After a childhood spent studying piano, violin, guitar and singing in Nancy, northeast France, Laura Cahen was ready for a life of stage and studio. She set off with Nord (2017), a debut album recorded with Samy Osta, then followed up with Une fille (2021), created alongside producer Dan Levy (of The Dø fame).
An intensely intimate, minimalistic record with electronic hints, that spurred Laura onto a nationwide tour and a collaborative EP (Des filles). After a successful show at Paris’ Le Trianon in February 2023, Laura began writing songs for a new album that blended together anglo-saxon musical references with her love for the French language. She thus crossed the Channel to ‘the other side’ and found refuge in the musical town of Margate. Specifically, inside Tunng & LUMP co-founder Mike Lindsay’s seaside studio, a welcoming shrine for synths, samplers, mellotrons and other vintage machine drums. This is also where her new album, De l’autre côté [On the other side], was born.
De l’autre côté thus conjures up stellar folk pop, from the superb “Les Astres” to the elevated “Partout” (which features longtime musical partner Theodora on bass), via the Au Revoir Simone-like keyboard stylings of “Quitter La Ville”, the electronic pulsations of “Les Ombres”, the Beatlesian soundscapes of “Nulle Part” or the tender piano of “La Maison”, on which Laura confesses : ‘I’m still just as scared of the dark’. The vocals on album closer “Puisque tu pars” soar above string waves, like the seagulls that ultimately appear. Laura Cahen never turns down a path — on the contrary, she invites us to cross with her to the other side, whether it be of the Channel, a lover’s heart, life or the mirror.
FACTS
1: There is a ferry that crosses the Channel between Dieppe in Normandy, where I live, and Newhaven, close to Brighton in England, four times a day in winter, and six in summer. It’s a beautiful and cheap way to get to the other side if you have time on your hands.
2: The dark marks that we see on the moon used to be mistaken for seas and were given these very poetic names by astronomers, some of which describe states of mind, like the Sea of Serenity or the Sea of Tranquility.
3: The CDs for my new album accidentally have the radio edit of the lead single ‘Quitter la ville’ instead of the full version.
1. What is the biggest inspiration for your music?
The sea, birds, wind, cliffs – subjects of human life, ecology, equality, womanhood, human rights… I’m like a sponge; I take in everything I go through, digest it, and let it back out.
2. How and when did you get into making music?
Right from the very start, my parents were big music lovers, and my two older brothers were already making music, which made me want to do the same. I took piano and violin lessons as a child, but then picked up the guitar as a teenager, and it quickly became like an extra part of me.
3. What are 5 of your favourite albums of all time?
Parallelograms — Linda Perhacs
Third — Portishead
U.F.O.F — Big Thief
Animal — LUMP
Metals — Feist
4. What do you associate with Berlin?
History, underground culture, a lot of arts, diversity, space, trees.
5. What’s your favourite place in your town?
The seaside.
6. If there was no music in the world, what would you do instead?
Probably another art form, maybe painting. If there were no art at all, I would cultivate the soil and ride horses like an Amazon.
7. What was the last record/music you bought or listen?
Something in the Room She Moves by Julia Holter. I love it so much, I feel so many dimensions and perspectives in her songs. I saw her live (in Berlin!) and was blown away — they used a lot of 80s synths and sounds that made me think of the Twin Peaks soundtrack. Her voice is like a dart, so precise, the bassist played beautifully on a Fretless Precision, and the drummer was incredible.
8. Who would you most like to collaborate with?
Adrianne Lenker… her songwriting is so special.
9. What was your best gig (as performer or spectator)?
I played a show at Le Trianon in Paris a couple of years ago, which was my biggest headline in the capital to date. All of the collaborators from my EP Des Filles joined me on stage; it felt like a big party and was very special. I’ll never forget it.
10. How important is technology to your creative process?
Not that important — I mostly write with pen & paper, and a guitar.
11. Please tell us a little bit about your new album “De l’autre côté”?
I made it in Margate (UK) with two amazing people: the producer Mike Lindsay and the arranger and multi-instrumentalist Josephine Stephenson. It’s got a retro-futurist kind of style, songs filled with analog synths and organic instruments, and it tells the story of two women who fall in love in a dystopia that is not too far from our current world. It’s my third album, and I’m super proud of it.
