Seriously, Nantes, what the fuck? After a really nice first day when the Loire-Atlantique region showed off its best gray skies, this awful summer weather has descended on the city with all its unbearable heaviness. You can’t see a thing because the sun is so shiny, highlighting just how white and bright everything is in Nantes. We have to face a terrible fact: on Saturdays, when it’s hot, there are hordes of Muggles everywhere, in annoying summer outfits, making noise while listening to crappy stuff that makes them want to yell “popopopopopooooo” to the tune of Seven Nation Army.
Luckily, tonight marks the second day of the Freak Frequenz festival, and the Ferrailleur serves as a fallout shelter where we can take refuge in the shade and listen to cold, merciless machines! Tonight, it’s dark electro and darksynth: the headliner Suicide Commando will close out the night after Supershothun and Macrowave, two projects that know each other well and have already shared several bills together. Like the night before, the concerts take place under the watchful eye of Johan Van Roy. While waiting to see him take the stage, let’s recall the slightly silly challenge the Verdammnis delegation set for themselves: after seeing him take a photo from the balcony through the fence the night before, we HAD to manage to copy it, just to make things even more spicy!
SUPERSHOTGUN
Spicy, Supershotgun certainly is. We could talk about his intense, piercing dark gaze or his beard that looks like it would be super prickly, but that would distract from his signature gear: a homemade exoskeleton that he proudly struts around in. His world is that of the over-the-top action movies of the ’80s and ’90s: imagine for a moment that instead of settling their problems with big guns, Stallone and Schwarzenegger fought the bad guys (who’ll probably have Russian or German accents) with wild dance contests, and you’ll get a sense of the project’s tone. We also hear this very pertinent remark: “are you ready to see performances by guys who act like they’re being tongue-in-cheek but are actually dead serious?” Supershotgun begins. He stares at his audience, looking menacing. He’s not messing around. We don’t know whether to laugh or be a little scared. Dead serious or tongue-in-cheek—it doesn’t matter anymore because we have this feeling that if we keep talking soon we'll be dead-dead with our tongues severed.
What matters is the sincerity of the approach, the passion. There’s no cynicism, no mockery—just a genuine tribute and a real joy in delivering the perfect soundtrack to get us bouncing in our seats during a high-speed chase between flaming trucks. As usual, the set builds to a crescendo, with mysterious and exotic atmospheres gradually morphing into intense synthetic assaults. True to form, Supershotgun communicates with his audience sparingly but with a sense of camaraderie: a few words shouted without a mic, a small gesture here, a tough-guy pause there. He’s clearly bothered by a few minor technical glitches, which might explain why the rhythms took over so much, at the risk of drowning out his melodies... We lost some precision but gained in aggression, a bit like if we’d planned to stealthily take out a target and ended up obliterating an entire hemisphere instead. The theme was respected, and it was a pleasure to see this figure—now a staple of Parisian underground stages—on a beautiful, large stage!
MACROWAVE
With Macrowave, there’s no need for a stage costume. The two musicians are from Alsace and live up to the region’s reputation for reliability: they’re punctual, precise, efficient, neat, and polite. Since they’re from Strasbourg, we’ll avoid bringing up the touchy subject of how to pronounce words like “bredele,” lest we spark a war between the folks from the Haut-Rhin (who are right) and those from the Bas-Rhin (who are talking nonsense). Fortunately, Macrowave is an instrumental project only, so we won’t have to get into the parochial debates that so fascinate the east of France but probably haven’t spiced up many evenings on the banks of the Loire.
They don't talk, but man, do they deliver! The drums right off the bat give you quite a jolt. The sound is dark and aggressive but also immersive: Macrowave crafts cinematic atmospheres with a sense of grandeur and epic scale, along with lighting effects that bring the futuristic world of their music to life. Killian Ebel picks up his bass to get closer to the crowd, while Aurélien Knaub pounds away at his drums with all his might. The two exchange smiles and grimaces. It definitely feels way better in here, in the dark, with our retinas blown out by the strobe lights and our eardrums blown out by this cyberpunk darksynth—free from the ’80s gimmicks often associated with the genre—than out there, with people listening to happy stuff while drinking mojitos.
SUICIDE COMMANDO
Time flies. A concert, a trip to the bar on the waterfront to get some fresh air, then back inside. Suddenly, it’s almost over. All that’s left is the “star” of this third edition of the Freak Frequenz, Suicide Commando, which is celebrating its 40th anniversary this year. After two nights dedicated to French artists who have emerged in recent years, we’re wrapping things up with a surefire hit—something that brings everyone together and puts everyone on the same page.
With Suicide Commando, there really aren’t any surprises. They know their stuff, we know their stuff. We’re here to hear the hits, even though after forty years there are starting to be way too many to fit into a single setlist. Johan Van Roy bursts onto the stage with a youthful energy that never fails to impress, a little devil leaping out of his box, dashing across the stage as he growls the guttural “Welcome” from The Gates of Oblivion. The opening track, taken from Forest of the Impaled (his best album of the last twenty years), is perfect. Then he grimaces and bows repeatedly with a flexibility that would make much younger people green with envy! Beside him, Mario Vaerewijck on drums stays hidden behind his dark glasses, while Torben Schmidt smiles behind his keyboards with the same kindness he showed when he was manning the merch stand. Everyone is wearing gloves—it’s cleaner that way for dissecting us. We then think back to that line we heard earlier in the evening: “the guys who act like they’re being tongue-in-cheek but are actually dead serious.” Yeah, it’s going to be brutal, it’s going to be mega-mean, but man, are we going to have a blast!
On stage, Suicide Commando is as biting as ever. In fact, there’s not much to fault, and the main regret often concerns the opening moments of the concert, when the drums drown out the sinister, icy melodies that Van Roy masters so well. Very quickly, the sound finds its balance. Despite the “anniversary” nature of the date, Suicide Commando remains firmly in the present: most of the songs played tonight are less than twenty years old. With its relentless drums, bizarre rhythms, and a delivery like a robot corroded by vitriol, Kill All Humanity exudes a delightfully Skinny Puppy-esque madness; The Devil is of an unstoppable heaviness; Cause of Death: Suicide still oozes that disturbing darkness while the screen displays a continuous 40-second countdown and reminds us that during this song, about 6 people committed suicide. Brrr. We catch our breath with the more atmospheric God is in the Rain or We Are Transitory; everyone knows the lyrics to Bind Torture Kill (even those who keep saying “Blind” for some reason)...
The world of Suicide Commando is obviously very grim, packed with horror references. It’s impossible not to have fun, though, between the ultra-catchy tracks and this master of ceremonies who’s darting all over the place, exuding a deviant humor that’s often delightful and knows how to win over the crowd with his warm demeanor: there’s his “bonsoiiiir” followed by “that’s about all the French I know” (that’s a lie, he keeps repeating a “merci à tout” that is just too cute), there’s his weird smile while the screen displays “fick dich” during The Devil, there’s his “Fuck Trump, fuck all wars” after Conspiracy with the Devil... After a frenzied Die Motherfucker Die, he and his bandmates take their bows. It’s over. Or not. It depends, he explains: “I’m a little deaf, I need you to make a lot of noise to let me know if you want something else” The crowd goes wild. Deadpan, he replies, “Damn, am I really that deaf? OK, bye-bye”… before, of course, treating us to Unterwelt and the unmissable Hellraiser as a farewell.
Oh no, that’s it—it’s over, and it was so awesome. Suicide Commando doesn’t come around often in France, so we made the most of it. Now it’s time to look back: since its inception, the Freak Frequenz destival has cultivated a paradox that breaks our hearts. By offering, edition after edition, high-quality lineups that bring together French artists who will be tomorrow’s headliners, artists making their French debut, and big names on the scene, the promoter Black Speech manages to blend the comfort of sure bets with the joy of discovery. We don't really have a lot of dark electro/goth/industrial events with this kind of ambition in France… but, once again, the crowd didn’t exactly pack in Nantes. Will we have the pleasure of seeing the event return for a fourth edition? We hope so, maybe one day… but let’s savor the joy of this third installment because, whatever happens, there’s plenty to be proud of in having put together such an event with a genuine vision—one where everyone feels right at home. Oh, and we’ve got a photo of Suicide Commando taken through the wire mesh=
