On the phone from Bordeaux in the southwest of France is Mathieu Jourdain. He’s the drummer for eclectic French jazz fusion duo, Inspector Cluzo, a band whose sound is all vigour and verve, thick with accents and swagger.
They’re also a band in love with the gourmet: more often than not, Jourdain’s conversation turns to rich, textured culinary analogies. Some make sense immediately. Others need to be savoured to be appreciated.
Either way, one thing remains constant: this January Inspector Cluzo will make the trip to Southbound all that more funky… and a whole lot tastier.
What can you tell us about the band Inspector Cluzo?
Inspector Cluzo is, as we’d say, The Two French Bastards because we’re a two piece band, just the drums and the guitar. And we play very powerful funk and rock from the ’70s and soul stuff with a high voice like Curtis Mayfield, all that kind of stuff.
What are the joys of touring?
We like countries where the culture is strong and people are fighting with something strong. We fight against the regular food. We try to make people enjoy taste because in our world the less the food tastes, the better it is, the better you can sell it all around the world. This is a commercial argument, whereas food is not that; food is plenty of taste. Some you like, some you don’t, but you don’t have to make it all taste similar from one country to another.
Do you have an all-time favourite summer festival story?
I’d say the Fuji Rock festival in Japan because it’s very different, the people are very different. It was a very new experience for us. People were crazy everywhere, it was like in a movie.
On the flipside, do you have an all time festival horror story?
We had to play two gigs but it was very far from one to the other one, so we played very early in a big festival. When we arrived it was early in the afternoon and people weren’t there yet, so we played in front of not a lot of people and we had to leave right away. So actually we played but we saw nothing, nobody. I think that was the hardest.
What are three things you think every punter should bring to a festival?
A good bottle of wine, thongs, to be comfortable, and a pair of ears. Virgin ears, people who haven’t listened to music before. That way you hear and feel music directly, without thinking about anything or comparing it to anything else. A bottle of wine, and thongs, to be comfortable, because it’s the summer, right, in January?
What’s one thing you love about the music industry?
What do we love about the music industry? Nothing, because music shouldn’t be an industry. But it is, you know, so what we like in the music industry most I would say to being able to travel. The fact that if you’re in the music industry then you travel, you meet people from different countries – that’d be the best thing. Otherwise there’s nothing that’s really necessarily good. And a good thing is you meet people sometimes, but it does take a while to meet good people in the music industry.
If Inspector Cluzo were a dish, what dish would you be?
Oh, it would be magret de canard. That’s duck breast, grilled, with roasted potatoes and mushrooms in the potatoes; that kind of stuff.
How’s the new album coming along?
We’re currently recording our second album in our studio called Studio Soul Kitchen, so it’s again, all about food. And we’ll be back in the summer in Australia to play some festivals and gigs and we’ll be glad to come back and release the next album next year, 2010, and think about a bigger tour at a proper moment. We love Australia. The people are great and we feel there is something between Australia and us.
Southbound is a camping, eco-friendly music festival which happens from Friday January 8 until Sunday January 10. For more information visit www.sunsetevents.com.au and follow the links to the Southbound line-up.
Scott-Patrick Mitchell
