French Rockets
Mount Lawley, Western Australia, Australia
Music
Press
“Early on, a couple of emerging Perth bands opened the night. French Rockets, who have received a bit of notoriety thanks to a smashing remix of Bloc Party’s The Prayer, were up first and proved a good match for Ratatat thanks to their often electronic-based shoegaze rock. Bringing a big production for a local act, including swirling laser lights and a variety of synths and samplers, French Rockets were loud, abrasive and perhaps owe a little to drum machine-era Jesus and Mary Chain.” Harvey Rae - Drum Media - Drum Media
“Always resplendent on stage with their customary laser, smoke and light show, psychedelic rockers French Rockets are a sight to behold, and musically their noisy, tripped out space rock is beyond reproach. Guitar manipulation is what they do best, the usual array of stomp boxes and effects sit predominantly off the ground so they can be tweaked by hand and used with vigour. Feedback loops over itself and builds some epic walls of distorted glorious sound that comes tumbling down amidst bouts of guitar punishment.” Tristan Broomhall - Drum Media - Drum Media
Discography
2010 - Split 12” vinyl : 1x1(2010 redux)/IDDQD (with Injured Ninja)
www.heartlessrobot.bigcartel.com/product/french-rockets-injured-ninja-12-vinyl-dvd-1x1-iddqd
2008 - 555 LP
(7 tracks) Independant release available through French Rockets MySpace site.
Photos
Bio
French Rockets sound is a stew of ideas, that idea was to make music based in modern psychedelia and marry it with hypnotic drones and spiky counterpoint with occasional dabbling in writing catchy 3:30min pop tunes once in a blue moon. Influences are many and diverse but what springs to most minds are seminal acts such as The Jesus and Mary Chain, My Bloody Valentine and Kraftwerk.
The band has developed its live show into an on-the-fly mashup of original looped sounds and samples and a lightshow to compliment the sonic barrage emanating from the stage by utilizing the latest in LED and laser technology making every show unique in its own right. This is achieved by accumulating over 40 specialty lights all controlled by a custom-built wireless DMX system making this system a ‘one of its kind’. The impact of the colossal lightshow married with the mashed up and looped sounds makes for a sensory overloaded experience that generally ‘blows peoples minds’.
Along with recent shows that include a slot on the Melbourne International Arts Festival 2009, Summertones 2009, In The Pines 2008 French Rockets have also shared stages with national and international touring acts such as Ratatat (US), Friendly Fires (UK), The Teenagers (FR), Magic Dirt, Midnight Juggernauts, Pivot, My Disco, Snowman and Tame Impala. Add to this a nomination and subsequent win for Most Popular Single/EP for their Split 12” (with Injured Ninja) for 1 x 1 (2010 Redux) in the 2010 WAMI Awards beating out Australian ARIA charting acts Gyroscope, Eskimo Joe.
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