[News] Cuneiform Records to reissue the album “Where Is Tamashi?” by Volapük and reveal the track “Impro Cloche”

Where Is Tamashii?” is a reissue of the final album by Volapük, the genre-defiant, Avant-Rock French ensemble led by drummer and composer Guigou Chenevier, an alumnus of the legendary Rock In Opposition (R.I.O.)/Art Rock quartet Etron Fou Le Loublan. One of Rock’s great unsung drummers, Chenevier  founded Volapük in 1993 as a trio with classical musicians Michel Mandel and Guillaume Saurel. He named his group Volapük after a unversal language that pre-dated Esperanto by 50 years. It was a fitting name for a group that ignored musical barriers, liberally sharing elements of Rock, Classical, Folk Music and even Jazz in the pursuit of composition and melodic essence.

Cuneiform Records began working with Chenevier and Volapük in the 1990s, releasing three Volapük studio albums. It also released a big-band project organized by Chenevier, called Les Rumeurs de la Ville. Recently, as part of its digital release series, Cuneiform reissued a live Volapük recording, “Pükapök.” Cuneiform is honored to now reissue “Where Is Tamashii?,” Volapük‘s last release before disbanding in 2010.

Stream the track “Impro Cloche” through the SoundCloud player below:

We asked Guigou Chenevier to tell us about “Where Is Tamashii?” Here’s what he said:


“In my opinion, Where is Tamashii? is the best realized album that Volapük ever recorded and released during the 12 or 13  years of our existence.
 
Unfortunately, for non-musical reasons, this album was not really well distributed when it was first released in 2003 and was not able to find the audience it should have.
 
This digital release that Cuneiform offers us today is a real chance for this album to finally exist again, and for more people to discover the very nice music it contains amongst its eleven pieces.
 
Listening back to this album today, something I had not done for many years, I am suddenty struck by the fact it constitutes a perfect bridge or link between the earlier period of the group and later projects which have ermerged from the Volapük nebula of musicians.
 
The song, “Where is Tamashii?” (I really LOVE Takumi’s singing on this song!), sounds quite like some pieces by Rêve Général, the ‘super-méga-group’ that we founded in 2016-2017 with a meeting of musicians coming from the Austro-Czech-Turkish band Metamorphosis and Volapük.
 
Guillaume cello’s and my drums on Impro Cloche very strongly remind me a bit of the song Dunaj by Rêve Géneral. Takumi’s violin in Chantage  is reminiscent of some parts of the album by Les Mutants Maha, a trio I created with Takumi on violin and vocals and Lionel Malric playing low tech keyboards in 2015.
 
I could easily list other examples, but in brief, my impressions in listening again to this album today; twenty one years after it was first released, is that its music is still fresh, organic and very real!  A good surprise for me.

Pre-Order the album on Bandcamp: https://cuneiformrecords.bandcamp.com/album/where-is-tamashii

Tracklist:
01. Where Is Tamashii?
02. Sasayaki
03. Impro Cloche
04. Chantage
05. Boom Boom
06. Vol de Voiture
07. Mission
08. Exercice du Matin
09. Pas de Panique
10. Nouvelle Vague
11. Coda

Lineup:
Guigou Chenevier
/ Drums and Percussions
Takumi Fukushima / Violin, Vocals
Michel Mandel / Clarinet, Bass Clarinet, Taragot
Guillaume Saurel / Cello, Electric Bass

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Author: Jacopo Vigezzi

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