Now that we are at the festival season and every media are focused on them, seems a goof timing to chill out a little and publish this conversation with one of the Nouvelle Vague singers. I saw Nadeah performing here in my hometown last month at a local festival also. Probably not the best environment (stadium, and facing the Depeche Mode sudden cancelation for the same night) but this lady brought fire to a place more used to local football derbies between FC Porto and Boavista FC.
I can synthesize her performance in two words: Presence and Voice.
I believe we’ll hear from her very soon since she’ll be back in Porto and Lisbon by the end of the year.
From my side, just a great Thanks for the time, photos that I’m publishing and the mp3 file from your song “At the moment” that the blog readers can hear in the player.
Bellow, some of the relevant links to follow Nadeah’s work:
http://www.nouvellesvagues.com/BAND_nadeah.html
http://www.hollywoodmonamour.com/info
KING_LEER (KL):
Nadeah,
First of all let me congratulate you for the astonishing performance at the Super Bock Super Rock Festival here in Porto, last week. It was the first time I saw you and Nouvelle Vague live and although the audience was very quiet in the beginning you brought the fire into the crowd.
NADEAH MIRANDA (NM):
Cheers Oh great King Leerful one. I think it’s normal for an audience who perhaps don’t know you or your music to be quiet at the beginning of a show. A lot of the people at the festival would have been there to see depeche mode , so perhaps they did not know what to expect from us. Personally I thought they were a great crowd, very attentive but a lot of fun when we got going.
(KL):
Are you always that comfortable with this kind of approach with the audience? You literally went into the middle of them!
(NM):
Yes …the most important thing about a concert for me is to make a connection with the audience…if that means going into the audience, or pulling people onstage or saying or doing something funny or silly to make that connection, then so be it. There’s nothing worse than feeling like the audience are not with you so I do my best to make friends fast s since we’re all choosing to spend the night together. As a performer I think you have to put yourself out there…make the first move since the people in the audience have already done that by coming to hear your show.
(KL):
Your past is full of projects and collaborations. Tell us a little more about your roots. When did you start to sing?
(NM):
I was about three years old when I realized I wanted to be a singer. But since I was far too shy to tell anyone and I had good grades, I just told people I wanted to be a doctor because I thought it sounded good. I was twelve when I first performed onstage. It was to represent my class in a song competition. You see, at my high school they had an annual singing audition which all the first form students had to do. This audition was the first time I had ever sung in public and I remember feeling like I was flying and it was probably the first time anyone in my class paid any attention to me. Before the audition I had about two friends… but after I that, the whole class wanted to be my friend… for at least a week anyway.
As for my own projects, I wrote my first song at 13 years old… about a boy of course. .At the time I was more involved with musical comedies but at sixteen I stopped doing these shows, learned the guitar, and started writing songs again with people from school etc.
At 18 I moved to Europe and busted my way around France and Britain and since then I have always had my own band…the loveGods, being the main one prior to now, an alternative rock collaboration with French guitarist Art Menuteau.
On moving to Paris I started singing for various other projects including..Marc Collin’s Hollywood mon amour, Katia Labeque’s B for Bang and of course Nouvelle Vague
(KL):
You have joined Nouvelle Vague last year. How was your reaction?
(NM):
Absolutely ecstatic. At the time I was studying French for as I figured I probably needed to g speak the language in order to get a proper job living in Paris. I had just about given up on music as a full time job. So when Marc asked me to join NV ( he heard me sing at a club in Paris after being invited by a friend from school) I really felt like THE luckiest singer in the world….saved by the proverbial bell I suppose.
(KL):
What is Nouvelle’s work method? Since we are talking about versions, the musical arrangements are written and then you and the other singers add the vocals? Do you take part on the arrangements side?
(NM):
The arrangements are 100%Marc Collin and Olivier Libaux’s. The singers can propose songs they think would be good to include, but since New Wave really wasn’t my thing and since Nouvelle Vague is after all, Marc and Olivier’s baby , I prefer to leave them to do the choosing.
As for recording NV3 I don’t know how it worked for the other singers, but with me I was given half a dozen original versions of songs to learn and then Marc, Olivier and I jammed through the songs trying various musical styles and interpretations. Once we were all down with a key and a vibe the boys got working on recorded arrangements and then I just came in, sang my parts and left them to do their magic. All very easy.
(KL):
About your future projects:
Venus Gets Even – What’s behind the name of your solo project?
(NM):
The name has multiple meanings- I prefer to let people interpret the name how they want without me imposing all my personal interpretations…I am sure yours are much more interesting anyway. But even if it meant nothing, I like the sound of Venus Gets Even -I also like the image of the planet of love getting even with the world… an oxymoron I suppose.
Besides that, I think it’s more fun to have an alias rather than using your real name.
(KL):
“Song I just wrote” is a demo but i have been listening to its full of sorrow and sadness with lines like “..I stare at the right side of my double bed, books and medicines instead of you…”. On the other hand, “At the moment”, a more bluesy meets cabaret tune that catches in a more wide range your excellent vocal performance in high and low tones.
What can we expect for the full album?
(NM):
A very bi-polar mix of songs and styles and emotions and characters… I’d get bored otherwise and I think all of us humans are so multi dimentional it’d be crazy to expect someone to replicate the same sound and vibe and emotion in every song . Also since the lyrical inspiration was taken from a rather intense and surreal two month period of my life, the music had to really support that . The rich musical arrangements are thanks to Nicola Tescari , the producer and pianist in Venus gets Even, who is a trained orchestra conductor , piano virtuoso and classical arranger/composer ..I could never have made such an intricate tapestry of sound by myself…and having a kicking band of musicians also helps.
(KL):
Finally: Yesterday was the “man meets the moon in person” 40th anniversary. From all the songs inspired by the moon tell us one that you can say it’s your favorite.
(NM):
I would have to be cliché and say Pink Floyd’s Dark Side of the moon.. I am a sucker for Pink Floyd.
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