ICH
BIN "Obéis!" (LP, Poutre Apparente, PALP-001, 2006)
The brand new parisian label Poutre Apparente is proud to announce
the reissue of 90's superb cybernetic electro renewal classic tape from South
Corsica band, ICH BIN: Minimal wave
beats, broken electronics, radical synthetizer and possessed vocals finely
inspired by great philosophical ideas appeared in Europe since the industrial
revolution. Colder than the coldest corsican winter, like Kraftwerk meeting Suicide
in North Poland.
Warehousemen in a secret petrochemical
factory in the north of Corsica, the four members of ICH BIN began to play
together in 1988 with materials recovered on a failed boat transporting
electronic instruments manufactured in
Korea. They developed year after year this so particular manner to play and
sing probably coming from the physical and mental state of the musicians
regularly exposed to a great dose of chemical emanations during their work in
factory.
“Actually,
we almost never played in Corsica", remember the members of
the band, "apart from our very
first concert for this festival in 1988 called Calvi, c'est fini where we opened for La Ricotta, a polyphonic fusion band from Corte. The
only response we had to our music was a dozen of Pietra (Corsica number one beer) bottles thrown at us in the first
minutes of Danger”... “We recorded a tape at studio Leoneti shortly after this disastrous
experience. It was basically a four-track session, with raw versions of Industrie
Lourde and Body Building. We sent one copy to Radio Pays who returned it back to us saying
things like "Sorry, but we don't understand, it doesn't sound very
corsican"”. Some tapes were also discreetly sent to a small network of
K7/fanzines in France, but most of them were shocked or didn't even reply, at
the exception of belgian label Pneu who released a brilliant cd-r in 2002.
End of 80's, beginning of 90's were the apogee
of Grunge music and Noise rock from the US à la Jesus Lizard, Unsane …
etc. and the electronic sound of ICH BIN was totally deviant. They were far
ahead from 10 years of the electro-punk/electro-clash revival of the beginning
of the 21st century. Considering Corsica like the last french industrial
post-nuclear area wasn't hype at all at that time. And still really isn't. This
can partly explain the perpetual misunderstanding about the band.
Unfortunately, they splitted in 2003 after a last concert at a Christmas party,
mainly for political reasons. They definitively stopped playing
music after this gig. All of the members still live in south of Corsica
nowadays and work in different restaurant-hotel-swimming pool complexes. (listen to mp3 excerpts)
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