Review Text
The debut album release from L'Epee, the band of Emmanuelle Seigner (Ultra Orange & Emmanuelle), Anton Newcombe (The Brian Jonestown Massacre), Lionel and Marie Liminana (The Limiñanas). It is very rarely that a musical project lives up to the billing of being a "supergroup". However, the exception to this rule comes in the shape of L'Epee. A stellar combination of the talents of The Brian Jonestown Massacre's Anton Newcombe, cinematic femme fatale Emmanuelle Seigner and ice-cool pop provocateurs The Limiñanas, L'Epee transcend artistic and traditional borders. Far from being defeated by a world seemingly regressing into turmoil, L'Epee's strength comes from a long history of challenging the status quo - they all share a fierce intelligence and an outsider aesthetic which, over the decades, has been sharpened to a razor's edge. Fitting, then, that their name translates as "The Sword". This pent-up creative energy has been channeled into their extraordinary debut album, Diabolique. Named in tribute to Mario Bava's 1968 cult classic Danger: Diabolik, it's a musical masterclass where elements of garage, ye-ye, sleaze rock, cult soundtracks, sci-fi, spaghetti westerns, and girl-group pop noir are combined with the cut-and-thrust zeal of a band bursting with ideas and energy. All delivered by Emmanuelle in a sultry Gallic drawl which will send a frisson of recognition through anyone familiar with her iconic roles in, among many others, Frantic (1988), Venus In Fur (2013), and Bitter Moon (1992) (all directed by her husband, Roman Polanski). "I've loved rock music since I was a kid," she says, namechecking Lou Reed, The Velvet Underground, and The Stooges as key influences. Having asked close friend Bertrand Belin to provide lyrics for three further tracks ("Grande", "On Dansait Avec Elle", and "Lou"), the trio set to work at The Limiñanas' studio in Cabestany, Southern France, in November 2017. Satisfied with the results, the trio flew to Berlin to hook up with Anton and Andrea Wright at his Cobra Studio in Berlin. Utilizing a treasure trove of vintage equipment, Anton set to work, re-recording the drums with Marie and adding - and deleting - tracks so that the shifting layers of sound suited the mood of each individual track.
