“There’s a very refreshing sincerity that contrasts with our times,” says Justice producer Gaspard Augé in the liner notes (read Jarre’s notes) for Cosmic Machine, a new compilation of experimental French electronic music. “Especially because these composers weren’t cool at the time. They were total geeks; they looked like math teachers with ponytails and bad glasses, or mad professors pent-up in their studios.”
A direct line can also be drawn between the mad-for-it music of the ’70s and the mainstream-influencing movements that breached our shores in the ’90s and ’00s, from the first wave of French touch producers (Air, Cassius, Motorbass, early Daft Punk) to the frizzle-fried electro of Justice’s Ed Banger crew. In the following extensive feature, we share more of Augé’s thoughts on how library records, sound design and space disco impacted Justice’s own productions, as well as Because Music’s complete track-by-track breakdown of their carefully curated compilation.
Jean Michel Jarre fan page 