The Study of Racialism

gemini072 · Moderator Joined: 27 Nov 2004 {Posts: 2942 }

French connections
Les Nubians take Afropean soul to the world stage

Anyone looking to develop a grand unified theory of world culture should start with Les Nubians. They were born in Bordeaux, France, to a Cameroonian mother and a French father, raised in Chad and in Paris, discovered in Japan, and named after an ancient civilization based in Sudan and Egypt. They've recently moved to Philadelphia, and feel they have a strong link to Poland, although they suspect it may have come from another life. It's no surprise: Helene and Celia Faussart have already packed a formidable amount into this one.

Helene first jumped onstage as a child to dance with makossa legend Manu Dibango, but while growing up in war-torn Chad, she helped land-mine victims with her father; when he died in 1993, she and Celia began singing as a way to ease the pain. Five years later, they released their first album, Les Princesses Nubiennes. Its soulful Afropean mélange was met with a degree of bemusement in France but sold well worldwide. This year's follow-up, One Step Forward (Virgin), features Dibango and a host of international collaborators; it's even more diverse, but people everywhere are catching on.

On the phone from a tour stop in Vancouver, Helene says that the duo's new album was designed as "a resumé of what was done in the past four years of travels. It was really to show the wideness of the world and the beautiful music all around the planet." This utopian vision may raise some eyebrows, but Les Nubians' music is hardly a diluted brew. The title track's lyrics ("One step forward / Two steps backward") show that the album is about tension as much as harmony.

Helene explains: "I think that we are in a period when people want to say a lot of things but they cannot, because they don't have the words, or they don't have the guts to say it. Especially coming from a woman."

The song "La Guerre" typifies their complex approach. "That track is sung very lightly," Helene says, "but the sharpness of the beats really cuts us back to the reality of war. In French, we have a saying: 'Avoir un main de fer dans un gant de velour.' An iron hand in a velvet glove. That's the contrast that we try to have on that album."

Another contrast revealed itself to Les Nubians when they were puzzling over the album's track sequencing.

"It became clear that the elements and the planets were ruling the themes of the songs, so for the nine first tracks, everything deals more with the sun energy," Helene explains. "The tempos are more up; we talk about action, force, strength, power. Then the last tracks are more dealing with the moon energy, which is more intimate; dealing with motherhood, the secrets of life, being unfaithful or not, about prayers, about memories."

Helene and Celia's reflective bent has led them to use the proceeds from their debut to finance Echos, a French/English spoken-word CD featuring poets and artists, to be released next spring. A sneak preview appears as a mystical-sounding hidden track on One Step Forward; it's a way to "open people's ears," says Helene.

In the meantime, Les Nubians are opening ears by subverting expectations. They've released One Step Forward's joyous first single, "Temperature Rising," in France with a French rap by John Banzaï, and in the States with with an English rap by Talib Kweli. For Helene, this was a way of demonstrating that "bridges can be built" between cultures. They've built their own bridge recently by relocating to nu-soul haven Philadelphia.

"Philadelphia looks like Bordeaux," says Helene. "It's an old city, it has a very old downtown, precious historic monuments and sites, a large river. People are not in such a [hurry], like New York, but they are still efficient in their way and their rhythm."

Les Nubians' current band involves American and French musicians, and they're busy collaborating with Philly's finest producers. Of course, they've also been busy proving they're more than just pretty faces with pretty voices.

"The producers are sometimes pissed off," admits Helene, "but I have my word on every arrangement. Every time you do an album, you are creating a new adventure that follows you for the next three years. It's something that you have to be proud of, so when you look back, you never regret it."

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