Based in France, Trank have spent a long-time crafting their unique sound. We caught up with the band, to discuss their current creative evolutionary pit stop on ‘The Maze’!
Who is answering the questions?
At this stage I’m not sure anymore. To the best of my knowledge – Michel, lead singer and synths / computers programming in TRANK.
How did you get to the band name, and what does it mean to you?
Today’s version : it was the sound of one of our guitars falling sideways to the floor of the rehearsal studio. I promise I’ll come up with another version every time you ask. (We just wanted a name that sounded the same in basically any language, with a K in it because there’s sort of a Germanic feel to the way we use machines in combination with rock instruments, and this word happened as one of many inexplicable jokes from Johann, our drummer. You had to be there. So, to us or anyone else, it’s not meant to actually “mean” anything. It’s short for tranquillizer, but that’s an accident.)
When did you realise that you wanted to do music full time?
In my case, probably age 12. Only took 3+ decades to get around to it. Probably the same for the other guys, but they’re younger (apart from Arnaud, our new bass player, who’s basically my age, so he doesn’t have an excuse either. I’ll be sure to let him know you mocked him.) That’s about the age I became a huge Depeche Mode fan and they made me obsessed with music. Same happened to David with Guns’n’Roses and Soundgarden at about the same age – and to Johann with Toto. Quite a mix, eh? We’re an obsessively eclectic bunch.
How did the idea for your latest release come about?
Seems natural to think of making a second album after the first one got rave reviews and got us gigs. Not “money” – that age is well and truly over, ain’t it. But more importantly, we thought we’d created a sonic identity with the first one, a core territory of sorts, a heartland – and we naturally started to explore its more remote corners shortly after it was released. We gave ourselves more freedom – for instance, there’s more diversity in terms of the beats and levels of energy we’ve used for each song. Also, it felt like instead of blending guitars and electronics all the way through each tune, we’d make the songs more dynamic by alternating between synth-dominated and guitar-dominated moments, without losing the sort of dark-meets-light, power-meets-atmosphere, distortion-meets-refinement sort of sound we’re after, of the widescreen cinematic feel that remains our ambition to create.
Can you tell us about the themes and influences that run through out?
There’s just one : the quest for one’s identity – but each song approaches it in a different way. That word of “identity” is more ubiquitous now than it’s ever been – Europe and France in particular seem to have re-imported the identity politics that emerged in the US in the 90’s, as a factor of largely misinterpreting, with the best intentions I’m sure, the works of a couple of French philosophers. But the scary part for me is that today’s kids are asked, or in fact forced, by the outside world, to find and define and assert their identity from a very young age – and not based on who they are as people, or what they could create or accomplish or strive for, which would be the existentialists way – my way; but based on things they never had a say about, like their ethnic origin, supposed or real: their religious background, supposed or real; their gender identity, etc. You get this barrage of contradictory injunctions that force you to pick a side based on things you never chose, and of course there’s the ridiculousness of being caught in the crossfire of this militant group against that one if you belong to more than one “minority.” It’s just awful, complex to the point of soul destroying. After writing four of five songs – the lyrics always come last – I realised that was the running theme that united them, and most of the songs on “The Maze” ended up talking about that seemingly impossible search for one’s identity. Some of the songs deal with it by means of social commentary – like “Twenty First Century Slave”, which talks about social justice warriors and their delusions of freedom and personality; or “Boys (Eyes on the Road)”, which talks about the seduction of joining a movement to find yourself – before realising you’re not even sure what the movement’s about. Some of them talk about it in a more “romantic” sort of way – “Queen of the Broken” is about finding yourself in someone else whose wounds you think and hope you can understand and maybe heal, even though they might keep you away.
Who produced the release, and what were they like to work with (If you produced it yourself, then what do you love the most about working that way?)
It’s largely produced by the band, which at the time of the album was mostly David (our bass player, who also ended up handling the guitars on all but three songs as our original guitarist, Julien amicably left the band after around 3 songs were done – for personal reasons which had nothing to do with the music or with us : we’re still good mates); he also did some of the synth programming with me; Johann, our drummer; and myself. And then our recording engineer and longtime friend, Yvan Barone, who’s a veteran of the Montreux live festival, co-produced it like he did the first one. We spend a lot of time crafting the arrangement and the sound of the songs to strike the balance we want between power, dynamic, harmonic richness and atmosphere – Yvan has a fantastic ear to help us realise when we’re putting too much in, and he is a master of truly organic recording, and analogue equipment. So he was essential to get to the sound we wanted. We’ve known him for years, in my case since before we started TRANK, so the sessions were very focused and intense – but also very friendly. The only time I feel even more comfortable than when I’m alone to record vocals is when I record them with him. And then the mixing was done by Brian Robbins, also like what happened on the first album. He’s worked with bands like Asking Alexandria and Bring Me The Horizon – so he knows how to take Yvan’s organic, warm, textured recordings and give them slam. Why change a winning team ?
I should also mention that since then, we’ve recruited three new members to play the songs as they should be played on stage, with the same sort of big, rich, occasionally epic sound we wanted on the record, without using backing tapes (aside of the occasional robotic synth line). Both Nico (our additional guitar man – David and him trade places as lead or rhythm depending on the song) and Arnaud (our bass player, now that David’s switched to guitars) have sort of a funk metal touch to their style, and the songs are gently but surely evolving to incorporate that into our identity; and Emma, our manager, is also a very talented keyboardist and backing singer. She and I have spent a lot of time preparing the sounds and parts required to play as much as possible of the electronics live (I don’t like the idea of playing the keys while singing – my idea of a frontman is to be out there with the crowd), and we can also re-create my favourite vocal harmonies on stage, which feels great. Johann and David also do a lot of very good backing vocals, but more of the “tribal”, high-testosterone type. With Emma we can do the more ethereal, melodic things I also love.
How would you say that the sound of the band has grown/changed over the last couple of years?
I think “The Maze” is the same brand of intense, melodic, heavyweight, widescreen rock we created on the first album – but it’s more varied within that, and more direct as well. The songs go down even better on stage, which is a sign as the ones from the first album already worked very well with every crowd we’ve ever played.
What do you want your latest release to do for the representation of the band?
Well – we just played a festival that went down a storm, and after the gig a bunch of guys same to speak to us : one of them was very moved and said he was going through a rough patch, and he received our set like a one-hour catharsis. That’s exactly what we want : for people to enjoy the sort of catharsis we create for ourselves. Putting “The Maze” our on vinyl, as we’ve just done – in fact that’s why we’re talking : the vinyl release of the album, which come a few months after the digital version, because we went for a high quality pressing plant with a long waiting list… - Putting it out on vinyl is also about making sure that the people who are truly passionate about music and rock in 2025 find their way to it. Rock isn’t the mainstream here anymore, you have to really be a passionate to go to it and search for new bands, and we know those types of people tend to enjoy the sort of physical relationship with the music that vinyl offers. I’m also a huge fan of the format in terms of sound quality, and there are a lot of things about the sound of TRANK that make vinyl the perfect format for us. We took our time getting it right (our mastering engineer, Andy Van Dette, used to work for Porcupine Tree and David Bowie…), but it was worth it : it sounds as PHAT as we wanted it to.
What else can we expect to see from the band in 2025?
Plenty of ideas floating around on that theme right now. We’ll let you know when we‘ve decided on our priorities among them. But there’ll be more concerts, and there’s another video coming for one of the songs on the album. The first two (for “Twenty First Century Slave” and “Queen of the Broken”) worked really well, so a third one seems like a good idea.
You can STREAM, DOWNLOAD or BUY the album HERE
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