Guerre Froide - Anguish and Entertainment

"Experience was able - in absolute time - to take the upper hand over reality. To this was added a truth true only within its own limit. The limit of the veil that falls before what has just been glimpsed, the limit of being truth in its entirety. Action could only act as such. The allusion to the mere act of existing has remained an arcane discourse, in which only the word, or the attention of the listener, is expressed without any ambiguity. Experience remains purely individual, desire possesses only a part of that from which it sprang. In the tormented search for an other, for a force to reveal itself, the word became possession, the contingent was born of a rhythm, of a breath. The necessary became the consciousness of a mad truth..." (Guerre Froide, Yves Royer, June 1982)

This is what can be read on an A4 flyer, printed on both sides and tucked inside Archives, a work credited to Guerre Froide released in an extremely limited run (only 222 copies) and published posthumously in 1985. But to better understand the message being sent, it's perhaps necessary to take a step back.

The early days and visionary glory: 1980-1982

It's autumn 1980, to be precise November 11th, when Yves Royer, at the time the group leader and singer of both Guerre Froide and Stress (another minimal wave band), performs alongside Patrik Mallet (bass), Gilbert Deffais (drum machine) and Fabrice Fruchart, known as "2F" (synthesizers), at the BJ's Club in Amiens (a town in northeastern France). From that moment on there are a few more shows in Paris, in the student quarter of St. Germain, and some sporadic appearances at local events.

Then comes the first audio production, titled Cicatrice. It's a "K7", that is, a cassette tape, with a cover printed on glossy paper, an ultra-limited run - just 50 copies - and 8 tracks, some recorded live and others in the studio, released on the label: Cryogenesisation Report.

Cryogenesisation Report is actually an independent collective label, created specifically at the initiative of Guerre Froide, which would serve for at least a good six years as the vehicle for all their parallel activities: from organizing concerts, to launching a fanzine titled "Interpretation Subjektive", to side musical projects such as "Gegenact" (literally "Counter-act") and "Pour l'Example".

Among the tracks on the cassette, one in particular would seal the band's fate: "Demain Berlin". A mirror of a deeply anguished era, the track unfolds as a layered crossing of languages and doubts, skilfully stitched onto a shaky, typically post-punk musical base - dry, arid, with a nagging, ever-building rhythm. "You will meet me again in Berchtesgaden... I'm sure it will happen, sure it was worth it, because you'll sing with only one thought in your head, we will meet again among the ruins of Berlin... death sometimes seems like a blessing, among the ruins of Berlin, the end will soon come in Berlin '81". It was indeed 1981, eight years still stood between then and the fall of the Wall, but Guerre Froide were already there to mark the occasion. The track would later be revisited under different titles - "Berlin Demain", "Berlin 81", "Eva", "Zum Ende" - but its evocative, prophetic power never ceased to astonish.

A few months later, the first vinyl record was recorded in the studio, this time on the Steachak label, a cult name in the cold-wave scene, with a far larger pressing of 1000 copies, and with a more polished, coherent cover design, the brainchild of a certain Alex Mech. The record, however, has no proper title of its own: it could be called Guerre Froide, just as well as Demain Berlin, and Fabrice Fruchart "2F" took no part in its making, having already left the band for unknown reasons. Meanwhile spring 1982 had arrived, and by then Guerre Froide had ceased to exist.

The enigmatic post-production of "Archives" and the long silence

It's now 1985, a full three years after the band split, and this time it's the original label Cryogenesisation Report – probably at the urging of Yves Royer himself – that takes charge of producing Archives. Once again it's on cassette, 10 tracks in all, with a specific run of 222 copies (who knows why exactly 222), all numbered and inserted inside handmade brown paper sleeves. Along with the cassette, the sleeve also contains an A4 sheet presenting the band, and a poster announcing the arrival of the new album, which in fact had already come out four years earlier.

The circulation of Archives undoubtedly helps build an aura of mystery around Guerre Froide's profile, and curiosity only grows further when, reading the presentation flyer, one learns that: “Almost all of Guerre Froide's concerts were simultaneously accompanied by slide projections on multiple themes. Images held a particularly important place in the band's conception. They were also the basis for another product inseparable from the Guerre Froide concept: the fanzine INTERPRETATION SUBJENKTIVE, edited and distributed on the occasion of certain concerts”, and further on, moving to the left side of the flyer, “13/06/82 those who were there…(know)”. What this refers to, and what Guerre Froide were trying to allude to, we'll never know, but ultimately that's what makes them even more fascinating, just as their whole experiential universe is fascinating. It's sight that helps hearing grasp the prophetic perceptions that reality itself offers. Truth doesn't exist as such, but it's man's need to uncover it that leads it to manifest itself in words, in deeds, in concrete actions as simple as listening, fixing on images more or less static, and it's in them that every individual projects their own perception, the soul of an unceasing breath, of a hypnotic, cold, pounding rhythm, typical of the minimal wave touch signed Guerre Froide.

From '85 onward a long period of silence sets in; by now the band has split up, but Demain Berlin inexplicably keeps circulating, probably thanks to new communication channels or social networks, and so the German label Genetic Music – this time it's not even clear at whose behest – decides to reissue the album Demain Berlin on CD, first pressing 500 copies in 2004 and then another 500 five years later. The only thing distinguishing the new CD edition is a mini-sticker listing a MySpace address and Nordwaves: maybe there's still hope, maybe the band is still active in some way and useful updates can be found online.

A Return with a Twist

This time it's Yves Royer and the returning “2F”, that is Fabrice Fruchart, who decide to reform the band in April 2006. Joining them in the lineup is a new bassist, Samuel Druon. And it's under the independent label Brouillard Definitif that Guerre Froide's first proper CD is released, titled Angoisse et Divertissement. The goal of this work and of the reunited lineup is clear from the start: to match the original creative inspiration behind some of the songs with the many sonic possibilities finally made available by technological progress. And the result is both evident and superb: the musical atmosphere is far more melancholic, yet at the same time consistent with and respectful of the minimal style, with much sharper rhythms. Alongside re-arranged and revisited tracks, Angoisse et Divertissement offers new songs that are even colder, harder and more aggressive. As is the case with “Reveille-Toi”: “Svegliati, fai uno sforzo, svegliati, tu non sei morto, svegliati, fai uno sforzo, svegliati, una volta ancora”, which would later be covered by the Parisian band Frustration.

The album thus stands as the ideal bridge between past and present, and the first 500 copies sell out in just a few weeks.

Starting in 2007, Guerre Froide fully resume their activity, regularly playing concerts and taking part in local festivals.

In 2009 the single “Nom” comes out in a cardboard sleeve, again produced by the label Brouillard Definitif, this time with a first pressing of over 1000 copies, containing, alongside “Nom”, two other previously unreleased tracks, “Planete Hurlante” and “Entre nous”. But it's with “Nom” in particular that Guerre Froide powerfully assert, sonically, and concisely sum up, semantically, their whole existentialism: “Wise man, you know you are alone, with your courage, madly alone.”

In May 2010 an even more ambitious new project comes to life, titled Abrutir le masse (Brouillard Definitif). And here, inexplicably, a strange marvel occurs: Yves Royer's voice, grown softer with the passing of time, at times recalls that of the great Ian Curtis, and listening to the album flows pleasantly from one track to the next. The sweetness of his vocal timbre does not, however, detract from the severity and rawness of the content, this time directed at the whole human species: “…and there's the genius of men, that ignites every evil… if nature is generous, the human species is dangerous” (from “Sauvages”). Some tracks, however, prefer a dreamlike detour to the frontal attack, as in the case of “Des Illusions”, a song rhythmically built around a pulsing heartbeat, and “Canal Historique”, where, between an electric guitar in perfect shoegaze style and a bass stretched out to create a hazy, grey backdrop, Yves's lament slips in naturally.

Guerre Froide's cold wave then seems to have nothing left to do with the urban reality from which it was born; if anything, it releases an unclassifiable feeling, somewhat outside of time, leaving the listener alone with themselves. With this latest work, the band proves it has outdone itself, having managed to position itself perfectly at the centre of a blurred era such as our own, and having carried out its mission as well as possible: that of a prophetic awakening of consciousness regarding the human condition.

A work of meditation rather than judgment, Abrutir le masse, despite the harshness of its premises, wants to leave everyone their own space for reflection, a starting point from which to make their own, contingent, “awareness of a mad truth”.

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