Fan Club Orchestra
Lawrence Le Doux‘s improvisational band Fan Club Orchestra (FCO) re-turns with their first album in 11 years via 12th Isle. FCO is composed of Lawrence Le Doux, Ann Appermans on guitar and bass, and Zéphyr Zijl-stra on trumpet.
Fan Club Orchestra (FCO) has its roots in collaborative performances and recordings that began taking place in the late nineties in Brussels. These continued into the second decade of the new millennium around Belgium and neighbouring countries. At a time when large contemporary arts spaces were less professionalised, less obedient to funding and attendance num-bers, and still tuned to their founding DIY impulses, FCO were able to nurtu-re their nebulous cast of players with their unconventional ensemble of in-struments to their own ends. The apparent informality of their performances, mixed with the sheer spectacle of their unfolding, transplanted the experi-mentalism of New York’s downtown scene of the 1960s—think La Monte Young—into the cracked consumer electronics period of new media art at the turn of the century.
FCO’s highly improvisational performances could take the form of chaotic jam sessions that approached freeform noise from a psychedelic rock per-spective, replete with spontaneous vocalisations and lyrics. More enduring, however, was their take on drone music. FCO would use a medley of Game Boys—an 8-bit handheld gaming device from Nintendo that was disconti-nued in 2003—and their camera accessory to produce a kind of tender, chiptune raga. All manner of sound-making devices were combined with this, from repurposed electronics to acoustic instruments and found objects, along with guitars. All this could involve up to ten people, may involve the audience, and sometimes welcomed guest collaborators such as the artist.
At the centre is Laurent Baudoux, who has more recently worked under the alias of Lawrence Le Doux for Nous’klaer Audio, Hivern Discs and Kalahari Oyster Cult, amongst other labels. Baudoux organised the processes and sounds of FCO’s foundational performances and recordings and has since remained the chief protagonist and instigator of the project.
Having self-released two albums in the early 2000s, FCO eventually joined Cologne’s Sonig label, with whom they would issue a handful of albums up until 2013. This was a fitting home as Sonig channelled both the fervour and the formalism of the experimental music history of the region—this is where Kraftwerk, krautrock, and key electronic music studios emerged. For all the commotion of their live performances, FCO’s recorded works with Sonig are sweet and playful, somehow balancing a galaxy of distressed textures into minor pop hits. A book documenting this period was privately issued this year.
A newly regrouped FCO now present their new album ‘VL_Stay’ on 12th Isle. This iteration of FCO sees Baudoux joined by Ann Appermans on gui-tar and bass, and Zéphyr Zijlstra on trumpet. Appermans is an original FCO member as well as a frequent collaborator with Baudoux. Zijlstra is a jazz student at the Royal Conservatoire of Brussels. Recorded in just two weeks, the trio invoke the pedigree with which FCO first toyed, while sketching a continuity with new references.
‘VL_Stay’ is made of delicate and melodic parts. Taken as a whole, it has an undeniably ethereal sincerity. By developing space with a diaphanous palate of electronics, the guitars and trumpet either punctuate the frame with motifs that quiver like a mirage, or they appear from the depths of the ambience. With the lustre of a rough crystal, the sounds are never piercingly bright, but this only further encourages you to glimpse what remains elusive.
The record invokes Wolfgang Voigt’s work as GAS, Isao Tomita’s composi-tions, and Jon Hassell and Brian Eno’s collaborations. Just as easily one could point to Arthur Russel, as well as the rare moments of levity in Bruce Gilbert. Where the pastoral side of Baudoux’s solo work starts to shine through, ‘VL_Stay’ begins to lend itself to comparisons with post-rock mini-malism.
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