Feature of the Month: French Films

on 2012-01-11

The best thing to come out of Finland since Jari Litmanen...
- Compromise Music

French Films are the real deal. If you haven't given their new album 'Imaginary Future' a listen yet, the time is now.
- Fake Plastic Tunes

What started out as a bedroom solo project for Johannes Leppänen has turned into a tune-laden touring machine with a ferocious work ethic. And they have two gigs at this year’s Eurosonic! With three lead singers, a sun drenched bucketful of catchy indie songs with more hyperkinetic guitars than you can shake a can of Battery at and thousands upon thousands of European miles on their odometer, they are a force to be reckoned with. No ironic detachment on offer here.

Their rise has been meteoric. A demo or two resulted in a global blog buzz. After releasing one four-song EP and even before a full-length album was out, the band had played in 11 countries and licensed one of their tunes for a Billabong video. Last July, a gaggle of Finnish critics chose French Films and Siinai as the acts with the biggest potential to make out in the big bad world. They released their debut album late last year and they’ve been on the road ever since. All in all, they’ve been a far more frequent sight on foreign stages than Finnish ones.

This month the band plays two gigs at Eurosonic, on Wednesday and Friday. On Thursday they play Bremen. That work ethic… The rest of January will see them traipsing around Germany, Austria and Switzerland.

In Austria they topped the FM4 chart and Imaginary Future was the station’s album of the month in December. Andreas Gstettner at the station went into Referenzautomatismus-mode and came up with The Drums, The Cure, The Editors, Interpol, Joy Division…

I've found a treat, a really good band. @frenchfilmsband , see this, very good indeed. - Edwyn Collins on Twitter. See what Edwyn was excited about.

See other videos: You Don’t Know and Golden Sea.



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