The ‘Retrospection’ LP And French Touch 3.0: A Chat With Jimmy Batt Ahead Of His First Album
We interviewed the Corsican artist for the first time ever over his outstanding first solo release and the current new wave of french electronic music
Listen to the album previews as you read:
Put on any side of Jean-Marie Battesti’s debut LP, “Retrospection,” and what will jump out at you first is the nostalgic confidence in the production. Whether it is the vintage vocal samples of “Inception,” the sun-swept “Rainbow Road,” the swirling basslines of “Final Boss,” or the almost cheesy emotion of the appropriately titled, “Like A Star,” Battesti’s first outing under his Jimmy Batt alias is a masterclass in all shades of vintage electro. There are flavors of NYC and Detroit, but the album is also woven with a very contemporary sensibility, almost approaching pop. To be sure, these are underground sounds from an underground producer, but Battesti knows how to write a killer hook and it’s not hard to imagine an alternative universe where these tracks are blaring through car radios all summer long.
It’s a release, in short, that feels as fresh as it does a homage to the past, blending together the best of the old with the new (and the DMX Krew remix on a track seems to cement this changing of the guard). The fact that this is Battesti’s debut is equally striking. Hailing from the French commune of Ajaccio on the island of Corsica, this isn’t an area of France known for its rich history of electro or dance music more generally (even if my Googling does alert me to the fact that Napoleon was born in the region). But Battesti has been quietly carving out a sound that, while unique, does seem to capture, as we discuss below, a new French sound, being pushed by artists like Sweely, Oden & Fatzo, and Nemo Vachez, and labels like RA + RE, Rakya, Lumbago, and Forest Ill.
The sound is hard to define, but it is continually inflected with an 80s and 90s sensibility. These producers don’t shy away from melodies that can often border on the cheesy and I often find that there is an almost ADHD approach to the sound design - motifs, synths, and rhythms are constantly changing across the tracks, giving way to a plethora of new ideas all in the span of a single song. I want to underline that this quick moving aesthetic is not a bad thing. In fact, it is one of the freshest sounds being pushed today. It makes sense, in some ways, that Battesti describes Soulwax as an influence. Their style of DJing was able to collectively weave together a seemingly disparate catchment of pop music in much the same way that the Jimmy Batt record is able to do this with dance music. He also has a profound respect for the roots of dance music at both an aesthetic and technological level. For a young artist, it’s impressive to hear how thoughtfully he understands the relationship between machines and their possibilities for sonic structure.
Battesti first appeared on my radar as one half of the duo Solar Sound System. On a pair of sold out 12”s, Solar Sound System, Battesti’s collaboration with Pascal Ordioni (aka PO), are equally exploratory and shapeshifting, blending progressive, electro, breakbeat, and acid all in a matter of a few bars. As we discuss below, the collaboration came about organically with Oridioni, and now is the nucleus for a fledgling Ajaccio dance music scene. In the lightly edited interview below (Battesti’s first, we might add!), we explore his influences, history with electronic music and his ongoing collaboration with Tam Fallan’s Opia Records, a London label that has been mining the cosmic corners of France’s dance music community to help craft a whole new type of “French touch”.
First off, thanks for taking the time to chat with us! Where are you from? Where are you living now?
Hi! I'm Corsican from Ajaccio and actually living on my island.
What’s life been like during COVID? How have you been keeping busy?
During the first lockdown, I was locked at my place without seeing anybody, so I used this free time to focus my spirit and my energy to produce all my album. Apart from "Data X," which I composed at the beginning of 2020, the whole album was made in lockdown.
How did you get into electronic music? Were you a clubber first?
I've been in love with groove and funky sonorities since forever. My father is a drummer so he gave me his passion for music, I began to learn bass, which later became my favourite instrument. One day, I met Seymour, the brother of a friend. He then asked me to record bass lines on his progressive electro and rock productions. His music style spoke to me, there was an 80's electro influence with the synthesizers, but with rock energy. At this time I was listening to Soulwax, Kavinsky, Justice, Daft Punk, which I was a fan of since the beginning, where we can find those pop and electronic sounds. That's when I understood the real capacities and beauty of analog synthesizers. Of course, after that, I began to learn more about the electronic music world.
“I've been in love with groove and funky sonorities since forever.“
What about your entrance into production? Was this the natural fit for you as opposed to DJing?
Firstly, during my teenage years, I learned DJing before starting to produce at 17. In the beginning, I was only recording my electric bass on backing tracks or tracks from other artists/bands on Pro Tools, then I ordered Ableton Live with my first salary and this was the true beginning. With time, I started to produce more and more with my synthesizers and machines so I was DJing less obviously. I still like DJing but I'm more interested in the challenge of producing a liveset with my own compositions, a bit like a band on stage.
You are also one half of the duo Solar Sound System. Can you tell us about that project? How did it start?
I don't remember how we [Pascal Ordioni] started to produce together but Ajaccio is small so we knew one another already and also at the time very few people from my age were playing this music style. I probably invited him to my previous home studio and we get along well so naturally, we started with house and minimal compositions before starting to experiment with other styles.
This is, for now, the only producer I have successfully worked with on a real project.
In what ways do you approach the Solar Sound System project differently? What is it like working as half of a duo?
I have been in different bands in my life so I know it's always fun to produce and compose with other people because there is the pleasure of sharing and working with two brains help to be more creative. We can also concentrate on specific parts of the work and share tasks with the other member when we reach a point of mutual trust. We listened a lot to each other so ideas were influenced by both of us. During livesets and at the recording studio, I often focus on the melodic parts of the song while Pascal was more on the drums but finally the two of us were participating in the totality of our songs.
I also like to work alone and to be in an introspective state, it's surely more personal and I think it's important to express yourself alone. But even when I'm producing a solo project, I still find myself collaborating with other musicians, like Pierre Mikdjian with his synthesizer solo part and Vincent Alessandri at the guitar on "Like a star". In the end, we all have to collaborate at one point like for music videos I did with the crew of Club Finesse.
“I am fascinated by vocoders, talkboxes, or fat groovy basslines. “
Can you tell us about how you linked with Opia? How did that connection come about?
Well, we already knew the label before so we sent demos of K7 and CD-R to Tam [Fallan] who directly wanted to collaborate with us. We didn't know what to expect at first, but I spotted that he always had an open-minded way of working and he let us express ourselves freely.
It’s pretty impressive that your first release as Jimmy Batt is an LP! How did you approach this project? Was it always going to be a double pack?
As I said, Tam is always paying attention to me and open-minded, so I sent to him some unfinished versions of tracks at the beginning of the lockdown back in March 2020. Seeing the number of tracks I sent, he proposed for me to make an LP. I thought it was a good idea because it allowed me to express myself more.
It’s a pretty varied LP, there are touches of progressive and trance and even a little bit of Italo! What was your inspiration? How do you feel like these sounds work together? Was the goal always to have DMX Krew on the remix?
Yeah, my influences are very varied so we can find a mix of all that in my sound design but I don't particularly want to put myself in a particular style. I especially like trance sonorities where we can find these dreamy and nostalgic vibes. It’s also a feeling I like to share with my audience.
Of course, the 80s side is also fascinating to me, it's the era of new technology in recording studios and also the birth of the MIDI interface. At the time, we could for the first time synchronise each synthesizer to drum machines, it allowed new sounds like new wave, Hip-Hop or more pop styles like Italo Disco. As everything was synchronisable easily, it changed the music world. Artists could experiment in record studios, find new effects to work with like gated reverb. Giorgio Moroder, Cerrone or Daft Punk are references who helped me a lot to define my sound design.
I am fascinated by vocoders, talkboxes, or fat groovy basslines. I like the fact of creating new things out of old things, this is what I’m trying to do. As a fan, the DMX Krew remix is something crazy for me. He is one of the few electro producers I find really interesting. I'm not listening to a lot of electro despite the fact that I’m an electro producer.
“Maybe 2020 sounds like French Touch 3.0, despite the fact that it's more an era than a specific style. Maybe foreign journalists or amateurs will put a name on this french. Something like "Nouvelle Vague,” for when they named the French Touch era.”
I see a connection between your music and some other crews in France, like Rakya and Forest ill. Do you feel like you are part of a scene? Is there a new sound coming out of France at the moment?
I don't really feel like I'm part of a scene or a crew, but I do talk with young artists like Sweely, Fasme, or Oden & Fatzo about music and hardware. It's maybe because they are producers with a "live" way of thinking. I think France has a big potential in terms of electronic music, since even before the French Touch era. Today we can start to create music with a very small setup, it explains why there are a lot of new producers everywhere. Maybe 2020 sounds like French Touch 3.0, despite the fact that it's more an era than a specific style. Maybe foreign journalists or amateurs will put a name on this french. Something like "Nouvelle Vague,” for when they named the French Touch era.
What’s next on the horizon? What are you looking forward to this year? Any other releases planned?
For now, I'm focused on the elaboration of my new joint, my new live solo set-up. It takes time, as I’m also still learning to use my new gears. I don't have a release scheduled this year yet.
I'm trying to finesse my production workflow, I'm always trying to create new things while keeping my style.
Interview by Henry Ivry.
