Neo Museum – Nouvelles Ethnologiques De L’Obscur Museum

NEO Museum was one of the most distinctive groups to emerge from the vibrant new music scene of Vandœuvre-lès-Nancy in the mid-1980s. Founded in 1984 by saxophonist Alain Casari, guitarist Antoine Gindt and drummer Daniel Koskowitz, the trio soon appeared at the Festival Musique de Traverse Off in Reims and the Théâtre des Nations in Nancy. It quickly became a focal point for collective composition, improvisation and experimentation, attracting numerous musicians from the jazz, improvised music and avant-garde rock scenes. Each member brought a distinct artistic background to the project. Casari, born in 1961 and trained as a saxophonist in Metz, was deeply influenced by contemporary music and by figures such as Stockhausen, Berio, La Monte Young, Scelsi and Kagel. His meeting with members of Hellebore in 1981 opened the way to a practice that crossed music, architecture and the visual arts, leading to the foundation of NEO Museum in 1984. After graduating in architecture in 1988, his work bridged architecture, urban planning, improvisation and electronic music. Gindt, also born in 1961, was a guitarist, co-founder of Hellebore and NEO Museum, and a key force behind Musique Action in Vandœuvre-lès-Nancy. His path later led him to become a leading figure in contemporary music in France, collaborating with composers including Aperghis, Chin, Dusapin, Goebbels, Kagel, Kurtág, Stravinsky and Zappa. Koskowitz, born in 1960, began in contemporary and alternative music before moving through improvisation, noise rock and electronic experimentation with Hellebore, NEO Museum, Soixante Étage, Etage 34 and Idiome 1238. From the late 1980s onward, he created music for dance, theatre, multimedia installations and solo projects, and later joined Art Zoyd, where he remained from 2004 to 2020. His work has continued to explore interdisciplinary projects spanning performance, multimedia and sound art.
NEO Museum established itself as a creative laboratory where composition and improvisation coexisted freely. The creative intensity of those years culminated in the recording of the group’s only album, Nouvelles Ethnologiques de l’Obscur Museum, produced between late 1985 and early 1986 at the Centre Culturel André Malraux in Vandœuvre-lès-Nancy. The album remains the most complete document of the group’s singular aesthetic and of a repertoire performed in France and abroad.
This reissue of Nouvelles Ethnologiques de l’Obscur Museum offers a renewed opportunity to rediscover a remarkable chapter in French experimental music. It preserves the legacy of a group whose adventurous spirit continues to resonate today, with the CD edition further enriched by rare and previously unreleased recordings.

Mit Nouvelles Ethnologiques De L’Obscur Museum (AD9 021, LP/CD) wird das 1986 bei Ayaa erschienene Debut von NEO Museum neu aufgelegt. So oxymoron wie der Bandname war die Musik, die Alain Casari an Altosax, Antoine Gindt an Gitarre, Bass & Piano sowie Daniel Koskowitz zwischen 1984 und 1988 in Vandœuvre-lès-Nancy fabrizierten. Als Spin-Off von Hellebore, mit Querverbindung zu Look de Bouk und im Frock-in-Opposition-Esprit von Etron Fou Leloublan waren sie Teil der ‘Recommended’-Szene und der Ayaa-‘Familie’ mit noch Toupidek Limonade, Les Batteries, Les I, Soixante Etages und Ghédalia Tazartès. Mit dem Musique Action Internationale-Festival in Vandœuvre als Attraktion. Und hier mit ‘Une Sidérurgie N° 4‘, ‘Une Sidérurgie N° 1‘, ‘Une Sidérurgie N° 5‘, ‘Erreur D’Errance Song‘, ‘Premier Élément‘, ‘Éléments De Paraphrase‘, ‘Rahcuoba Pro Afghan‘ (über die Affäre um den 1984 von sowjetischen Truppen festgenommenen Kriegsberichterstatter Jacques Abouchar) und – als weiterem CD-Bonus neben ‘Studio Test #1 & 2‘ – ‘Décadence Birmane‘. Als lauter Exempeln für Spleen als etwas genuin Französischem. Sie rocken eine obskure Art von Rock. Sie jazzen – mit noch Sopranino-und Tenorsax, Posaune und Bassklarinette – eine obskure Art von Jazz. Weil sie wie auf einer Sur-Ebene spielen, leicht distanziert und doch in liebhabender Appropriation als postmoderne Ethnologen. Neo, nouvelle, innovativ war und ist immer noch der Blick, sich in einer oxymoronen Mischung aus Sophistication und Naivität in Jazz und Rock als zweieiigen Zwillingen zu vergucken.

Rigobert Dittmann (Bad Alchemy 135)