We, French folks, often go through terrible ordeals when it comes to articulate names of foreign bands without sounding ridiculous or unduly confident.
Conversely, we’re grateful when a foreign band dares to choose a French name, not only because we feel safe pronouncing it, but because we smile inwardly at what it would sound like in the mouth of, say, an English speaker.
So when I first read about Blanche Blanche Blanche I sought phonic examples of how you people might pronounce such a name, but today this mystery remains unsolved, which is highly frustrating.
blanche blanche blanche – runny day (right click/save as)
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Anyway, apart from being a phonological challenge, Blanche Blanche Blanche is a charming duo from Brattleborro, Vermont. Sarah Smith and Zac Philips manage to make songs that are equally buoyant and melancholic, tropical and murky, while sustaining enough eeriness not to sink into stale mannerism. Altogether their music sort of sounds like John Bender’s early 80s ascetic pop mingled with old hazy hits from Ariel Pink’s Haunted Graffiti, topped with the vocals of Beat Happening’s Heather Lewis.
blanche blanche blanche – ana’s life
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blanche blanche blanche – results
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Yet sometimes it just reminds me of the British countryside :
blanche blanche blanche – with or without you (right click/save as)
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If you like to stick to chronology, you may start out with their first cassettes and albums released on Night People, Feeding Tube Records and OSR Tapes, before pursuing the retrofuturistic journey with their latest LP, Wink with both eyes (get it here). And don’t you grieve when you’re done because a new record of Blanche Blanche Blanche is due out on La Station Radar later this year.
Next time, I suggest you call your future band Bûcherons Bandants, Barbu Barbu, or Purin Malin. Thank you.