Uniform motion describes an object that is moving in a specific direction at a constant speed and that's what we've been doing for the past decade. It's been pretty much non-stop composing, drawing, recording, coding, mixing, mastering, distributing, promoting, social networking, crowdfunding, rehearsing, booking, touring, and so on...
Read moreIt's been a very interesting ride and a lot of fun driving along the backroads of the music business, meeting some amazing people on the way, in places like France, Spain, Germany, Sweden and the Netherlands; communicating via the internet with some wonderful folk from all the over the world. We've recorded and released 5 proper studio albums, 1 covers album, and a live album. We’ve played over 130 shows and documented a lot of our humble experiments along the way.
If you’re reading this message, chances are you probably supported us in some way during our adventures. We are infinitely grateful for the support we have received over the years. Some of you bought every record we made. Some of you commented on our silly posts on Facebook. Others sent us pictures, or sound samples that we could use in our videos or songs. A few people helped us organise shows or helped us fine tune our songs before releasing them. Lots of you spread the word and told your friends or family about us. Some of you wrote to us to let us know that our work had touched you in some way. Thank you! You’re all amazing and we would love to be able to keep this up for another 10 years but it’s important to know when to quit something you love. And now seems like the right time.
Thanks again for all your support,
A bientôt,
Uniform Motion
It all started with a 4-String guitar. Andy starts recording a bunch of songs at CDM Studio in Toulouse and meets Renaud.
The project is launched as a web series on www.uniform-motion-pictures.com. Andy and Renaud decide to combine comics and music and release a new song, accompanied by a video of live performance of the music and drawings being live sketched on to a videoscreen, along with an interactive comic strip every two weeks. The French magazine Les Inrockuptibles picks up on what Uniform Motion is doing and the band wins the CQFD Remix ’08 contest, resulting in them playing their first shows at La Maroquinerie and Apple Expo in Paris before appearing on iTélé, a national news channel.
Uniform Motion’s first album, Pictures, is released. The band makes it to the regional finals of the Printemps de Bourges contest. Andy and Renaud also go on their first tour, to Germany, during which they experiment with blank CD packaging on which Renaud draws custom pictures at the merch table.
Uniform Motion launches a new website in preparation for their new album, Life, which comes with poster packs (one illustration per song) and a Flash based Virtual Concert. Some international press outlets get wind of Uniform Motion’s endeavours with articles appearing in Canada, US, UK and Germany (drawn.ca, The Stranger, College Music Journal) The band also gets some airplay on NME Radio, BBC 6music, byte.fm, et and receives some positive reviews of the new album. Uniform Motion reaches the finals of the CQFD contest organised by Les Inrockuptibles. Olivier Piotte joins the band on drums.
Uniform Motion turns to crowdfunding for their 3rd album. After recording the new album, the band puts 2 songs and a promotional video game on their website and asks their fans to pre-order the album in order to raise money to pay for CD manufacturing and mastering fees. The game includes two little characters that jump up and down and the user has to catch little objects while they listen to the song. A month later, there’s enough cash to pay for the first batch of CD’s. The band’s social network presence starts to pay off as well. A facebook fan comments on their page and asks about a Vinyl release. The band immediately improvises a vinyl crowdfunding campaign, and two months later, 67 fans receive their copy of the album. Uniform Motion continues to document their experiments on their blog and in September 2012, one of their articles about digital music causes a bit of a stir in the music-tech world (Digital Music News, Hypebot, Musically) and the tech world (Gizmodo, Techdirt). Even more traditional outlets like the Guardian, Der Spiegel, Forbes, BBC Radio and MTV end up mentioning Uniform Motion and their article. Uniform Motion makes it the Printemps de Bourges finals for the second time and wins a grant from the local government.
Uniform Motion carries on experimenting with projects like its collaboration video where fans are asked to take a photo or make a short video with a cut-out Knight (the character from their 3rd album) The band launches onecitypersecond.com, a gigfunding site, which takes them to Sweden, Spain and Germany, tests Google+ Hangout based concerts and starts providing tutorials for their songs so fans can learn how to play them more easily. Last but not least, Uniform Motion offers their fans the possibility of donating sounds for their 4th album. Uniform Motion reaches the finals of the France O Folies contest organised by the Francofolies festival and national TV channel, France O and appears on national TV in the France ô Folies à Toulouse » programme. Opening slot with We Have Band and a TEDx showcase in Paris.
Uniform Motion releases their 4th album, THE MAGIC EMPIRE and a covers album ALTERED COVERS Opening slot with Plants and Animals, and a solo show in Barcelona.
Uniform Motion tours France as a 4 piece, with the addition of Patrice Thomas on Keyboards and Guitars. Release of LIVE AT THE PACE LIBRARY, a live album, more than a dozen shows across France. Andy opens for Cats on Trees at Le Trianon
Uniform Motion tours Spain as a 5 piece, with the addition of Fred Pesce on Bass and starts work on their 5th studio album. Two sold out shows at Theatre Roquelaine in Toulouse. Andy opens for Jay-Jay Johanson in Toulouse.
Uniform Motion releases 5, their 5th studio album and tour Germany for the third time
The project officially ends 18th March 2017, exactly 10 years after it began.
Pictures (2009) started as a bedroom project. The vocals and a battered old 4-string guitar were initially recorded using a cheap Chinese made microphone. Those demos were taken to the next level thanks to the help of Marc Dubézy at CDM Studio in Toulouse. It became a much more ambitious record with several musical collaborations and was recorded and mixed over a fairly long period of time. It was released as CD/DVD/Comicbook.
Life (2010) was a more humble endeavor, recorded and mixed at home over a fairly short period of time. The drums were all programmed using software, and even the mastering was a homemade job. 100% DIY! Even the CD packaging was DIY.
One Frame Per Second (2011) was recorded in Paris, in the basement of a school, by 2 trainee sound engineers. We only had 3 days to record it so we had to ensure it was well rehearsed. Olivier played all the drums and the Mellotron was featured for the first time in our music. The album was mixed and mastered at home. It was also our first record to be released on vinyl.
The Magic Empire (2013) was recorded at the new CDM Studio (replacing the one that burned to the ground in 2009) by Marc Dubézy and then mixed at home, and mastered by TW Walsh. The only Uniform Motion album to include a hidden track!
Altered covers (2013) was Olivier’s idea. It was meant to keep us on our toes during the summer holidays but ended up being mixed on a laptop horizontally due to two herniated discs! The drums were recorded in Olivier’s new rehearsal space in his attic. The rest was recorded at Andy’s place.
5 (2016) was our first album as a 5-piece. The drums and bass were recorded at Olivier’s place and the guitars, vocals and keyboards were done at Andy’s place. We decided to outsource the mastering to Laurent Marc in Toulouse.
We played our first proper show at Apple Expo in 2008, quickly followed by an opening slot at La Maroquinerie in Paris, with Islands and Alphabeat.
Over the years, we got to play with so many wonderful bands including Jay-Jay Johanson, Cats on Trees, We Have Band, The Hungry Kids of Hungary, Entertainment
for the Braindead and Plants and Animals, with several tours outside of France including Germany and Spain.
Touring isn’t always easy but we always had a great time on tour and are really grateful to have been able to play in so many different places.
Illustrations were a big part of project Uniform Motion. We were one of the first bands to incorporate an illustrator as a fulltime member of the band.
At our live shows, people would sit quietly, often mesmerized by the intricate lines being drawn in front of their eyes. Many would queue up after our gigs to get a customized CD or vinyl with a hand-drawn illustration on it.
The Little Knight and the Princess, the Forty-Foot Man and the Magpie from The Magic Empire were all characters designed specially for each album. Sound Engineers would always mention our stageplots because of how cool they looked.
So although we were most definitely not the best band in the world, we were most probably the band with the best live illustrations and the most awesome stageplot!
You’ll find a few dozen videos on our YouTube channel, including live performances, tutorials to learn how to play some of our songs and official video clips. We were pretty active on Facebook over the years and left a retrospective ‘song a day’ for you to scroll through. We’ll most probably be popping in from time to time to read comments. We still have some merch left, including T-Shirts, CD’s and Vinyl that you can purchase on our Bandcamp Store. The many wonderful illustrations (posters, album covers, etc…) and band photos can be found here.
