Joining Dilouya’s Faithful Circus
The French love to make love to your soul. And it’s prominent through their music too. Multi-talented French producer and writer Romain Dilouya does exactly this. His soulful beats penetrate throughout each track he touches. Dilouya dropped his very first album "Dilouya's Faithful Circus" last month. Now receiving worldwide recognition, this soulful, jazz-filled album sees artists such as Omar, N'Dea Davenport, Sly Johnson and John Turrell. Dilouya reveals how his soulful signature is engraved within each track, the difference between the British and French music scene and the making of Faithful Circus. Margaret Tra writes.
The music industry especially Soul, Hip Hop is very strong in Paris, what is it like for you as a musician living in Paris?
Well Hip-hop is strong here, but the Soul music scene in Paris is mostly underground so it is of course fantastic to be able to constantly meet amazing artists, work together and put projects all together, and at the same time a very short number of them find echo to their art in the media. So we need to keep fighting to make that music significant in the French musical landscape.
You also spent time in London, could you notice the difference between the two in regards to the music scene?
I'd say that London has a much more dynamic music scene than Paris, more clubs and I saw that playing instruments, having significant DJ’s in the radios is something cultural in the UK. And London has a really particular vibe, by that I mean that if we look back to the music genders that 'touched the ground' in London and left the city with a brand new twist, only that tells a lot about how important music is there. I can't help thinking about reggae music meet up with the punk scene in the early 80's, or the constant flow of new electronic and pop music movements in London. That's amazing and somehow it also influences soulful music in many ways (like the acid-jazz scene in the 90's or the 2 Step/British-R&B in the years 2000)
You collaborate with a lot of musicians, how do you pick and choose who you work with?
I've always been a huge fan of musicians and singers, and I just try to work with people that touch my soul, that I admire and respect (Of course among the artists I can reach, obviously someone like Stevie Wonder would be more than welcome anytime).
I know it may sound too simple, but my writing process is pretty basic, I just write songs at home and I try to imagine who would be the right fit for them, so obviously I pick artists that I love listening to.
Your music massages the soul, with your own little twist. How do you ensure your signature is engraved on each track?
Well as I told before, my production process is quite simple, I write songs at home on my keyboard and my favourite thing in life is certainly working on the arrangements, I can spend ages on the same verse for example and mess around the chords, the melody and the harmony trying to find something original to bring to the song.
And most importantly I try to never consider a tune as gender restricted, I've never tried to do a Soul track or a Pop tune, I just do what I feel is right according to one particular song at one particular moment.
Tell us about the Faithful Circus, and what has the response been like? Are you working on any future projects?
"Dilouya's Faithful Circus" is my first album; it has been released physically in Japan and France for now and worldwide digitally. It's a producer's album, and I've been blessed to have the opportunity to work with fantastic artists like Omar, N'Dea Davenport, Sly Johnson or John Turrell on this album. It's been quite an adventure to put all this together but at the end of the day it's only positive and a truly learning experience.
And I'm amazed and surprised by the response it has received around the world, it's only been a month since it's been out and already people are playing it everywhere (Japan, US, UK, France, Brazil), I'm receiving kind messages everyday! It's incredible! So I think we should bring that nice little homemade circus on the road!
As for my future projects, I'm already writing new music in a different vibe than what I did on my debut album, I listen to so many kinds of music all the time that I can't exactly say what's it going to sound like, but what I know for sure is that I'd like to experience to work in a smaller team than what I did previously, like if I was a scientist in a lab for a while or something like that.
Download the album here on itunes.