Parisian quintet En Attendant Ana have been steadily capturing hearts and minds across Europe and the US with their long running tour in support of last year’s stunning album Principia, the group’s third.
Ahead of their recent triumphant gig at Twenty One Southend for Tea and Oranges, the band’s frontperson and principal songwriter Margaux Bouchaudon very kindly agreed to answer a few questions for heavymetalkids.uk:
Hi Margaux, thanks so much for talking to the blog. For anyone reading here in the UK who might not be aware, can you tell us a little about how the band came together and how you’d best describe your sound?
Hey, thank you for having us! We are an indie pop band based in Paris. Camille and I started playing together almost ten years ago. The band’s composition changed a lot across the years, as well as our sound I would say, but that’s quite natural! We shifted from an urgent garage pop to a more « refined » pop with hints of post punk or krautrock music. Our music evolves with us, as we grow up (or old…), with our tastes, with the things we listen to, the things we discover. I do write most of the songs alone but we rearrange them altogether. It’s an amazing experience to see how our five personalities pour into those songs and represent the five of us individually and as a band. It’s not always an easy task but I’m quite happy with the result!
Last year’s album Principia garnered rave reviews across the board and spawned what I considered to be the song of the year in Wonder. As a Parisian band on a US label with a sizeable and ever growing UK following, how does it feel to be able to reach so many people worldwide with your music and be shown so much love in response?
I must say, it’s a pretty incredible feeling! In fact, our previous album, Juillet, was released just before Covid. We only had time to tour the UK for a week, and then the world came to a standstill. We didn’t get a chance to defend that album live. With Principia, it’s exactly the opposite! We’ve been touring for over a year now, and it’s not even over yet, as we’re adding new gigs to the list. For a band of our size, that’s incredible. We’ve had amazing feedback from all over the world, and we really didn’t expect it. We’re trying to find our way in a world that’s more and more difficult to understand and sometimes making music in that context seems pointless. So what we’ve received from the people who’ve come to see us makes it all a little more meaningful I would say.
Every time I check in on your socials you either seem to be away on tour or planning the next one. What is it about the live experience that keeps you guys coming back for more? I was fortunate enough to catch you last year in London and the atmosphere was electric. You truly are a band operating at peak levels.
As I said before, not touring after the release of Juillet was a bit frustrating, so we’re taking our revenge this time! All jokes aside, we hadn’t really planned to have so many concerts this year. We were so afraid of not having any that we accepted a lot of gigs and found ways to tour as much as possible. But we don’t regret it at all, even if it’s even more difficult and exhausting as an independent band. As far as I’m concerned, I love the creative phase of an album, especially the recording and mixing stages, because I feel like I have access to the widest spectrum of musical creation. It’s more challenging for me to perform live because I have to confront myself to others, accept our possible mistakes, the fact that it can go wrong. There is a huge part of the unknown in the studio as well but it’s still something that we have a sort of control over. But as I said, when you create something with the audience, when you feel that there is a sort of chemistry happening everything takes its sense.
Finally, myself and many around me were moved and inspired by your recent decision to withdraw from the Great Escape Festival following its silence regarding the Bands Boycott Barclays petition. How important is it that those within the arts come together to call out those elements of the industry complicit in the atrocities being perpetrated in Gaza?
As we wrote on our socials, it was not an easy decision to make. We had to take into account a financial and professional reality that comes with the very fact of being a small independent band… So we had long internal conversations trying to find the good way of reacting to the festival’s silence. We decided not to go because it felt like it was the best answer we could give. Given the quest for meaning that we find ourselves in, both as individuals and as musicians, it seemed important for us to align our convictions with our actions.
Combining the urgency of post punk with the pure melodies of indie pop, En Attendant Ana’s Trouble In Mind Records back catalogue and recent Sub Pop single Magical Lies is all essential listening. Live dates continue to be added, please follow the band’s socials for the latest information.
Huge thanks to Margaux for speaking to heavymetalkids.uk and to Marion Seury and Tim Keech for arranging the interview.
Band photograph by Greg Ponthus.
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