Les Soniques is a four piece psych-rock outfit lead by principal songwriters Henry Girard and Quinn Letendre (formerly of Kid Lucifer). After a three-year run as Kid Lucifer Girard and Letendre chose to break off to pursue a new vision and sound. The resulting project draws heavily from psychedelic music from the past and present, African funk and surf rock to amalgamate into a psych-funk-rock hybrid unlike anything they have done in the past.
In this interview spotlight, I chat with Les Soniques about their music, challenges, technology and more.
Full Q&A long with links and music below.
Where are you from and what style of music do you create? (In your own words, not necessarily in marketing terms or by popular genre classifications.)
We’re a four piece band from Montreal, Quebec. Usually, we just tell people we play rock and roll to make things easy, but we take a lot of inspiration from garage rock, funk, psych rock, 70s funk bands like Witch and Amanaz and punk rock.
What led you down this path of music and what motivates you to keep going?
Myself (Quinn – drums) and our guitarist, singer and songwriter Henry Girard started playing together in the garage rock band Kid Lucifer in our hometown of Vancouver, British Columbia. After a few years in that band, we decided to start fresh to pursue a new vision, with more wide ranging influences an a focus on melody and simple, effective songwriting. We were fortunate enough to be able to book and embark on a five-week long US and Canadian tour this time last year, and that experience showed us that touring and playing shows is what we want to do with our lives. We all love to travel and love playing gigs and meeting new people more than anything, so our goal is simply to be able to tour as much as we can and put out music that people love.
How is this new release different than previous ones? Were you trying to accomplish anything specific?
Our self-titled debut EP will be release on May 22nd. With this release we’re trying to focus on songwriting and simplicity in every track. In the past, we used to play really wild, bombastic shows which was a ton of fun, but now we’re trying to move forward with making everyone’s parts play well to the overall song and have our musical chemistry and melodies drive the songs. We set out to create a diverse set of songs that all feel true to our influences and sensibilities while still feeling cohesive and exciting for new listeners and old fans of ours.
Name one or two challenges you face as an indie musician in this over saturated, digital music age? How has technology helped you (since we know it does help)?
Standing out and finding an audience can be difficult these days in such an over saturated music market, and it can be hard to make money from music sales with the state of streaming. However, i’m a big proponent of the benefits of the internet and streaming landscape for artists. I think it’s amazing that the music world is so open now that anyone can record a song at home, put it online, and people nearly anywhere in the world can access it easily. There are hundreds of examples of amazing bands that never would have been popular and able to tour and make a living without the ability to put their music online for anyone in the world to hear. Niche music has a better chance than ever to be successful, international music is opened up to new audiences (many people I know in the Montreal music scene listen to more music from outside North America than from it), and if your music is great, you’ve never had a better chance for like-minded fans and artists to find your music. On top of all that, the power in the industry has shifted in a major way back to musicians, as labels need artists now in order to survive far more than the artists need them, and musicians are able to hold on to the rights and all the money gained from their work while still distributing it everywhere. We were able to book an entire DIY US and Canadian tour last year without help from any labels or major booking agencies! I think it’s an amazing thing that more people should take advantage of instead of complaining about the lack of music sales.
What was the last song you listened to?
I Don’t Need Love, I’ve Got My Band by The Radio Dept. Relatable title and a great song that we’re thinking about covering for our next show (whenever the hell that may be).
Which do you prefer? Vinyl? CDs? MP3s?
A pretty cliché answer, but we’re all pretty partial to vinyl. I was given an amazing old turntable by my dad years ago, and there’s nothing like listening to an album on there with some good speakers. I find it’s a totally different experience compared to streaming and makes me appreciate the whole process, the artwork and every song. That being said, there’s definitely something to those few CDs that get stuck in your car and you end up listening to on repeat and memorizing every note of.
How about this one…. Do you prefer Spotify? Apple Music? Bandcamp? Or something else? Why?
I love Spotify because it’s a great resource for anyone to find your band and to see how people are engaging with your music through related artists and playlists. However, I’d say my heart lies with Bandcamp. It’s a great resource for bands and for fans to directly support indie artists, and the low barrier to entry allows for anyone to put their music out into the world, which I think is amazing. It seems like a site run by people who truly love music.
Where is the best place to connect with you online and discover more music?
We’re pretty active on Facebook and Instagram, and encourage anyone to hit us at lessoniques@gmail.com and say hi anytime!
Anything else before we sign off?
Other than our debut EP coming out May 22nd, there’s a few side projects I have to plug. Henry and I are working on some new songs with some very talented friends of ours, more in a shoegaze style, under the name The Wesleys. Look out for some new music coming this summer! Our keyboard player Sam Schuette has an acoustic EP he just released under his name, and I write about music and culture at FastOneLast.com.
Thanks for having us, this was fun!
