Olivia Louvel – Traumfrau Formerly known as the Zap club, I found myself in the newly opened ‘Bermuda Triangle’ – an ‘alternative club’ on the seafront nestled under the arches to see Olivia Louvel – an artist I only recently discovered.
 
Olivia Louvel is a French, Brighton-based alternative/electronic artist who’s live performance and innovative & quirky song writing brought me to see her at Tramfrau’s event.
 
Traumfrau hosted a ‘night of fairy tales’ – with twigs and branches scattered around the room and a whole crowd of people in fairy-tale style fancy dress – from unicorns to goldilocks – you could see that the crowd had certainly dressed to impress.
 
Olivia Louvel came on stage around 10pm along with another band member who played the electronics and began her first number. There’s no question about it, Olivia Louvel is indeed a performer – she moved about the stage whilst triggering samples in such a graceful yet seductive way that should mesmerise the crowd. Although, unfortunately, the crowd were there for a night out – not, sadly, to listen sensitively to intricately made, far-out experimental music.
 
A few songs in, it appeared that everyone in the room was enjoying themselves apart from Olivia. All of a sudden, mid-song, Olivia switched off all the music and stopped playing, exclaiming that she ‘couldn’t hear herself sing’ and that there was ‘no point in playing unless the crowd were quiet’. Unfortunately, in my opinion, the way she carried out her request, I found to be a little abrasive and a quite frankly a little rude – but maybe I’m just a little sensitive to these things.
 
I did empathise with her though as every musician has been in the position at some point during their career where they’re doing their best to engage an audience that, quite frankly, just don’t want to be engaged – and it’s bloody tough! However, in my opinion, it’s (unfortunately) all part of the job. Olivia happened to be playing electronic music, at a club, late on a Friday night. You can’t really expect an audience in such a situation to be avidly watching and staying silent. Which is why I’d wished I was watching Olivia perform at a more concert or gig style venue as I think her music would have transferred across a lot better in those conditions.
 
After her outburst though, it seemed that her performance changed. She became more forceful and powerful with her stage persona which I think worked really well in accordance to her music. The gig certainly became more emotive and stimulating to watch. Some parts of her songs even involved screaming which I couldn’t tell if they were part of the experimental nature of the piece or indeed her way of releasing her frustration at the audience. For the most part – the gig worked well and provided an exciting stage presence – however, towards the end, you could sense that she seemed to loose her vigour and the fighting spirit she previously had which almost vanished towards the finale of her set which was a real shame as, personally, I think it broke down the barrier and lost the magical presence.
 
I did however thoroughly enjoy her music and have since been listening to her current release, Doll Divider, on repeat and would highly recommend you do too! Even though this gig might have been seen to be a bit of a disaster due to certain circumstances (mainly out of Olivia’s control), I would highly recommend you catch her live again, but this time – in a venue more suitable to her style of music & performance.
 
Olivia Louvel has a new album due out June 2014 called ‘Beauty Sleep’ which will be accompanied by some film visuals.
 
Olivia described it to BrightonsFinest as a ‘collection of electronic hallucinations, a shamanic vision, tripping pop with the spirit of Yma Sumac appearing through one song and other spirits lurking waiting to be released!’ – Sounds fun!
Eva Rose