What is there to say about; the Noisettes that has not already been said? As it turns out, there are a few things; adjectives mostly. Adjectives like "awe-inspiring", "self-indulgent", "vituperative", even "unrecalcitrant". But adjectives can only tell part of the story. To tell the whole Noisettes story, we need nouns, verbs and conjunctions. We also need our imaginations.

We need to imagine that it is sometime in the now-shadowy late eighties, that we are in Seattle, WA. Who was it that struck the chords that would be called "grunge" rock? Who was it who truly launched what was perhaps the greatest rock-and-roll phenomenon of out time? We may never know.
It's better that way. For the story of "grunge" or, as today's kids know it, "noonoo googoo booboo" rock, is not the story of the Noisettes. It is, in fact, entirely irrelevant.

The Noisettes story could be said to begin in the very late sixties. For it was then that a young Thaddeus Koolhoeven, while playing with daddy's electric guitar, accidentally spilled daddy's "bong" water on himself and the instrument, short-circuiting it and hideously scarring young "Thad", emotionally as well as physically. But more importantly, a new sound was born. A noisy sound. The sound of crackling electricity and a young boy screaming. Thaddeus never forgot that sound. That sound wa to become the sound of the Noisettes. Granted, in intervening years he refined it, sweetened it and added some synthesizers and so forth.

Anyhow, Thaddeus Koolhoeven soon grew up. He found collaborateurs to help with the sounds he wanted to make. To fight. To fight the good fight. To attempt to erect a wall of noise to protect himself and the chosen few from the raw, surging tidal wave that was "grunge" rock. It was to no avail. The wall crumbled. Everybody drowned. The end.

Or was it?

One day, while pursuing an alternative Seattle weekly, Koolhoeven read mention of the burgeoning Musique Brut scene taking shape in the California culturopolis of San Francisco. He packed up all his crap and moved down there faster than you can say "jiminy cricket" (or anything else with the same number of syllables). The day he arrived he hastily established a group and set up their first "gig" on the spot, right there in the bus station. Within a few weeks, the Noisettes became the toast of the town! From then on it was drugs and drug overdoses. And a lot of drinking to boot. Also, those smelly cuban cigars they all smoked everywhere they went.

So there you have it, in a nutshell. We can all be thankful the Noisettes have finally consented to be tape recorded. For now at least, we can hear their special brand of "music" without having to smell those cigars.

werner von ermine-music snob