The first notes of a good tune, just like the first meetings of two people, give us a lot of interesting insight. I was not surprised at how quickly, Mr. Stephane Wrembel and I hit it off as we discussed his upcoming show in Madison on Sunday, April 2nd at Café Coda. Stephane shared that the event will be a soup of his compositions and the latest respects to Django will accompany those originals.The sounds he has been a part of have resonated with me for years of listening and radio sharing. We discussed which Pink Floyd album we would pick if we were to be stranded on an island…I think by the end we narrowed it down to which album would we NOT have with us. We walked through the musicians on tour and the new album(s), Django Experiment I & II and how making it their own started by recording it like it was a live show, minus the crowd. We discussed how even though this is an album that is an inspired by and a tribute to, Django, how it is in no way an example of being a cover band. I think one listen through and you will certainly agree. It was also a little surprising to learn how the sat down and produced two albums worth of music, when only the one was the oriGinal intention. We spoke of the influences of Django Reinhardt, the energy and explosion of New York and the love love love of Zappa. I learned if I give Stephane thirty minutes of my show, that it is very likely the listeners (and myself) will want an hour. Radio, and particularly the conversations with the artists I choose to speak with always help my eyes and mind open up wide to understand what music means/does to people, artists or otherwise…so when we talked about the timeline of Stephane’s life, the way music was/is as he has gone from nomadic creator to world traveler, I felt like this cat is one of those that people that others will want to create artistic experiments around, to celebrate the contribution and imprint left….and he’ll make you think about an apple differently than you may have before. Also, Stephane reveals a secret he intends to do each year on January 23rd. Oh, it’s in here.
Please enjoy our conversation and maybe get yourself out for a great show.
