STEREO TOTAL "ALLO... J'ECOUTE..." (1995)

Je suis venu te dire que je m'en vais
Et tes larmes n'y pourront rien changer
Comme dit si bien Verlaine 'au vent mauvais'
Je suis venu te dire que je m'en vais
Tu te souviens des jours anciens et tu pleures
Tu suffoques, tu blêmis à présent qu'a sonné l'heure
Des adieux à jamais, je suis au regret
De te dire que je m'en vais, oui je t'aimais, oui mais
Je suis venu te dire que je m'en vais
Et tes larmes n'y pourront rien changer
Comm'dit si bien Verlaine 'au vent mauvais'
Je suis venu te dire ue je m'en vais
Tu te souviens des jours heureux et tu pleures
Tu sanglotes, tu gémis à présent qu'a sonné l'heure
Des adieux a jamais, je suis au regret
De te dire que je m'en vais, car tu m'en as trop fait.

[From "Je suis venu te dire que je m'en vais" by Serge Gainsbourg"]



During winter 1992-93, Françoise Cactus and Brezel Göring were living in the same neighborhood in Berlin and the legend has it that they casually met while shopping in a bakery in Adalbertstraße.

Françoise was about to close her experience with the French girl-garage-punk-R’n'R-Band Lolitas (...they released six albums in Germany and France and toured all over Europe and America, for more information about them have a look here...) and Brezel was keeping himself busy with an Experimental-noise-copyright-ignoring-tapeloop-soundeffects project called Sigmund Freud Experience (...he released three vinyl records under this guise, 100 copies each...).

In 1993 they started playing together. Their first recording was a ten minute cooking-recipe, in which all ingredients had sexual connotations. The recording is sadly lost... In 1994 they started rehearsaling and recording in Hamburg at the Alien Sound Studio of Peter Stein, and began to perform concerts in small venues in Berlin and Germany.

In those early days, the band logo consisted of two tits that were originally painted on a mix-tape Françoise made for Brezel entitled "Stereo Total", and I easily guess this is how the band's name was born... The logo was later shown on the backside of their first album "Oh Ah"; here you can have a look at the inlay-card of the CD version.

At this time the line-up included Françoise (vocals and drums), Brezel (vocals, guitar, organ and synthesizers) and Lesley Campell from Scotland (distorted guitar). With their unusual mix of music influences and languages, it wasn't easy then to find a label... The band used to play French Chanson, Disco, Rockabilly and Garage in a very minimal, simplified, essential way, often with self-built guitars and cheap electronics; lyrics were both written in French and German.

At last, in 1995 Desert Records released their first 7" EP entitled "Allo... J'ecoute...", which was a strong link to Lolitas, and - as you already guessed - is the subject of this post...

Here's the track list for this release:

01. Dactylo-Rock (Sekretärinnen-Rock) (2:35)
02. Avec ma valise (2:17)
03. Es ist kein traum (1:00)
04. Je suis venu te dire que je m'en vais (2:47)

All tracks were remastered in January 2015 and are available in FLAC lossless format or high-quality 320 Kbps MP3 files; both formats include scans of the complete original artwork.

Please have a look at the comments for the download links.



Side A opens with "Dactylo-Rock (Sekretärinnen-Rock)", a song with German lyrics that has its peculiarity in the use of a typewriter as rhythmic instrument. This song was later re-recorded and released on their debut album "Oh Ah" in late 1995. The next years it was also released as a CD-Single on Peace 95 and on a limited edition blue vinyl on Bungalow; both releases included many remixes by other German artists.

"Avec ma valise" was originally included on Lolitas' "Séries Américaines" released in 1987, and is a strong link to Françoise's previous musical activities. The sadness of the original number is lost, but the faster tempo and Brezel's crooning are interesting enough, and give new life to the song.

On Side B we find the very short and minimal "Es ist kein traum" sung by Françoise with an electric guitar accompaniment; sadly my close-to-zero knowledge of German doesn't allow me to go further than the title translation: "It Is Not a Dream".

The EP ends with a cover of Serge Gainsbourg's classic masterpiece "Je suis venu te dire que je m'en vais", which was originally included on its "Vu de l'extérieur" album released in 1973; you can listen to the original version here. Stereo Total later recorded a more electronic version of this song for their debut album "Oh Ah".



Here's the complete credits and personnel list as translated from the back sleeve of the EP:

Lesley Campbell: guitar
Françoise Cactus: drums and vocals
Brezel Göring: guitar and vocals

Alex Chilton: drums on "Je suis venu te dire que je m'en vais"
Coco: bass on "Je suis venu te dire que je m'en vais"

Recorded in Berlin by Coco, 1994.

"Je suis venu te dire que je m'en vais" recorded in New Orleans by Alex Chilton, 1993.

Mixed by Nils Peters.

Brezel Göring and Françoise Cactus, 1994

The following clips offers a preview of the remastered single, enjoy "Dactylo-Rock (Sekretärinnen-Rock)" and "Avec ma valise"!





As a bonus, have fun with the official videoclip for the re-recorded version of "Dactylo Rock"...



...and a playback of Serge Gainsbourg performing the original version of "Je suis venu te dire que je m'en vais", WOW!





More information about Stereo Total is available here:

http://stereototal.de

http://stereototal.stereototal.de

http://monokini.free.fr/index.html

http://www.discogs.com/artist/Stereo+Total

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stereo_Total

http://www.facebook.com/StereoTotal

http://www.myspace.com/stereototal

http://soundcloud.com/stereototal

If you have any other useful information about Stereo Total - especially corrections and improvements to this post - or if you spot any dead links, please get in touch with me at stereocandies [at] hotmail [dot] com or leave a comment in the box below, thank you!