YACHT LE GOUDRON

I saw this song this morning. I listened to it quite soon after that. The only thing that I couldn't understand was why YACHT were now singing in French. Must be a remix, I thought. So I went and Googled 'Le Goudron' to see who'd done it before. Turns out it's a pretty famous number by Brigitte Fontaine, with some strange folksy/psychedelic acoustic guitar accompanying her singing.

Well, YACHT decided to create a revisioning of the song. And really I didn't say remix because the only things that stay the same are Brigitte Fontaine's voice and the original song's repetitive melody. Maybe it's more correct to call it a cover.

In any case, it is now an electro house masterpiece of open hi hats fizzing with white noise and modulated bass synth. With the French vocals this song actually sounds like it could've been produced by a French DJ or band, someone like Sexy Sushi - it has a similar sound to French electro stuff.

Listen listen listen.



I really like it. The clackety, distorted synths start bolting around like thunder towards the end of the track as Brigitte's surreal refrain whips around like wind: "Le temps est un bâteau, la terre est un gâteau".

Time is a boat, Earth is a cake.

The song, anyway, comes from YACHT's Le Goudron on DFA Records and was released 93 years ago. Just joking - April 13th 2012. Another song on the album is the floaty and friendly 'I'll Be Your Mirror'.



Again this is a cover-type song, of Velvet Underground's 1967 original. This re-treatment, again, works really well. It's understated and beautifully cute. Nice one YACHT. Bobby Birdman's remix of 'Le Goudron' is really cool too (LISTEN TO THAT HERE).

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• Check out YACHT's official site
• Their Myspace
• YACHT on SoundCloud
• Follow YACHT on Twitter
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YACHT LIVE @ HOXTON BAR AND GRILL

Hold on to your hats this Tuesday 26th July because YACHT are playing Hoxton Bar and Grill at 8PM in association with Eat Your Own Ears. Yes indeed.

Now, YACHT are a strange one. Established since 2002, it all started off as the solo project of Jona Brechtolt - a young musician who since his high school days has been focused only on making music. Later, in 2008, YACHT welcomed in long-time collaborator Claire L. Evans and since then more band-members have joined the fray - most recently including Rob Kieswetter (aka Bobby Birdman), Jeffrey Brodsky and Katy Davidson as mainly touring members of the band.

Now, according to their official site, YACHT seem to be (much like Pictureplane) much more than just music, evolving to encompass some kind of philosophy in carving the way forward for progress in their music. Or so that's what I understand from it.

YACHT will continue to travel, speak, sing, give ontological birth, and seek to know the importance or insignificance of existence. YACHT and the YACHT Trust will strive to build a larger and larger community. The path will be long and strange.

(excerpt from 'What is YACHT?')

But aside from all of this philosophising, YACHT are essentially a two-piece, Brechtolt and Evans hailing from Oregon and Texas respectively, who create upbeat electronic music with a light smattering of grunge in occasional studio drums and guitar riffs. With their musical output being rather too prolific to begin to go through all sorts of different tracks, here are two - the first being 'Summer Song', for which the odd-humoured video is below.


As you can hear it fits pretty snugly in the ranks of indie/electro/dance that nearly personified the general sound of 2007-8. With its completely disco-entrenched beat and bassline, 'Summer Song' reeks of dancefloors and summer evening barbecues - it's soft with a sharp edge, combining noisy high pitch synths with who-cares group vocals to create one achingly non-sedentary piece of music. There might be a little owing in this one to the likes of LCD Soundsystem and The Rapture.

The second track is much newer, coming from Shangri-La released earlier this year; here is 'Dystopia':



Encompassing the same pop sensibilities as 'Summer Song' with its catchy refrain and razor-edged hi-hat disco beat, 'Dystopia' is a carefree announcement of Earth's demise. The sounds in this song are tinged with an upped production value, bound to come with years of practice and notoriety, yet the charm is still there: the happiness, the life within the music, and the overall earworming nature of it all.

So if you liked these two, that's probably a good enough criterion to get yourself down to Hoxton Bar and Grill this Tuesday 26th July, where YACHT will be gracing London with their presence alongside some special guests.

Tickets are £8.50.
Doors open at 8PM.

• GET TICKETS HERE
• Check out YACHT's beautiful-looking but ultimately weird official site
• Have a listen to some tracks on their Myspace (no longer in use, but still...)
• Or have a look at YACHT on SoundCloud
• And follow YACHT on Twitter

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