Colder
is Frech producer and graphic designer Marc Nguyen Tan. Colder's sound is rooted in the post-punk and post-disco of the late 1970s and early 1980s as well as dub and krautrock. His last release lies back more than five years.
Chronological Top 10 of the major and most important crushes I had with music, since I was a kid.
Used on 2001: A Space Odyssey’s soundtrack. 4/5 years old at my parents’ house.
On «Kollaps». I was fifteen and had this friend who used to pass by my house and bring records. I got stuck on that track for quite a while, bought the record on vinyl, CD, and then cassette, just in case. I was surprised, a few years later, to see that The Jesus and Mary Chain were using it as an intro for their gigs.
On «Love’s Secret Domain» (Torso 1991). Bought in a record shop when I was 16 years old. I also caught on later with «Red Skeletons» on «Black Light District» and then «Emergency» on «Music To Play In The Dark».
On «Swastikas For Noddy» (Lay 1988). Heard for the first time around the same time, borrowed the record from a friend. This is also how I got addicted to most of the World Serpent’s key artists, like Nurse With Wound, The Stapleton/Tibet Duet, Sol Invictus, Boyd Rice, Chris & Cosey and Cindytalk S.
On «Bites» (Nettwerk 1985). 17 years old in a club in London during a school trip.
On «Before And After Science» (Island 77). 18/19 years old. I knew his work as musician and producer for Roxy Music and the Talking Heads. I also knew his conceptual ambient pieces but never paid attention to his own pop songs until I bought that record and «Another Green World». These are my favorites now.
The first one (off «Valuable Passages» on Factory 86) was borrowed from a friend’s record collection, the second one was first heard in a club, still in the UK. I’ve never been a great fan of Durutti Column but had a crush on this one track. I just regret they didn't keep on that kind of work a bit more.
On «Fruit Tree» (Hannibal 1986). 24 years old. Heard on the radio while coming back to Paris by car. It was a bad time for me then, a mix of different professional and personal issues and problems. Even if the track sounds really sad, I understood it as a vibrant message of hope and determination.
On «Ready For The House» (Corwood 1978). 26/27 years old, while listening to «Songs in the Key of Z» , a compilation of the worst artists and bands in the music history. I know that Kurt Cobain used to say that Jandek isn’t pretentious but that people who listen to him are. Maybe I am, but I’m quite fascinated with this guy who has secretly released records for ten years or more and accessed the position of a cult artist. Somewhere it goes far beyond the casual concept of music. Here it seems like the music is the man. Even if most of the time it sounds harsh, rough and ugly, in the end it sounds «real» which is the most important for me.
28/29 years old. Heard the same day, I bought Vincent Gallo’s record in a shop after a screening of Buffalo 66 . Right after that I went to a party with a friend where there was this DJ playing weird things like David Hykes and the harmonic choirs - a quite unusual playlist for a party - and then «A Life» from Mark Hollis.
