Yamin Alma is about to release a new EP, Love Ascension. This is an opportunity for us to reveal the interview we conducted last May.
This artist appeared to us with great delay. Discovered at the Inouï 2017, he released a first album at the end of last year. We only discovered it in the spring of 2018 when we came across Into The Blue : a little folk pearl, full of serenity and warmth.
Meeting Yamin Alma in a Parisian café is like crossing a ray of sunshine in the rain. And that day it was raining a lot. This singer, originally from Perpignan, gave himself up to us and you know what? When we left, the weather was nice!
Who is Yamin Alma?
We know your hometown, but in the end we know very little about you: who are you and how did you get into music?
Yamin: I was born in Perpignan and my family is originally from this city. I grew up there, I studied there. I lived there for 20 years. As a child, I was often on the road in a traditional Spanish flamenco dance company as a professional dancer. I had the chance to travel a lot: I went to Mexico, China, Algeria… Pure chance, I was found a dancer's physique and my parents dragged me into this adventure. I was also in the CHAM classes (Class with Arranged Schedules in Music) and so I was very often at the conservatory. Through these experiences, I was able to learn a lot of things: moving to a rhythm, feeling music, piano, music theory…
In your musical influences you mention Bob Dylan, Nick Drake, Neil Young… We can also think of Asaf Avidan in your voice… Has folk always had an important place in your career?
Yamin: From the beginning, folk is a music that caught me. I love the purity of performance in folk: it's often guitar voice and if you want to attract the attention of an audience, it's often a very good school. You learn how to really write songs, how to refine the message. I think it's very important to make sense of things because we often tend to forget it. Folk is a big challenge!
Into The Blue, debut album by Yamin Alma
In Into The Blue you put a little note where you explain that you recorded this album at home, behind closed doors, that for you, it was like throwing things; It had to be pure, sincere and with all its imperfections… We really feel the authentic and storytelling side in this album. What did you want to talk about?
Yamin: Into The Blue, I started writing it when I was 21. It took me 2 / 3 years to get all the pieces and to decide too. I recorded it for the first time and released it without promoting. Then I remastered it because I wasn't happy with the result. At the time I went to Sweden for a year and I made an album for a singer there, I met a lot of authors… Sweden is the kingdom of folk with Canada… And it inspired me a lot, it gave meaning to what I wanted to do. I was in a relationship for a long time and I needed to come out of emotions. It was also a way of understanding myself through music. A therapy…
Experience of London
Just before Into The Blue, you released a track called Losing Control which is radically opposite to your album. I recently heard UFO which seems to come back to this more fishy rock that you proposed before. Would this album be just a transition after all?
Yamin : To be a good song writer I think you have to do folk but also rock. These are complementary styles. I lived in London for 3 years. There, I saw a lot of concerts, I met a lot of artists, I formed my band, I wrote songs for artists and for myself. I met the English vibe, this kind of sound: it plays in the cellars … There is a kind of conviction; You took it in your face, it's impressive! The guitar is always in the front row. Losing Control came from there! UFO is different. When you're an artist, you don't want to prove the same thing 10 times. Into The Blue has its color, but it transcribes what I was at that moment. I am not going to do the same thing again. I also have a lot of other influences and for my new EP: it will be more American, more in, more effective, more Kravitz… Always with meaning, because that's what I want to keep in my music. But I also want it to be more dancing to invite people. Folk, people don't always hang on because it's not festive enough for them. I wanted to show that I was able to make songs that groove more. This is my new challenge!
Was it also in London that you reworked Into The Blue ?
Yamin: Yes, with my buddy, Ginger Drage in Green Monkey Studio. It has plenty of analog equipment. I had made him listen to my recording and he really wanted to do mastering with it. I finished the mixes, I sent it to him; He recorded drums on top and we did some arrangements together. He then passed the sound in old record players to get the 70's sound.
Do you think it was necessary to pass UK for your album to find its true color?
Yamin: Completely, I think that to make music, you have to go and meet it. You don't just have to say: I'm going to rock. In France we don't have this rock culture at the base… so going to England and meeting the English who make rock, learning to speak English with them, it's formative! This is where you find how to make your project alive, by going to the source.
Can you tell me about your encounter with The Love Machines?
Yamin: I met Jimmy Pallagrosi, the drummer of the band, when I was still studying at the conservatory. He was there to give a master class on groove; He is a great teacher, he always invites young people to join him around the drums, he encourages people… He knows how to create a super playful atmosphere. That day, he gave me confidence and invited me to come with my guitar to play with him. I was a little scared but we were really hooked. There was a real chemistry! He said, "Come to London and we're putting together a band! ". When I arrived in London, I had lost contact, I had gone to see a concert of Cortes at the Notting Hill Hard Club and during the change of set, I went out and there I came across Jimmy. Unlikely! He recognized me and offered me to meet again for a drink and music. And it was done! Then there was Jodh Bergson, who is the bass player for a party in London called Sessions 58 in Shoreditch, a kind of open mic with a band. We played together and we found that we spoke the same language. I asked him to join us and we started rehearsing. It's real musical favorites!
A tour in the USA for Yamin Alma
You just came back from a tour in the USA. Which of these 3 musical experiences do you prefer?
Yamin: Wow! It's so complex, but so interesting: it's a very good question! I had never been to the United States before. I met Olivia, my girlfriend and also my manager (also a painter, reiki master and author) who is from New York. She took me with her and found me 16 concerts all over the Northeast: New York, Boston, Portland, York, Portsmouth, Connecticut, Bridgeport… I was all alone to defend Into The Blue in guitar-vocals-harmonica. The United States is a very, very big machine: you have projects from everywhere, it merges in all directions. There are still a lot of independents, the mainstream has not necessarily smoothed everything out, it's really very diverse. Everyone can really do their thing and move forward. I feel like I grew up in the US in a few months more than I grew up in 5/6 years in Europe. It's impressive!
Olivia : Indeed, there is room for all artists who want to be followed and build their own community to be successful. I think Yamin offered the US not only his folk album Into The Blue, but it was mainly with his voice that he convinced. We saw people come more than 4 times to concerts and follow him from city to city. He really made an incredible audience. There was a great interest in his music: from millennials to 60-year-olds. Everyone found what they were looking for in Yamin. There really is an opportunity in the US for artists of all styles. If you are good and have something to offer, then the audience comes to you, follows you and supports you.
Yamin: It's true that there is a craze that completely surprised me at first and I really did not expect that. People who come back, play your music to their friends and buy the CD for their friends. It's something I've never experienced in Europe and it touched me a lot.
When you think back to your experience at Les Inouïs, what do you envisage for the future? Did Le Printemps de Bourges bring you the same opportunities?
Yamin: Les Inouïs is a beautiful form of artistic recognition: for me, it is the biggest springboard of France for young emerging artists. After that, it's always a question of the market. You have to know how to meet the demand. The music I make is not the most popular in France. Whereas in the United States, it's true that it touches a popular niche: it's where you feel an identification that is created and that you do not necessarily feel in France. But the Printemps de Bourges is a very beautiful scene and we were very well received. Maybe I was expecting more professional returns.
What's next…
What does UFO advertise?
Yamin: It's a new desire. I want to defend rock. I want to see guitars, that it plays. This is the single of a new EP that should be released in September. We will wait for the end of the festivals, for now it's not the right time to release a record.
Something planned for the summer?
Yamin: Not really. In September, we will go back to the US for a series of dates: we are starting to have some in California, Los Angeles, San Francisco… We would like to organize a tour in France when we return.
Do you think it's going to be more complicated in France? Do you think you're more destined for an international career like Tahiti 80 or Phoenix?
Yamin: Maybe. But maybe one of my songs will meet an expectation. I would very much like the French to identify with the rock that I am going to propose. It's hard to predict that kind of thing. I think the movement in France it's very rap and very electro at the moment. But we'll see…
What are you listening to right now?
Yamin: I recently discovered a singer called Elias Dris, it's very cool what he does. I came back in a Prince, Michael Jackson and Kravitz period. I fell back into this music and I find it beautiful. I listen to a lot of Ryan Adams. I listen to a lot of classics like Eric Sati, Debussy. Norah Jones too… When I feel that there is a vibe and that I understand something emotionally through the music, I like it.
When we see his influences and hear him talk about the way he listens to music, we understand better his background, the way he composes, feels music, composed Into The Blue and his way of thinking about his style and his career!
Yamin Alma is a sincere artist who simply follows his instinct as a musician and wants to live from what makes him vibrate in the moment.
Yesterday, we learn the release of his new EP: Love Ascension !
Indeed more rock, it is clearly inspired by US rock à la Lenny Kravitz. The songs are ultra engaging and we feel that future hits are already standing out. Favorite, personal for the eponymous title of the Ep which even made me think of Bon Jovi or Aerosmith (a good little 90's revival). It is a rough diamond that clearly contrasts with Into The Blue but that shakes and feels good. Pure energy!
