Interview RENAUD THOREZ (and PATRICK IMBERT)            by Lars T., 2001   ------------------------------------------------------ Q: When and how did you meet Damon, and how did you become a member of Chrome, and what did you do before Chrome? A: I met Damon Edge in 1984 through Fabienne Shine, his girlfriend, around the time they were moving to France from the US. I was a member of a group called LOGO whose drummer was Patrick Imbert and the keyboardist was Olivier Caudron. Outside of our group, we also played with other singers or musicians. Fabienne Shine contacted us because she was looking for a group of musicians to work with. We recorded some demos and a single with her on which she sang in French, under her own name, for the label Vogue. She introduced us to Damon who was himself looking for musicians to record his albums in France. Patrick and myself recorded four albums for Damon during the years 1984-1985, Olivier Caudron recorded one. We were not in fact members of Chrome, but simply musicians chosen by Damon to record with in the studio. Only Patrick and Remy DeVilla had accompanied Damon on tour in Germany in 1986. We knew Remy through Fabienne and Damon. He had also worked with us for Fabienne. Q:When and why did you leave the band? A: (Patrick Imbert responds) We were never part of the group, so we never left. Also, once Damon changed musicians, we didn't follow what he was doing any longer, as we weren't involved in the same type of music that he was doing. Damon was the only member of Chrome in France. In 1986, 2 albums were recorded in France with Bab and Plume. I don't know these musicians. I only know of these albums because I transcribed the scores of the songs for registration with the SACEM (an organization which handles the rights/royalties of artists). Q: Much mystery surrounds the two Chrome live albums released in the 80s (Lyon Concert and Live in Germany). It is said that the latter was not actually live, and that it has "overdubbed" applause. Could you clarify this? A: (Patrick Imbert responds) Lyon live is really live recording session. It was recorded on stereo cassette tape and after cleaned improved in recording studio because of the low quality of the session tape. This album was recorded before I met Damon Edge and I don't know who played except Rémy Devilla but I saw the mastering session. So I can say that the applauses are originals. About "Germany live" : I did the tour. We played 8 or 9 places. I don't remember all the cities. I remember Munchen, Stuttgart, Cologne, Hambourg, West Berlin in the "Grand Theatre" just before the wall was broken. I remember we met a girl who proposed a tour in USSR but Damon refused : "I don't want to play for the fucking communists". The musicians was Rémy Devilla (guitars), Pierre Roussel (bass guitar), I don't remember the name of the keyboard, I just know he played with "Gun's and Roses", and me (drums). I did never see or heard Damon after this tour. I never heard the Germany live album and I would like to if you have this one. Q: Even more mystery surrounds Damon's lifestyle while in Europe. Various sources claim he was an acid casualty, a heroin addict, a paranoid person who stayed indoors and rarely interacted with other people. His extensive musical output suggests something else. What was your impression of Damon as a person, and what was it like being in his band? A: The stories circulating about Damon's character are true. Damon was a very strange person. Damon lived like a shut-in inside his apartment, always in darkness. He rarely went out, and always wore really dark sunglasses. While he always discreet about taking drugs, it was obvious that he was always under the influence of them, to which he added his consumption of neuroleptic medication, white wine, milk, and cigarettes. He almost never ate. He had a great Honda sport coupe in a garage, which was registered in the US. One night, he took me for a spin and I had one of the biggest scares of my life, as he drove extremely violently and fast, explaining that he had learned how to drive racecars and had competed in the US. I don't know anything else about this though. Our contacts were very limited: he didn't speak a word of French, didn't express himself much. He seemed to be in another world. He was very introverted, jealous and possessive about Fabienne. Q: Both Patrick Imbert and Remy Devilla have vanished from the music scene completely. Can you tell me something about these excellent players and their backgrounds? Are you in touch with Remy or Patrick these days? A: Patrick is one of my friends and still lives in the same city as me in the Paris area. Patrick helped me answer these questions. He still makes music. I stopped playing music when our band split up. I haven't had any contact with Remy Devilla since that time. If necessary for your research, he shouldn't be too difficult to locate in France. Q: After you left the band, Pierre Roussel took your place. Do you know if this is the same person that played on an early Heldon album A: I didn't know Pierre Roussel. Patrick knew him during the German tour. I don't know the Heldon album. Q: How was the band doing financially? Chrome/Damon Edge was definitely an underground phenomenon, and I keep wondering how Damon could pay three people to be in his band while selling such small quantities of records A: I don't know about the contractual and financial relationships between Damon and his record company. We didn't have, as musicians, any contract, nor any contact with Damon's record label. It was Damon himself who paid us for our studio performances, and our fees were very small. With the little resources which he had for production, we had a very limited amount of time in the studio to record each album. 48 hours total for an album. No rehearsals, we'd arrive in the studio without knowing the songs, and worked them out on the spot. It was extremely difficult physically, and nerve-wracking to keep up the intensity recording so many songs in so little time, following the chord structures and construction of the songs established by Remy. Damon produced, along with the sound engineer, the sound of the rhythms by using a number of effects (phasing, reverb, echo, harmonizer) and didn't add his parts (vocals, synthesizer effects) until afterwards. The rhythms were recorded in a single day. He oversaw the mixing of the albums. He liked to doctor the tracks and was able to create new titles through taking different parts of different recordings and re-assembling them. In some ways, he was pioneering through his use of sampling and re-arranging elements like that which would later follow with rap and techno. Patrick thinks he assembled songs (for example, the extra songs on Lyon's Concert) in this way, and could've used different tracks (such as rhythm and effects) on other albums. Damon controlled everything on his productions. He even created his own album covers. He was a true artisan who didn't allow for any outside input. Q: Which Chrome/Damon Edge album is your personal favorite? I know some people think Zombie King was the best album he did while in Europe, while others prefer his later, more commercial recordings (like Grand Visions etc) A: I don't know any of the other releases by Damon later than 1986. Q: Remy Devilla co-wrote Trip the Switch from Into the Eyes of the Zombie King, and ít is indeed one of the best Chrome tracks ever. Did Remy have the ambition to write more songs, and why was this collaboration never repeated? A: Remy found himself thrown into an important role on the albums which he played. He was the one who had to understand, translate and construct the pieces. Damon wasn't a musician in the technical sense, but more of a producer of ambience and sound. Damon used Remy for a while and then moved onto other things. I think that Remy knew that as strong as his contribution was, it was not a lasting one. Damon was a sort of traveler, regularly drawing on other people's energies to feed his work. Q: Did you ever feel that Chrome belonged to a "scene" in any way? Looking back, it is kind of difficult to place Chrome/Damon Edge on a musical map A: I don't know how to categorize the music Damon produced other than to say that it reflected his own image; that is to say, strange, without concession, brutal and original. Patrick told me that Damon defined his music as "cold wave." Q: Did Damon expect Chrome to be more successful than it was? Some have said he was just waiting to become mega-famous, but that did not happen. Towards the end of the 80s his music suggests he was trying to widen the Chrome audience A: Damon never spoke to me about Chrome in the US. He didn't seem interested whether a larger audience appreciated his music or not. He only seemed to want to produce a lot of albums without compromise or constraint. Q: A few tracks from "Alliance" seem to be very popular still; especially I'm a Gentleman and Blue Nights. Were those songs dance floor hits in Europe? (at least that's the impression I'm left with). A: I don't think that the songs from "Alliance" or any of the other albums had any sort of commercial success. Damon Edge and Chrome, as an underground phenomenon in Europe, was only known by a marginal group of youths, whose number I couldn't estimate. Q: Why didn't you and Patrick get to have your names on Dreaming in Sequence? (I assume Bab and Plume refer to you!) A: Bab and Plume are other musicians. Patrick and myself didn't play on "Eternity" or "Dreaming in Sequence." Q: Did you quit the music business immediately after you quit Chrome? A: Our appearance alongside Damon Edge was brief. Afterwards, we carried on our main musical activities. Q: Did you ever meet Fabienne Shine? Can you tell us something about her? (actually I know she put out an album a few years ago) A: We knew Fabienne Shine very well at that time and worked a bit with her. We also knew Eric Levi, who was the guitarist /songwriter in Fabienne's group, "Shakin Street." We had been in touch with him for our group upon his return to France in 1987. He's presently in France and heads the group, ERA (Sony Music). His sister is a personal friend. She told me that Damon had known Fabienne Shine when Shakin Street (who were based in France, originally) moved to California to develop the group's career internationally. Q: Someone said Chrome programmed their drums in the 80s, rather than having a drummer playing them. I don't believe so, but I realize there was some sort of drum set involved. Please clarify A: Damon Edge didn't want to use machines (drum machines or sequencers) to record the rhythm tracks on his songs. We simply used a click track (metronome) to establish a steady tempo. This track was often kept in the mix, with it's sound doctored. Damon wanted us to play the bass and drums like machines; as in, very cold and without any interpretation other than strictness and punch. He thought that the result was much more effective and alive than had we programmed the rhythms. I think that with Patrick, whom I had played with for a long time already, we had a cohesive bass and drum sound which went along very well with the rhythmic sound of Damon's songs and so fit in with what he was looking for. The slightest deviation, or attempt at playing with more feeling, was immediately condemned by Damon: "Renaud please, just play like a machine." Patrick often overdubbed roto-toms to the bass and drums. Q: An album called Liquid Forest 1983 was released in 1990, and it was recorded in "Rome and Italy" ( ! ) by Damon and Cliff Martin. Do you know anything about the making of this album, and do you by chance know who Cliff Martin? A: I don't know anything about the course of Damon's life and artistic production after his return to the US in 1986. I don't know Cliff Martin. I don't think he had any connection with Damon Edge. Q: Did Chrome tour a lot? A: I don't know. Q: This is the last question, and I realize you might not be able to answer it. Soon before Damon died he released an album called Clairaudient Syndrome. All band members are credited under weird names, so I have no idea who played on that record. Damon told someone that he had "changed the names of all the band members" for the album. Do you know if any of the French players stayed with Chrome when Damon moved back to the US? A: I don't know and don't have any information about the album, "The Clairaudient Syndrome." I don't think there ever were any French members of Chrome. I don't know if the group Chrome existed without the presence of Damon Edge.