Everyone loves a mystery. But don’t expect to see Jessica Fletcher raving it up to France’s latest dance darlings.
Deploying a cloak of anonymity Acid Washed have arrived, a duo of Parisian men adopting the benign noms-de-guerre Richard D’Alpert and Andrew Claristidge, they continued their subterfuge by obscuring their faces in all communications.
In doing so they’ve driven total focus onto their exquisite vintage electro. But it’s not all gimmicks: “Our anonymity, it’s not complete,” states ‘Richard’ from Paris. “When we play, we’re not using masks because that would be too close a reference to Daft Punk.”
The secret lives of artists is of course nothing new, see Basic Channel, Underground Resistance or the Aphex Twin for a starched lesson on riling up the underground. However something amongst their retro electro, shimmering imagery, instrumental bangers and addictively weighted dance vocals has led them to the top of the blogosphere hype aggregators, for weeks at a time.
So how have they so quickly shared the world’s gaze with the likes of Sufjan Stevens and Arcade Fire? “I really thought about it lately after all the blog figures came out,” continues ‘Richard’. “Music-wise so much of this record is drenched in emotions. It just seems like ten years of drug and drink memories and ten years of friendship all got put into the album. So there’s this melancholic aspect but also this joyful aspect too.”
Released on Record Makers, also home to Francophile brethren Brodinski, Sebastien Tellier and Kavinsky, it seems once more we may well soon be surfing a lysergic wave of the French touch again.
Words by Matthew Bennett
Where: Paris, France
What: Retro electro pop
Unique Fact: They were the most blogged about artist in the UK in September.
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