By Delachaux

 

As a San Francisco based DJ/producer who’s been behind decks experimenting with many of the city’s absinthe soirees, I’m often asked about what kind of  music ‘works’ with the infamous drink’s recent resurgence. You see, it’s been scientifically proven that certain soundscapes compliment certain libations. Champagne enhances swing jazz, rum hops up your calypso, whiskey rocks with metal, so on and so forth. So while I have not yet coined, crafted, or discovered a snappy new genre that accommodates all of the characteristic styles and themes of my selections at an absinthe party, I can say that there is one perennial ingredient that touches something deeper than just the nostalgic attention of today’s cocktail crowd. That ingredient is called sentimental fantasia. Allow me to amplify.

 

Forget what you know about the word ‘sentimental’ and all of its commonly mawkish usages and think for a moment about the very communication of music. Surely you’ve had experiences where a song you’ve never heard before comes on and all of sudden your emotions are stirred by its haunting familiarity. You don’t know the tune’s lyrics per se but something deep within its melodic movement transmits an uncanny emotional intimacy that’s shared between you and the music’s creator. It is this mysteriously direct conveyance that accompanied and, dare I say, instigated absinthe drinkers during the Belle Époque era a hundred years ago and continues to inflame the passions of contemporary absintheurs. 

 

But let’s go back and sip on some history.

 

As with other evolving canons of art and culture in the Belle Époque era, music too became distinctly ‘modern’ both in its performance and its sound. As the Parisian middle class of the 1890s began to find more time for leisure and entertainment, the highly privileged, multi-instrumental chamber performances reserved for society’s elite quickly gave way to what became known as ‘la musique de salon’ or salon music.  

 

Now the characteristics of salon music directly reflected the accessibility of its presentation.  Salon compositions were specifically designed to be performed from a single piano in any number of emerging cabarets and salons where a general public could come to drink and socialize during ‘l’heure verte’ in the evenings. While the compositions were relatively short in length, they were very prodigious in content often packing a dynamic flurry of notes and progressions so as to give listeners the illusion of hearing a cacophony of exotic modes and melodies all from a single and often well-worn piano. Salon composer/players such as Frédéric Chopin, Sigismond Thalberg, and Jacques Thibaud created worlds of operatic paraphrasing within a simple piano narrative to accompany and emote scenes of both adventurous fantasy and sentimental romance. With its cautious introspection, Erik Satie's infamous ‘Gnosienne n.3’ is a poignant example of the latter. 

 

Fast forward to 2008. 

 

Today’s resurgence of absinthe has been accompanied by an exciting cultural synthesis of old and new. Unlike some retro movements that strive to purely re-create a period in every detail, absinthe drinkers tend to mingle many influences from all over the map including Ragtime, Jazz, Glam, Gothic, Victorian, Edwardian, Flapper, Swing, Burlesque, Rockabilly, S&M, Industrial, 80s, Electro, & much much more. As in the blending of costumes, such as Edwardian period pieces with the edgier elements of contemporary couture, so too can this gentle synthesis be heard in the musical selections. 

 

I take my clues from the exotic safaris of salon music and dress them up with contemporary sonic flavor. I specifically search for those old haunting melodies that still waft in the back round of history like lost balloons daring you to hold on while they sway through antique skies of heart and imagination. I then spark these old flints on contemporary electronic flammables to ignite beefier bursts of sentimental fantasia. The best selections are those that echo that lost opulence and beckon listeners to chase the same exonerating feelings that captivated absinthe drinkers long ago. 

 

So sit back, pour yourself a glass, and lean into some of the tracks I’ve listed below. I think you’ll enjoy.  

 

‘Dopis’ – Zofka

‘Oui’- Rouge Rouge

‘Promise’ – Coco Rosie

‘Moonbeams’ – Bent

‘Princess Crocodile’ – Gry

‘Dope Noir’- Waldeck

Strangeboy’ – Brazilian Girls

‘Goodbye, Sea!’ –  Messer Für Frau Müller