Interview: Eleandre
Recently I was turned on to the musical project, Eleandre, a project which is dark, mystical, and alluring in a way that transcends mere genre labels or preconceived notions. Mattowarrior's Metal Madness recently got to interview it's main man Ludovic, and here's what he had to say:
So tell me about Eleandre- how was the project formed?
Eleandre is the addition of both my daughters' names. Without them, none of this could have happened. So first of all I want to dedicate this whole musical project to them. Eleandre is a solo project that I have been leading since May 2020, with the main concept of doing everything myself (voice, guitar, bass, synths and effects, songwriting and also recording). Eleandre is therefore a kind of Siamese concept between my daughters and me, it's a way for me to realize myself and also to support the fact of being far from them, it's in a way a catalyst of my difficulty to live without them. My music is mainly inspired by this distance that allows the return on oneself, it's in a way an idea that makes me think of Platon’s cave or the retreat in the catacombs of the first Gnostic Christians.
How long have you been in the music scene, any prior bands we would know about?
Musically, I've been officiating since 2012 on the experimental electronic internet scene. First under the name of Ake, when I was still a student, then under the name of Ake Project since my separation from university studies. This last project allowed me to make several albums still available on bandcamp, and also to start working on a collaborative mode with different international artists. But I felt there, that my music was starting to run out of steam and I wanted to go back to my roots, and to the rock and metal aesthetics that always attracted me rather than to pure and experimental electronics.
What are your influences? I hear what you list as far as your bio as far as the obvious ones, but also more esoteric ones as well. There is a dirgey style to some of the tracks that almost reminds me of Northern European gothic Metal bands like Katatonia in a way, as well as other stuff in that vein.
My influences, in addition to being musical, come from my more or less distended links with esoteric societies such as Freemasonry or Rosicrucians. Thus I have always been attracted by hidden knowledge and especially by medieval alchemy. The fact that I was born in Carcassonne, in the south of France must have something to do with it, I think. My music is obviously tinged with the writings of Aleister Crowley, Helena Blavatsky, Gurdjieff, Ouspensky or Alejandro Jodorowsky. Although they are not pure musicians, I can also quote Eric Satie who made me think a lot, they have by their generalist and encyclopedic knowledge led to a kind of syncretism of all my influences within my compositions. The fact that you mention Nordic music here does not surprise me, even if I am far from being a specialist, because I think very strongly of a collective unconscious as described by Carl Gustag Jung, and this psycho analytic concept makes me tend towards these Nordic and Germanic roots. Come to think of it, I remember following my father, a former soldier, to parties with his friends, who listened to German and Nordic music. Maybe it just comes from there. . . and the cold doesn't scare me. HAHA
Do you dig Darkwave/Dark Ambient or Black Metal?
So I'm not someone who listens to a lot of music. Without making me the man too busy to listen to music, I believe I remain faithful to my favourite musicians and my main influences. I'm a little afraid to get lost in it, because the choice today is so huge with platforms such as spotify, youtube or others, and the quality is more than I expected. Basically, I set aside very little time to listen to other bands (in car mainly), which also allows me not to put my instruments down and tell myself that everything has already been done. It's hard to find one's way around all the sub-genres and to understand the links and stories between the shifts from one genre to another. So my answer is no.
Would you have considered yourself a goth kid growing up?
From the age of 15, I began to have a dark and gloomy outlook on life in general, on my issues related to girls and my relationship to life and death. That's where my aspirations to all the elegiac, the gothic and industrial movement came from. Since I was on Reunion Island, there was a very tiny scene of metalheads and it was frowned upon to dress in black with all the make-up on. So I resisted by telling myself that I would wear black and that I would draw satanic symbols on my arms, or even false tattoos. Then came progressively the black varnish and band t-shirts, then the introduction in restricted spheres of dark music aficionados. . . I had my first Marilyn Manson album "Antichrist Superstar" and the machine was launched. It was from there that I invented a whole occult character for myself (to the point of doing magic on a floor of my boarding school with people from Mayotte).
Some of your releases, like the cover to “Lost in Ages” feature occult imagery. What would you consider your interest in the Occult? (Note, this question was asked before the prior one listing the occult influences).
I am less interested in the occult than in pure esotericism, which for me is more a call to recreate a more humane world. It's a pity that the movement, and all the literature attached to it, is so little understood, because it's really a question of understanding what's hidden inside us so that we can then be more in tune with the outside world. The occultism for me is similar to the play of lights in a concert, it throws a lot and it shines. . . the esotericism would be the music and the alchemy necessary between the musicians to create and play the music on stage.
How did you develop your unique vocal style?
Honestly, I only started singing a few months ago. So I can't answer your question, because I know that I still have so much to learn about it, for me it's more a way to accompany my songs by introducing a melody, lyrics and themes that interest me.
You use electronics in many of your songs, but they are never totally predominant.
Are you satisfied with the balance or do you ever want to delve deeper into being more electronic or dance oriented?
As I said, with my former project Ake Project I was in pure digital and electronic music. . . I don't want to come back to it in a direct way, but I like these sound layers and atmospheres that you can add to the songs and compositions. For me the sound I'm trying to shape is a cold sound (maybe from the north of Europe?). which is no substitute for synths, but they aren’t the main character (not anymore haha).
How do you write songs, do you usually have a concept in mind and then write the music or do the lyrics come first?
Mainly I work my songs in the spirit of James Maynard Keenan on his first tracks with Tool. Basically I create an instrumental track and then I try to incorporate melodies into it (mainly with synths, hence the need to keep them for Eleandre's music). The words usually come to me right away or during my regular insomnia.
What is an Eleandre live show like? Any plans (obviously when this whole Pandemic is over, barring some places allowing shows) to tour or do shows soon?
I'm not one of those bands that play live, I think that for the moment my personality and my occupations keep me in the shadows. It will be a big step to see me on stage one day, maybe I'll stay in the shadows and put the musicians in the spotlight with a lot of visual elements and theatricality. But for the moment, or at least for the next few months I don't plan to perform live on a stage for a live show.
Tell me about what you have planned for Eleandre in the future.
I have a new song called "Fall in love with yourself" coming out on July 31st, which gives me a lot of promotional work for the next few days. I have another song coming out next month that should mark a real turning point in the music I produce. I'm a hard-working guy and I'd like to keep up the pace I've set for myself, which is two songs a month, which is quite a job. Ideally, I would like to be able to reunite these tracks under an EP or an album soon. Otherwise, I can see myself being invited to Los Angeles, which remains for me the city of all dreams, and this since my childhood. If not, in some imagined future, I think you can offer me a hearse or a Ferrari, so that I can reach faraway Europe. Thank you in advance.
Mattowarrior's Metal Madness would like to thank Ludovic and Eleandre for this unique interview regarding this compelling project.
You can check out Eleandre for yourself at the following links:
https://open.spotify.com/artist/39RGaVGCxsfi85qY8AQYDm?si=cET211dSRsCmhboIA3DFxA
https://www.instagram.com/eleandre_music/
https://www.wokechimp.com/eleandre-lost-in-ages
https://www.youtube.com/c/ELEANDREMusic/videos
So tell me about Eleandre- how was the project formed?
Eleandre is the addition of both my daughters' names. Without them, none of this could have happened. So first of all I want to dedicate this whole musical project to them. Eleandre is a solo project that I have been leading since May 2020, with the main concept of doing everything myself (voice, guitar, bass, synths and effects, songwriting and also recording). Eleandre is therefore a kind of Siamese concept between my daughters and me, it's a way for me to realize myself and also to support the fact of being far from them, it's in a way a catalyst of my difficulty to live without them. My music is mainly inspired by this distance that allows the return on oneself, it's in a way an idea that makes me think of Platon’s cave or the retreat in the catacombs of the first Gnostic Christians.
How long have you been in the music scene, any prior bands we would know about?
Musically, I've been officiating since 2012 on the experimental electronic internet scene. First under the name of Ake, when I was still a student, then under the name of Ake Project since my separation from university studies. This last project allowed me to make several albums still available on bandcamp, and also to start working on a collaborative mode with different international artists. But I felt there, that my music was starting to run out of steam and I wanted to go back to my roots, and to the rock and metal aesthetics that always attracted me rather than to pure and experimental electronics.
What are your influences? I hear what you list as far as your bio as far as the obvious ones, but also more esoteric ones as well. There is a dirgey style to some of the tracks that almost reminds me of Northern European gothic Metal bands like Katatonia in a way, as well as other stuff in that vein.
My influences, in addition to being musical, come from my more or less distended links with esoteric societies such as Freemasonry or Rosicrucians. Thus I have always been attracted by hidden knowledge and especially by medieval alchemy. The fact that I was born in Carcassonne, in the south of France must have something to do with it, I think. My music is obviously tinged with the writings of Aleister Crowley, Helena Blavatsky, Gurdjieff, Ouspensky or Alejandro Jodorowsky. Although they are not pure musicians, I can also quote Eric Satie who made me think a lot, they have by their generalist and encyclopedic knowledge led to a kind of syncretism of all my influences within my compositions. The fact that you mention Nordic music here does not surprise me, even if I am far from being a specialist, because I think very strongly of a collective unconscious as described by Carl Gustag Jung, and this psycho analytic concept makes me tend towards these Nordic and Germanic roots. Come to think of it, I remember following my father, a former soldier, to parties with his friends, who listened to German and Nordic music. Maybe it just comes from there. . . and the cold doesn't scare me. HAHA
Do you dig Darkwave/Dark Ambient or Black Metal?
So I'm not someone who listens to a lot of music. Without making me the man too busy to listen to music, I believe I remain faithful to my favourite musicians and my main influences. I'm a little afraid to get lost in it, because the choice today is so huge with platforms such as spotify, youtube or others, and the quality is more than I expected. Basically, I set aside very little time to listen to other bands (in car mainly), which also allows me not to put my instruments down and tell myself that everything has already been done. It's hard to find one's way around all the sub-genres and to understand the links and stories between the shifts from one genre to another. So my answer is no.
Would you have considered yourself a goth kid growing up?
From the age of 15, I began to have a dark and gloomy outlook on life in general, on my issues related to girls and my relationship to life and death. That's where my aspirations to all the elegiac, the gothic and industrial movement came from. Since I was on Reunion Island, there was a very tiny scene of metalheads and it was frowned upon to dress in black with all the make-up on. So I resisted by telling myself that I would wear black and that I would draw satanic symbols on my arms, or even false tattoos. Then came progressively the black varnish and band t-shirts, then the introduction in restricted spheres of dark music aficionados. . . I had my first Marilyn Manson album "Antichrist Superstar" and the machine was launched. It was from there that I invented a whole occult character for myself (to the point of doing magic on a floor of my boarding school with people from Mayotte).
Some of your releases, like the cover to “Lost in Ages” feature occult imagery. What would you consider your interest in the Occult? (Note, this question was asked before the prior one listing the occult influences).
I am less interested in the occult than in pure esotericism, which for me is more a call to recreate a more humane world. It's a pity that the movement, and all the literature attached to it, is so little understood, because it's really a question of understanding what's hidden inside us so that we can then be more in tune with the outside world. The occultism for me is similar to the play of lights in a concert, it throws a lot and it shines. . . the esotericism would be the music and the alchemy necessary between the musicians to create and play the music on stage.
How did you develop your unique vocal style?
Honestly, I only started singing a few months ago. So I can't answer your question, because I know that I still have so much to learn about it, for me it's more a way to accompany my songs by introducing a melody, lyrics and themes that interest me.
You use electronics in many of your songs, but they are never totally predominant.
Are you satisfied with the balance or do you ever want to delve deeper into being more electronic or dance oriented?
As I said, with my former project Ake Project I was in pure digital and electronic music. . . I don't want to come back to it in a direct way, but I like these sound layers and atmospheres that you can add to the songs and compositions. For me the sound I'm trying to shape is a cold sound (maybe from the north of Europe?). which is no substitute for synths, but they aren’t the main character (not anymore haha).
How do you write songs, do you usually have a concept in mind and then write the music or do the lyrics come first?
Mainly I work my songs in the spirit of James Maynard Keenan on his first tracks with Tool. Basically I create an instrumental track and then I try to incorporate melodies into it (mainly with synths, hence the need to keep them for Eleandre's music). The words usually come to me right away or during my regular insomnia.
What is an Eleandre live show like? Any plans (obviously when this whole Pandemic is over, barring some places allowing shows) to tour or do shows soon?
I'm not one of those bands that play live, I think that for the moment my personality and my occupations keep me in the shadows. It will be a big step to see me on stage one day, maybe I'll stay in the shadows and put the musicians in the spotlight with a lot of visual elements and theatricality. But for the moment, or at least for the next few months I don't plan to perform live on a stage for a live show.
Tell me about what you have planned for Eleandre in the future.
I have a new song called "Fall in love with yourself" coming out on July 31st, which gives me a lot of promotional work for the next few days. I have another song coming out next month that should mark a real turning point in the music I produce. I'm a hard-working guy and I'd like to keep up the pace I've set for myself, which is two songs a month, which is quite a job. Ideally, I would like to be able to reunite these tracks under an EP or an album soon. Otherwise, I can see myself being invited to Los Angeles, which remains for me the city of all dreams, and this since my childhood. If not, in some imagined future, I think you can offer me a hearse or a Ferrari, so that I can reach faraway Europe. Thank you in advance.
Mattowarrior's Metal Madness would like to thank Ludovic and Eleandre for this unique interview regarding this compelling project.
You can check out Eleandre for yourself at the following links:
https://open.spotify.com/artist/39RGaVGCxsfi85qY8AQYDm?si=cET211dSRsCmhboIA3DFxA
https://www.instagram.com/eleandre_music/
https://www.wokechimp.com/eleandre-lost-in-ages
https://www.youtube.com/c/ELEANDREMusic/videos
Comments