Billy Ze Kick were a French

alternative rock Alternative rock (also known as alternative music, alt-rock or simply alternative) is a category of rock music that evolved from the independent music underground of the 1970s. Alternative rock acts achieved mainstream success in the 1990s w ...

band formed in 1990. Formed as ''Billy Ze Kick Et Les Gamins En Folie'', they split in 1994 after only one album. The singer, Nathalie Cousin, continued with a solo album under the abbreviation BZK. They reunited in 2000, releasing a new album on the next year, and remaining active as of the end of 2006. The name of the band is probably taken from the title of
book by Jean Vautrin
later adapted in to
film on 1985
. The music itself usually involves the repeating of a catchy refrain with melodic rap on top, with influences on electronic rock and reggae. The band's biggest hit, ''Mangez Moi'' (Eat Me), is about

psychedelic mushrooms A mushroom or toadstool is the fleshy, spore-bearing fruiting body of a fungus, typically produced above ground on soil or another food source. ''Toadstool'' generally refers to a poisonous mushroom. The standard for the name "mushroom" is ...

. ''OCB'' was another of the band's hits, about the

rolling paper Rolling paper is a specialty paper used for making cigarettes (commercially manufactured filter cigarettes and individually made roll-your-own cigarettes). Rolling papers are packs of several cigarette-size sheets, often folded inside a cardbo ...

s made by that brand. The endgame video clip in the game

MDK ''MDK'' is a 1997 third-person shooter video game developed by Shiny Entertainment for Windows and subsequently ported to Mac OS by Shokwave, and to the PlayStation by Neversoft. The game was published on all systems by Playmates Interactive E ...

is their cover of the

Les Poppys Les Poppys is a French musical group of 17 children founded 1946 in Asnières, France by Jean Amoureux as '' Les Petits Chanteurs d'Asnières'' and renamed to ''Les Poppys'' in 1970. Francois Bernheim, former singer of the group Les Roche-Marti ...

song ''Non Non Rien N'a Changé'' (No No Nothing Has Changed).

Discography

* ''Billy Ze Kick et Les Gamins en Folie'' (1994) * ''Paniac'' (1996) * ''Verdure et libido'' (2001) * ''Premiers titres'' (2003)

References

External links

BZK on Pudding Productions
(French). {{Authority control French reggae musical groups French rock music groups Breton musical groups