Biography
Three musicians drawn from the feminist collective Woundeur Brass—Joane Hétu on vocals and saxophone, Diane Labrosse on keyboards, and Danielle Palardy Roger on drums—launched Les Poules as an auxiliary venture. Their debut LP, issued in 1986, solidified both their collaborative chemistry and their partly improvised approach to synthetic avant-pop. Each participant soon branched into separate endeavors. By 2000 the original trio reconvened as a free-improvisation ensemble, issuing a fresh recording two years later.
Montréal served as the setting in 1986, when an avant-rock feminist ensemble that had already operated for several seasons under the Wondeur Brass banner had shifted from political music theater to a confrontational experimental-pop format. At that juncture Hétu, Labrosse, and Roger—the collective’s three most experimentally inclined members—chose to step away from an ensemble that had once expanded to nine players in order to concentrate on their own compact undertaking, which they named Les Poules, a pointedly ironic label for feminists. The material on Les Contes de l’Amère Loi, released the same year, displayed greater precision than the Ravir album Wondeur Brass had produced in 1985: post-new-wave in character, stark and turbulent, the pieces allowed expanded space for improvisation while delivering heightened impact. Rather than recall the remaining Wondeur Brass members from their temporary pause, the three dismissed them and enlisted bassist Marie Trudeau. That quartet cut Simoneda, Reine des Esclaves under the Wondeur Brass name before adopting the Justine moniker and producing two further albums during the 1990s. Hétu, Labrosse, and Roger continued to appear on one another’s solo recordings and jointly operated the production company SuperMémé-SuperMusique, yet Les Poules was widely regarded as a closed chapter.
In 2000 the three performed once more as a trio in Victoria and Vancouver, Canada, and the earlier group name surfaced without contrivance. Ambiances Magnétiques reissued Les Contes de l’Amère Loi on CD the following year, prompting a Montréal concert. No retrospective impulse was at work; the earlier repertoire had been set aside. The revived Les Poules engaged in quiet free improvisation, with lyrics reduced to abstract vocal sounds, keyboard figures replaced by treated samples, and drumming converted into textural percussion. Prairie Orange appeared in 2002.
Montréal served as the setting in 1986, when an avant-rock feminist ensemble that had already operated for several seasons under the Wondeur Brass banner had shifted from political music theater to a confrontational experimental-pop format. At that juncture Hétu, Labrosse, and Roger—the collective’s three most experimentally inclined members—chose to step away from an ensemble that had once expanded to nine players in order to concentrate on their own compact undertaking, which they named Les Poules, a pointedly ironic label for feminists. The material on Les Contes de l’Amère Loi, released the same year, displayed greater precision than the Ravir album Wondeur Brass had produced in 1985: post-new-wave in character, stark and turbulent, the pieces allowed expanded space for improvisation while delivering heightened impact. Rather than recall the remaining Wondeur Brass members from their temporary pause, the three dismissed them and enlisted bassist Marie Trudeau. That quartet cut Simoneda, Reine des Esclaves under the Wondeur Brass name before adopting the Justine moniker and producing two further albums during the 1990s. Hétu, Labrosse, and Roger continued to appear on one another’s solo recordings and jointly operated the production company SuperMémé-SuperMusique, yet Les Poules was widely regarded as a closed chapter.
In 2000 the three performed once more as a trio in Victoria and Vancouver, Canada, and the earlier group name surfaced without contrivance. Ambiances Magnétiques reissued Les Contes de l’Amère Loi on CD the following year, prompting a Montréal concert. No retrospective impulse was at work; the earlier repertoire had been set aside. The revived Les Poules engaged in quiet free improvisation, with lyrics reduced to abstract vocal sounds, keyboard figures replaced by treated samples, and drumming converted into textural percussion. Prairie Orange appeared in 2002.
Albums
