(Photo by Michel Bresson / Martin Dupont) Martin Dupont, a French new wave band from Marseille disbanded in 1987. But they are now making a come back with a concert on January 21st 2023 in Marseille’s Espace Julien together with Corpus Delicti. Tickets are available here.

Martin Dupont was formed in 1982 and (re)released material on the following labels: Facteurs d’Ambiance, Minimal Wave and Infrastition. The band consisted of Alain Seghir, Brigitte Balian, Catherine Loy and Beverley Jane Crew, the latter joined the band after the first album “Just because” released in 1984.

After Martin Dupont split up in 1987, the members started their own projects. Brigitte Balian collaborated with the composer Patrick Portella, Beverley Jane Crew became producer of the Contemporary music network in London, and Alain Seghir composed for the choreographer Josette Baïz and the stylists Geneviève Delrieux and Patrick Murru, before devoting herself to his career as a surgeon (ENT surgery). He also created – together with Dan Armandy – the Supermax card for the Yamaha DX7 which was considered the invention of the year by Jean-Michel Jarre.

Although the band laid dormant for decades, the interest never really faded. A music video for the song “It’s so” was produced in 2005 by the American label Minimal Wave, followed by a limited edition vinyl in 2008 namely the compilation “Lost & Late”. The material included songs published on the unreleased cassette “81-83” from 1985. Another compilation followed the same year, “Des jeunes gens mödernes”. In 2009 the albums were re-released as a 4CD boxset by the French label Infrastition. Included in this set were previously unreleased tracks.

In 2017 the French electropop label BOREDOMproduct released the tribute album “Broken memory”.

In December 2018 the New York based label Minimal Wave released a new boxset, “The complete collection 1980-1988” holding 5 vinyls with artwork by Peter Miles. A previously unreleased track, “Nice boy”, appeared on the compilation “Des jeunes gens modernes volume 3”.

Bernard - Side-Line Staff

Chief editor of Side-Line – which basically means I spend my days wading through a relentless flood of press releases from labels, artists, DJs, and zealous correspondents. My job? Strip out the promo nonsense, verify what’s actually real, and decide which stories make the cut and which get tossed into the digital void. Outside the news filter bubble, I’m all in for quality sushi and helping raise funds for Ukraine’s ongoing fight against the modern-day axis of evil. Besides music I’m also an SEO and AI content flow specialist and have an interest in everything finance from stocks to crypto. There is music in everything!

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H/P are the initials of Happiness Project. The French Electro-Pop project signed on BOREDOMproduct is already busy for years and this year released the first album as H/P. Driven by Christelle Fournioux, Cyrille Tuyeras and Fred Tuyeras the new work entitled  “Programma” moves on there where previous Happiness Project albums stopped. Pure Electro minimalism reminding legendary 80s formations but with a more explicit vintage sound on top. “Programma” is a fascinating and achieved production which might serve as a referential opus for H/P. I got in touch with all members for this interview.

(Courtesy by Inferno Sound Diaries)

Q: What made you change the name into H/P and what are the main differences with Happiness Project?

Fred: That was something we had in mind for quite a long time, and that was an idea of our label, who wanted some change. But however, we have always named ourselves H/P, when we were talking about the band.

Cyrille: Our latest album before “Programma” was named “Mutation”, so it meant that something was expected to change after this album. When we started to record and produce “Programma” with BOERDOMproduct, we thought it was time to change and simplify our name which was not always easy to understand for people who didn’t know us and our music. We chose the initials of our name H/P to make understand that our music will become more minimalist and will go rapidly to its purpose. But the soul of H/P doesn’t not change at all, we’re still the same and I think one can hear this in our music.

Q: Tell us a bit more about the way “Programma” saw the daylight? How did this new work took shape and what kind of album did you want to accomplish?

Fred: “Programma” started with a very clear idea of the music we wanted to make. We wanted to sound much more minimal than the two previous albums. The reason was we wanted a big change. But from the original versions of the songs, to their final aspect, things took some time, because there were a lot of back and forth movements between the band and the label. This is usual work, I guess when you are in the production process?

Christelle: Simplicity was the idea for this album, and I think we reached this purpose with our label which made a great work of production to give to our music this minimalism which contains a true depth either. And we wanted to change the way to sing and the position of voices in our music. Voices are more present and maybe dark either and are in real harmony with our music. All this was the programma for our album !  

Q: What makes the 80s sound that special and how did you incorporate this influence into your own composition? Do you have 80s standards?

Fred: The 80’s are so meaningful to us! Especially, because that was when we were musically born! I mean there was so much going on and so many extraordinary bands. Of course, we have so many standards from the 80’s ! The most important ones to us are Joy Division, New Order, In The Nursery, Dead Can Dance, Cocteau Twins… But we have also been influenced by bands from the 1970’s, too! Kraftwerk and Space, to name two of them!

Q: You invited Alain Seghir from the legendary formation Martin Dupont to play bass guitar on one of the songs. How did this meeting and collaboration happened? And are there international 80s artists you also would like to work with?

Fred: Well, of course, Martin Dupont! We could have mentioned them before!! That’s such a long story. As fans, we bought all their albums, as they were coming out. Then Cyrille got in touch with Alain Séghir, via Myspace, who obviously enjoyed some of our creations. Then, we met at a concert in 2019, in Cognac, France. That was such a good moment. And as artists, we made the cover of “Just Because” for BOREDOM’s tribute album “Broken Memories”. The idea of having him on one of our songs naturally came to Cyrille who had an idea for a bass-guitar melody. He took a chance, sent an email to Alain and it worked out! 

Cyrille: Martin Dupont is one of our big influence. We had all their albums at home and I am still listening to their albums now. It was a dream which came true when we covered their song “Just Because”. When this song was produced on the tribute album “Broken Memory” Alain Seghir sent us an email to tell us that he enjoyed a lot our version. We were so happy that we decided to make an unofficial video of the track, because this song means so much to us. And if you take a look of this video you will see in the latest seconds that we announce in a certain way the change of our band’s name! So to continue this wonderful adventure I decided to invite Alain Seghir to play bass on our track “Vicinities” because I have always loved the way this great singer plays bass too. And the result is so cool, we love it.

If we could create another track with another legend of the 80’s, personally I would enjoy to create something with In The Nursery, Brendan Perry or New Order.

Q: What did you try to express by the album title “Programma” and the lyrical themes of the album? Can you also tell us a bit more about the artwork of “Programma”?

Fred: As for the artwork, this picture was issued from a series of works, which question the human place in an expansive urban world. It was made by a friend of ours, Stéphane Coubret. With the title “Programma” we wanted something which could evoke a certain idea of technological advance. Therefore, a word which did not exist, this could be the name of a retro-futuristic place, like in the picture or the name of a computer program. As for the lyrics, they were all inspired by this idea and the situation, we were all living in: confinement! 

Q: I noticed the reviews you already got for “Programma” are very positive. That brings me to ask you about the importance and impact of reviews, magazines and journalists? And do you sometimes consider to do things a different way because of reviews you get? And how critical are you with your own work?

Fred: We have never created any album as a response to former press reviews… at least, not consciously. Of course, we are sensitive to feedback but we have always created our music as a continuing pathway… and our goal has always been to not make the same album twice. We are critical with our own work, because we often feel doubt, uncertainty, but also willingness throughout the creation process. We do question ourselves a lot.

Cyrille: We create music to be listened and each feedback is very important for us and meaningful. When we have good reviews, it does not make everything, but encourage us to continue the long story of H/P. It gives us the will to celebrate our twentieth anniversary in 2023.

Inferno Sound Diaries

I have been working for over 30 years with Side-line as the main reviewer. My taste is eclectic, uncoventional and I prefer to look for the pearls, even if the bands are completely unknown, thus staying loyal to the Side-Line philosophy of nurturing new talents.

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Genre/Influences: Electro-Pop.

Format: Digital, CD.

Background/Info: Happiness Project changed their name into H/P. Previous singles “Ultraviolin” and “Black Tea” revealed a true metamorphosis. “Programma” features ten songs of vintage Electro-Pop.

Content: The album stands in the tradition of BOREDOMproduct; pure Electro-Pop with delicate bleeps and retro sound treatments. H/P moved a bit further composing their songs with analogue equipment which only reinforced the 80s feeling. The songs remind me of bands like Taxi Girl, Kraftwerk, Visage and even Elli & Jacno. So it’s not really a surprise they invited Alain Seghir from the 80s formation Martin Dupont to play bass guitar on the last song of the album.

+ + + : The 80s approach is not the most original format, but real analogue gear still have this magic effect on me. Unique sound treatments mixing coldness together with melodies create the soul of this work. And it’s a great album revealing multiple noticeable songs like the already known singles “Ultraviolin” and “Black Tea”, but also the excellent opener “I Prefer Two” which sounds as the offspring between Kraftwerk and Taxi Girl. Another great piece of music is “The Alarmist”. It’s pure nostalgia and especially the strings are magic. “Les Choses” is another cool song I want to mention. Last, but not least I also like the production of the vocals revealing different songs featuring male- and female vocal parts.

– – – : I don’t have real minus points about this album, but let’s say that the ‘softer’ cuts like “Hope In The Distance” and “Black Tea” aren’t my favorites.

Conclusion: H/P has achieved a great piece of music. The metamorphosis from Happiness Project into H/P sounds like a great sonic upgrade. 

Best songs: “Ultraviolin”, “I Prefer Two”, “The Alarmist”, “Les Choses”, “Programma”.

Rate: 8.

Artist: www.facebook.com/hp.programma

Label: www.boredomproduct.fr / www.facebook.com/boredomproduct Read the news on ‘Programma’.

Inferno Sound Diaries

I have been working for over 30 years with Side-line as the main reviewer. My taste is eclectic, uncoventional and I prefer to look for the pearls, even if the bands are completely unknown, thus staying loyal to the Side-Line philosophy of nurturing new talents.

www.side-line.com

(Photo by Emmanuel Prevot) Out now is the 2-track digital single “Ultraviolin” by the French electronica / synthpop act h/p including the video edit and an extended version.

“Ultraviolin” acts as a teaser for “Programma”, a 10-track genuine analog record with the sound quality of today. The material has been produced with synths and effects from that very analog era, then converted into high resolution thanks to the current technologies.

Here’s the video for the single, and below the Spotify player for the 2-track out now.

With “Programma” the band pays a tribute to the sound of avant-garde electronic pop pioneers from the early 80s. You also get Martin Dupont’s Alain Seghir on bass on the final track of the album.

The album is now in pre-order via BOREDOMproduct as a CD digisleeve or as an ultra-limited edition 12″ LP.

Bernard - Side-Line Staff

Chief editor of Side-Line – which basically means I spend my days wading through a relentless flood of press releases from labels, artists, DJs, and zealous correspondents. My job? Strip out the promo nonsense, verify what’s actually real, and decide which stories make the cut and which get tossed into the digital void. Outside the news filter bubble, I’m all in for quality sushi and helping raise funds for Ukraine’s ongoing fight against the modern-day axis of evil. Besides music I’m also an SEO and AI content flow specialist and have an interest in everything finance from stocks to crypto. There is music in everything!

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The fine people from BOREDOMproduct are preparing a brand new electronic tribute album, this time for Martin Dupont. Martin Dupont was a French new wave act active from 1982 to 1987. Founded in 1980 by Alain Seghir, Brigitte Balian and Catherine Loy, launched their first single in 1982: “Your passion”.

Here’s how this fine band sounded:

To appear on this new compilation, contact the label at martindupont@boredomproduct.fr or check facebook.com/boredomproduct and submit them a title proposal. Note that BOREDOMproduct does not wish to have duplicates on the compilation, so first come is first served! Keep in mind that the submitted covers should of course comply to the BOREDOMproduct electronic sound, but that goes without saying.

BOREDOMproduct will select their favourite covers for the final tracklist once they have received them all. Deadline: March 27th!

Bernard - Side-Line Staff

Chief editor of Side-Line – which basically means I spend my days wading through a relentless flood of press releases from labels, artists, DJs, and zealous correspondents. My job? Strip out the promo nonsense, verify what’s actually real, and decide which stories make the cut and which get tossed into the digital void. Outside the news filter bubble, I’m all in for quality sushi and helping raise funds for Ukraine’s ongoing fight against the modern-day axis of evil. Besides music I’m also an SEO and AI content flow specialist and have an interest in everything finance from stocks to crypto. There is music in everything!

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