Oui Love! On tour with Team Ghost and Anoraak: Part 1

The Great Escape marks the start of a lot of things in the musical calendar – the beginning of a hectic summer touring schedule, an influx of press coverage following successful performances and the long and winding (but thoroughly exciting) promotion campaigns of some of the most interesting and innovative new music being crafted around the planet at the moment. It is, therefore, the perfect starting point for the Oui Love tour, an event organised by the French edition of Bureau Export who bring some of the best French talent over to the UK and send them around the country to show us Brits what’s going on across the channel. This year, TLOBF was invited to go along and to check it all out.

Picked for Oui Love 2011 are TLOBF favourites Team Ghost and fellow countrymen Anoraak, who are about to set off on a tour which takes in some of England’s most vibrant musical spots – Brighton, Bristol, Birmingham, Manchester, Liverpool and London. Kicking off at The Great Escape, the two bands take to different stages for the first night of the tour, with Anoraak starting off proceedings at a packed out show in Brighton’s recently reopened, recently renamed The Haunt (which incidentally, also played host to a rather brilliant online publication’s night the previous evening!). After a fairly draining festival, every band playing on the Saturday evening of The Great Escape inherits the unenviable task of attempting to warm up the slightly jaded, musically overwhelmed masses – something which Anoraak manage pretty much instantaneously with their catchy, electro-pop riffs and boyish party energy. By the end of their set, they have an eclectic crowd chanting and dancing, very much warmed up for the rest of their final night.

A few streets away, Team Ghost grace the stage of a different venue where in the dimly-lit depths and tropical heat of The Jam, the five-piece enchant and seduce a captivated, if completely knackered crowd with their epically crafted, textured melodies. It’s a pretty successful start all around for the groups, who, after some traditional seaside fish and chips, bid a fond farewell to Team Ghost’s Christophe Guérin (who’s unfortunately unable to stick around for the rest of the tour) and climb aboard the bus to make the relatively short journey over to the bands hotel. Thanks to alcohol and cigarette breaks, the 10 minute journey turns into a good hour and a half long trek as Team Ghost enthusiastically blast out their own, newly acquired Japanese EP throughout a liberatingly loud heading-to-the-hotel-bonding-session. And the Oui Love tour is officially underway…

Sunday, the day after the Brighton shows, is a day off to nurse poorly heads, wander around and acclimatise to the progressively worsening British weather. Most importantly though, to settle into our abode for the upcoming tour, the fabulously pink Y-Not bus which would be home to 16 boys, 2 girls, a diverse film collection, a PS3 and a fair amount of booze. Home, sweet home indeed! After their day off, the bands are more than ready to head to the Louisiana in Bristol, the next stop on the tour, and the first joint show of the Oui Love tour so far. The Louisiana has played host to an impressive roster of artists throughout its lifetime, including White Stripes, the Strokes and relatively recently, the sumptuous line up of Fleet Foxes supported by Beach House. Tonight, its carpeted stage will play host to the Oui Love bands, as well as tour and bus buddies Towering Heights, joining the tour from their native Lincoln.

It’s Anoraak who take to the stage first tonight, to a pleasantly full room with a crowd very much up for what Anoraak are about to offer. Making their way through tracks from Wherever The Sun Sets and Nightdrive With You, the three piece led by Anoraak mastermind Frédéric Rivière (and his extraordinarily good English accent) stirs the crowd, including a group of completely smitten French students, into a frenzy. Bandmates – brothers Baudouin and Guillaume Marnez – exude energy and just looking at them enjoying themselves on stage instantly lifts the vibe of this Monday night concert.

Team Ghost are tonight’s headliners, with the Louisiana’s acoustics proving to suit this band’s sound down to the ground. The band play their way through tracks from 2010′s Celebrate What You Can’t See and You Never Did Anything Wrong To Me, and the warmth and depth of the soundscapes being produced on stage are incredibly striking. There’s something really hypnotic about the music of Team Ghost, and Bristol’s crowd stands completely captivated until the group, led by the overwhelmingly talented Nicolas Fromageau, one of the founding members of M83, draws the epic, engaging journey to a close.

Everybody’s getting on well and the strange habits and ways of life on the road are already starting to feel completely normal. Like replacing water with beer for example. Or replacing food with…well, beer, for example. Most importantly though, the music of each band becomes more and more endearing with each show, with Team Ghost and Anoraak, although very different in style, working very hard each night and delivering truly outstanding performances. So that’s two shows down, four to go. Laissez les bons temps rouler…