nationalities in the band, and he’s one of them.
Tommy: Sometimes I work as a clown in a primary school, but beyond that it’s mostly drifting and … meaningless.
Chengdoo: So what do you do for leisure?
Tommy: What is lee-zhur?
Chengdoo: Leh-zhur.
Tommy: Riding my bike in the sunshine, writing poetry under the stars, singing serenades to my girlfriend at night.
Ramon: I teach at kindergarten. I’ve got little 4-year-old students. I am a clown, but I don’t have to wear the makeup; it just comes out naturally. I love it. For the first time in my life I have two jobs that I really, really love.
Chengdoo: What do you do in your spare time?
Ramon: I watch DVDs.
Chengdoo: No, seriously.
Ramon: I watch DVDs. And more DVDs.
Tommy: And then you put them inside the DVD machine. (Drumroll.)
Chengdoo: What’s your future?
Tommy: To continue to pretend.
Chengdoo: If you weren’t in China, would you still be doing this kind of work?
Ramon: Yes, I’d be doing it, and no, I’d probably be on the street corner drunk on malt liquor or something, with a sign “will work for condoms.” Or something.
Chengdoo: How are the bands evolving?
Ramon: We’ve had offers to go everywhere from Beijing to Wuhan to Shenzhen but we haven’t had the time. We’ll be gone for two months in the summer and then when everyone comes back hopefully we’ll be able to do that without doing our other jobs. That’ll be something we sit down and talk about after everyone’s back, where do we wanna go with it. As for Armissan, I’ll leave that to Tommy, who’s really the lynchpin of both bands.
Tommy: What the fuck is a lynchpin?
Ramon: We would all love to do it full-time, but it’s a matter of whether or not we can make that happen.
Chengdoo: What are your goals for the future?
Bodo: I hope we can get more access to Chinese people. We will sing a little bit in Chinese, which we are doing already. … When I listen to music, I don’t give a shit about [the lyrics]; I just listen to the melody. [But Chinese audiences] always want to just listen to this, what do you call it, blinky-blink twinkle … . Maybe one day we will get more access to Chinese people, and it will be great. Because we will be pioneers here.
Ramon: I think we already are. The French Alliance has set some things up … there’s a lot of people who are open to it. It’s exciting being here. Lots of opportunity. It’s been amazing how much opportunity there has been to play. … A lot of times questions [fans ask] are more about the music, and that tells you something. They’re enjoying the music … not because we’re foreigners but because we bring something new, the style we play. … You know that something special’s happening even though the reason you got that opportunity play is maybe because you’re a foreigner.
Chengdoo: What was the most negative reaction you’ve got when playing?
Sébastien: The worst moment for me was when we were in Shamrock, and the crowd actually preferred watching soccer on TV than watching our band so they decided, the crowd, we made them vote, and they boo-ed the band.
Chengdoo: But you also get a lot of good feedback, and one of you is rumored to get a lot of telephone numbers … .
Tommy: Those bloody French.
Bodo: Yes, that’s the tactic of the English gentleman, always distract from himself.
Sébastien: Once I got a rose after the show. Me. No one [else]. Just me. I got two roses. Two roses.
Ramon: I get more attention than I desire at the moment.
Chengdoo: And what about Xiao Dong?
Ramon: Actually I know some students at the university who are just crazy for Xiao Dong.[In a high-pitched voice] ‘Oh he got his hair cut, oh he got new glasses, oh, Xiao Dong!’ They just love him. I have high hopes for that guy. Even without us he’s gonna be very successful.
For more on Red Water, go to http://www.redwater.com.cn
For more on Armissan, go to http://www.myspace.com/armissan or
www.purevolume.com/armissan
The interview was first published in chengdoo CITYLIFE issue 3
