Jean-Pierre Massiera (10 July 1941 – 28 December 2019),Jean Garand, Larsen Nick, Liner notes for ''Jean-Pierre Massiera: Psychoses Freakoid (1963-1978)'', Mucho Gusto Records, 2008 sometimes referred to by his initials JPM, was a French musician, composer, record producer, sound engineer, and recording studio owner. His prolific output between the 1960s and 1990s ranged across

pop Pop or POP may refer to: Arts, entertainment, and media * Pop music, a musical genre Artists * POP, a Japanese idol group now known as Gang Parade * Pop! (British group), a UK pop group * Pop! featuring Angie Hart, an Australian band Album ...

instrumental An instrumental or instrumental song is music without any vocals, although it might include some inarticulate vocals, such as shouted backup vocals in a big band setting. Through Semantic change, semantic widening, a broader sense of the word s ...

psychedelic rock Psychedelic rock is a rock music Music genre, genre that is inspired, influenced, or representative of psychedelia, psychedelic culture, which is centered on perception-altering hallucinogenic drugs. The music incorporated new electronic sound ...

and

disco music Disco is a genre of dance music and a subculture that emerged in the late 1960s from the United States' urban nightlife, particularly in African-American, Italian-American, Gay and Latino communities. Its sound features four-on-the-floor ...

, often incorporating elements of

musique concrète Musique concrète (; ): " problem for any translator of an academic work in French is that the language is relatively abstract and theoretical compared to English; one might even say that the mode of thinking itself tends to be more schematic ...

field recording Field recording is the production of audio recordings outside recording studios, and the term applies to recordings of both natural and human-produced sounds. It can also include the recording of electromagnetic fields or vibrations using diff ...

s and samples in an eccentrically experimental and unique style. His work is usually credited under one-off band names such as Les Maledictus Sound, Horrific Child, and Herman's Rocket. He has been called "the French

Joe Meek Robert George "Joe" Meek (5 April 1929 – 3 February 1967) was an English record producer and songwriter considered one of the most influential sound engineers of all time, being one of the first to develop ideas such as the recording studio a ...

". Ben Thompson, Review of ''Midnight Massiera'' by Jean-Pierre Massiera, ''The Guardian'', 15 March 2009
Retrieved 7 December 2019 ''

The Guardian ''The Guardian'' is a British daily newspaper. It was founded in Manchester in 1821 as ''The Manchester Guardian'' and changed its name in 1959, followed by a move to London. Along with its sister paper, ''The Guardian Weekly'', ''The Guardi ...

s reviewer Ben Thompson called his work "a fetid miasma of sick humour, sound effects and unexpectedly first-rate musicianship", and reviewer William Rauscher described him as "a freewheeling auteur whose outrageous forays in trashy pop culture mix low-brow sensuality with oddball experimentation".

Early life and career

Massiera was born in

Nice Nice ( ; ) is a city in and the prefecture of the Alpes-Maritimes department in France. The Nice agglomeration extends far beyond the administrative city limits, with a population of nearly one million France France, officially the French Republic, is a country located primarily in Western Europe. Overseas France, Its overseas regions and territories include French Guiana in South America, Saint Pierre and Miquelon in the Atlantic Ocean#North Atlan ...

, but grew up in

Córdoba Córdoba most commonly refers to: * Córdoba, Spain, a major city in southern Spain and formerly the imperial capital of Islamic Spain * Córdoba, Argentina, the second largest city in Argentina and the capital of Córdoba Province Córdoba or Cord ...

and

Buenos Aires Buenos Aires, controlled by the government of the Autonomous City of Buenos Aires, is the Capital city, capital and largest city of Argentina. It is located on the southwest of the Río de la Plata. Buenos Aires is classified as an Alpha− glob ...

Argentina Argentina, officially the Argentine Republic, is a country in the southern half of South America. It covers an area of , making it the List of South American countries by area, second-largest country in South America after Brazil, the fourt ...

. After learning guitar, he returned to France when in his teens, and formed the instrumental

beat group Beat music, British beat, or Merseybeat is a British popular music Music genre, genre that developed around Liverpool in the late 1950s and early 1960s. The genre melded influences from British rock and roll, British and Music of the United St ...

, Les Milords. Massiera played

lead guitar Lead guitar (also known as solo guitar) is a musical part for a guitar in which the guitarist plays melody lines, instrumental fill passages, guitar solos, and occasionally, some riffs and chords within a song structure. The lead is the featur ...

; the other band members were Pierre Malaussena (rhythm guitar), Patrick Batteu (bass), and Francis Cavallaro (drums). After several singles in the style of British and American

groups such as

the Shadows The Shadows (originally known as the Drifters between 1958 and 1959) were an English instrumental rock group, who dominated the British popular music charts in the pre-Beatles era from the late 1950s to the early 1960s. They served as the bac ...

and

the Ventures The Ventures are an American instrumental rock band formed in Tacoma, Washington, in 1958, by Don Wilson (musician), Don Wilson and Bob Bogle. The band, which was a quartet for most of its existence, helped to popularize the electric guitar acro ...

, Massiera and Malaussena formed a new band in 1964, under the name of Les Monégasques, with Fernand "Nicky" Cafiero (bass) and Jean Haumont (drums). The band also played on recordings by pop singer Gérard Brent. Max Cole, "A Guide to the Unhinged Genius of Jean Pierre Massiera", ''Red Bull Music Academy'', 14 January 2015
Retrieved 7 December 2019

Freakbeat and progressive rock

In 1967, Massiera set up his own

recording studio A recording studio is a specialized facility for Sound recording and reproduction, recording and Audio mixing, mixing of instrumental or vocal musical performances, spoken words, and other sounds. They range in size from a small in-home proje ...

, Studio d’Enregistrement Méditerranéen (SEM) in Nice, with good quality recording equipment, and began recording local musicians including drummer

André Ceccarelli André "Dédé" Ceccarelli (born 5 January 1946) is a French jazz drummer. Biography After learning to play the drums from his father, Ceccarelli started out playing in the salons of the Hotel Royal Nice Promenade des Anglais at the age of fi ...

and singers Jocy (later known as Jessy Joyce, real name Joyce Pepino) and Basile. In 1968 he composed and produced the album ''Attention'', credited to Les Maledictus Sound. As well as Massiera and Ceccarelli, the musicians included guitarist Patrick Djivas, later of the band PFM. One track was contentiously called "Jim Clark Was Driving Recklessly" – the

racing driver Auto racing (also known as car racing, motor racing, or automobile racing) is a motorsport involving the racing of automobiles for competition. In North America, the term is commonly used to describe all forms of automobile sport including non ...

Jim Clark James Clark (4 March 1936 – 7 April 1968) was a British racing driver from Scotland, who competed in Formula One from to . Clark won two Formula One World Drivers' Championship titles with Lotus, and—at the time of his death—held the ...

had been killed in a crash a few months previously. In late 1968, Massiera sold his studio and moved to

Quebec Quebec is Canada's List of Canadian provinces and territories by area, largest province by area. Located in Central Canada, the province shares borders with the provinces of Ontario to the west, Newfoundland and Labrador to the northeast, ...

, but returned to France the following year. Massiera continued to work as a producer for pop and

freakbeat Freakbeat is a loosely defined subgenre of rock and roll music developed mainly by harder-driving British groups during the Swinging London period of the mid-to late 1960s. The genre bridges British Invasion R&B, beat and psychedelia. Etymolo ...

musicians in the late 1960s and early 1970s, including the single "Pardon pour Buchenwald" by Erik, on which he included samples of

Nazi Nazism (), formally named National Socialism (NS; , ), is the far-right politics, far-right Totalitarianism, totalitarian socio-political ideology and practices associated with Adolf Hitler and the Nazi Party (NSDAP) in Germany. During H ...

speeches. He also added a variety of electronic effects on the 1971

heavy rock Hard rock or heavy rock is a heavier subgenre of rock music typified by aggressive vocals and distorted electric guitars. Hard rock began in the mid-1960s with the garage, psychedelic and blues rock movements. Some of the earliest hard rock mu ...

album ''Chico Magnetic Band'' by Mahmoud "Chico" Ayari. In 1972, with the support of his half-brother Bernard Torelli, he opened a new

16-track Multitrack recording (MTR), also known as multitracking, is a method of sound recording developed in 1955 that allows for the separate recording of multiple sound sources or of sound sources recorded at different times to create a cohesive who ...

studio,

Antibes Antibes (, , ; ) is a seaside city in the Alpes-Maritimes Departments of France, department in Southeastern France. It is located on the French Riviera between Cannes and Nice; its cape, the Cap d'Antibes, along with Cap Ferrat in Saint-Jean-Ca ...

Studio 16, known as the Azurville studio. Savinov, "Jean-Pierre Massiera", ''JPMDiscogs''
. Retrieved 7 December 2019 The studio was used by John McLaughlin,

Bill Wyman William George Wyman ( né Perks; born 24 October 1936) is an English musician who was the bass guitarist with the rock band the Rolling Stones from 1962 to 1993. Wyman was part of the band's first stable lineup and performed on their first 19 ...

, and many others. In 1974, he composed and produced the album Visitors, with an extraterrestrial theme. The musicians included vocalist Gérard Brent, violinist

Didier Lockwood Didier Lockwood (11 February 1956 – 18 February 2018) was a French violinist. He played in the French rock band Magma in the 1970s, and was known for his use of electric amplification and his experimentation with different sounds on the electri ...

(later of

Magma Magma () is the molten or semi-molten natural material from which all igneous rocks are formed. Magma (sometimes colloquially but incorrectly referred to as ''lava'') is found beneath the surface of the Earth, and evidence of magmatism has also ...

), and Bernard Torelli on guitar. This was followed in 1976 by ''Atlantide'', with Patrick Attali on lead vocals and Torelli on guitar,

sitar The sitar ( or ; ) is a plucked stringed instrument, originating from the Indian subcontinent, used in Hindustani classical music. The instrument was invented in the 18th century, and arrived at its present form in 19th-century India. Khusrau K ...

and

Mellotron The Mellotron is an electro-mechanical musical instrument developed in Birmingham, England, in 1963. It is played by pressing its keys, each of which causes a length of magnetic tape to contact a Capstan (tape recorder), capstan, which pulls i ...

. Also in 1976, Massiera composed and produced one of his most notable albums, ''L'Etrange Mr. Whinster'', credited to the act Horrific Child and marketed as a "psychological experience". The album incorporated African rhythms, samples, spoken excerpts from writers

Baudelaire Charles Pierre Baudelaire (, ; ; 9 April 1821 – 31 August 1867) was a French poet, essayist, translator and art critic. His poems are described as exhibiting mastery of rhythm and rhyme, containing an exoticism inherited from the Romantics, an ...

Lovecraft Howard Phillips Lovecraft (, ; August 20, 1890 – March 15, 1937) was an American writer of weird, science, fantasy, and horror fiction. He is best known for his creation of the Cthulhu Mythos. Born in Providence, Rhode Island, Lovecraft ...

and Lautréamont, and contributions from Massiera's regular contributors Torelli, Brent, and Jessy Joyce, among others. He also co-wrote and co-produced Jessy Joyce's album ''Love Me'', and the single "Toi qui rève de baisers" credited to Sex Convention. The 1977 album ''Turn Radio On'', was co-composed by Massiera and Torelli, and co-produced by Massiera and Georges Colleuil. Massiera also produced

folk rock Folk rock is a fusion genre of rock music with heavy influences from pop, English and American folk music. It arose in the United States, Canada, and the United Kingdom in the mid-1960s. In the U.S., folk rock emerged from the folk music re ...

albums by Valéry Btesh, and engineered releases by

proto-punk Proto-punk (or protopunk) is rock music from the 1960s to mid-1970s that foreshadowed the punk rock genre and movement. A retrospective label, the musicians involved were generally not originally associated with each other and came from a variet ...

band Little Bob Story. Massiera's next album, ''Phantasmes'', was credited to JPM & Co. and contains a mixture of styles including

chanson A (, ; , ) is generally any Lyrics, lyric-driven French song. The term is most commonly used in English to refer either to the secular polyphonic French songs of late medieval music, medieval and Renaissance music or to a specific style of ...

disco Disco is a music genre, genre of dance music and a subculture that emerged in the late 1960s from the United States' urban nightclub, nightlife, particularly in African Americans, African-American, Italian-Americans, Italian-American, LGBTQ ...

, experimental

electronic music Electronic music broadly is a group of music genres that employ electronic musical instruments, circuitry-based music technology and software, or general-purpose electronics (such as personal computers) in its creation. It includes both music ...

and

prog rock Progressive rock (shortened as prog rock or simply prog) is a broad genre of rock music that primarily developed in the United Kingdom through the mid- to late 1960s, peaking in the early-to-mid-1970s. Initially termed "progressive pop", the ...

, as well as the track "Dali court", a parody of

Boney M Boney M. is a German reggae, funk and disco music group founded in 1974. It achieved popularity during the disco era in the second half of the 1970s. The band was created by German record producer Frank Farian, who was the group's primary song ...

's " Daddy Cool" dedicated to

Salvador Dalí Salvador Domingo Felipe Jacinto Dalí i Domènech, Marquess of Dalí of Púbol (11 May 190423 January 1989), known as Salvador Dalí ( ; ; ), was a Spanish Surrealism, surrealist artist renowned for his technical skill, precise draftsmanship, ...

, and a version of

Michel Legrand Michel Jean Legrand (; 24 February 1932 – 26 January 2019) was a French musical composer, arranger, conductor, jazz pianist, and singer. Legrand was a prolific composer, having written over 200 film and television scores, in addition to ma ...

's " Les moulins de mon coeur". Also in 1977, Massiera issued a single under his own name, "Aime moi", a version of

Deep Purple Deep Purple are an English rock band formed in London in 1968. They are considered to be among the pioneers of heavy metal music, heavy metal and modern hard rock, although their musical style has varied throughout their career. Originally for ...

's "

Child in Time "Child in Time" is a song by English rock band Deep Purple, released on their fourth studio album, '' Deep Purple in Rock'' in 1970. It is the longest track on the album, running over ten minutes. The song's lyrics are loosely inspired by the ...

Disco music and later projects

The following year he co-wrote and produced the album ''Space Woman'', credited to the act Herman's Rocket. The "cosmic disco" album was commissioned by record label owner Humbert "Mémé" Ibach, and the title track became one of Massiera's best-known tracks. Massiera's next album, ''Galactic Soul'' (also known as ''Synthetic Soul'') followed a similar approach, but this time was credited as being by Venus Gang. Both albums were produced with Torelli as arranger, and both included reworkings of Massiera's earlier material as well as that of others. Also in 1978, Massiera co-wrote and co-produced Jessy Joyce's disco album ''J. Joyce & Co.'', and co-wrote and produced one of his best-known albums, Human Egg, the name of both the album and the act. The prog rock album featured many of Massiera's regular contributors including Bernard Torelli, Patrick Attali, Tony Bonfils, Jessy Joyce and André Ceccarelli. Before the end of the 1970s, Massiera also produced disco albums by Micky & Joyce (''Hold Up'') and ''Trans Am Dancing'' by Friends featuring singer Sparkle Tuhran. He left Antibes in 1979, and opened the studio Jean Jaurès in Paris for

Philips Records Philips Records is a record label founded by Netherlands, Dutch electronics company Philips and in 1999 was absorbed into Netherlands, Dutch-United States, American music corporation Universal Music Group. It was founded as Philips Phonograph ...

. In 1981 he produced the

jazz-rock Jazz fusion (also known as jazz rock, jazz-rock fusion, or simply fusion) is a popular music Music genre, genre that developed in the late 1960s when musicians combined jazz harmony and jazz improvisation, improvisation with rock music, funk, a ...

album ''Debbi'' by Francis Lockwood, the disco-

reggae Reggae () is a music genre that originated in Jamaica during the late 1960s. The term also denotes the modern popular music of Jamaica and its Jamaican diaspora, diaspora. A 1968 single by Toots and the Maytals, "Do the Reggay", was the first ...

album ''La Chica'' by African Magic Combo, and a second album credited to Visitors, as well as numerous singles for other artists, in some cases as a co-producer with Torelli or others. Through the 1980s Massiera continued to work as a writer and producer, but at a lower level of intensity than before, sometimes using the pseudonyms Areisam or Sierra. With Torelli in 1983, he wrote and produced the

12-inch single The twelve-inch single (often written as 12-inch or 12) is a type of vinyl ( polyvinyl chloride or PVC) gramophone record that has wider groove spacing and shorter playing time with a "single" or a few related sound tracks on each surface, compa ...

"Inch Allah", credited as Orient Express. In the mid-1980s he left Paris and established a new studio in

Le Bar-sur-Loup Le Bar-sur-Loup (, "Le Bar-on- Loup"; ; ) is a commune in the Alpes-Maritimes department in the Provence-Alpes-Côte d'Azur region in Southeastern France. Originally known simply as Le Bar, the commune was renamed Le Bar-sur-Loup by a decree ...

. In 1992, on the occasion of Columbus'

quincentennial An anniversary is the date on which an event took place or an institution was founded. Most countries celebrate national anniversaries, typically called national days. These could be the date of independence of the nation or the adoption o ...

, he co-wrote and produced the album ''Red Power'' by Indian Nation. A second album on the same theme, ''Red Soul'', was issued in 1995.

Reissues

Selections of Massiera's work have been issued on CD, as ''Psychoses Freakoïd (1963-1978)'', ''Psychoses Discoïd (1976-1981)'' (both issued by the Canadian label Mucho Gusto Records, 2007), and ''Midnight Massiera: The B-Music of Jean-Pierre Massiera'' ( Finders Keepers Records, 2009). ''Midnight Massiera'', Allmusic.com
Retrieved 7 December 2019

References

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Massiera, Jean-Pierre 1941 births 2019 deaths French record producers