TTC bracht begin deze maand hun debuut-album uit in Europa: Ceci n'est pas un disque. De Franse hiphoppers zijn hard op weg een bekende internationale act te worden, en Scholieren.com had het genoegen ze te interviewen. Het is 19.34 als we Teki opbellen in Parijs.

Scholieren.com: "Hi, how are you?"
Teki: "Hi, I'm fine."
S: "Can we start the interview right away?"
T: "Yeah, ok. Wait a moment."
*Gerammel op een toetsenbord*
T: "Ok, let's begin."

S: Ok, first question. How did TTC come into existence?
T: Well, it started in 1997. Cuisinier is my cousin, so we've known each other since we were born. We formed a group, doing some shows. I met Tido in '96, through a common friend. Tido visited our jams a lot, started rhyming and joined. We really started under the name TTC in about '98. Our first twelve-inch we released in '99, indepedently.

S: Although you're a French group, you're contracted by the English Bigdada. Was it hard to get a record deal for you?
T: It would definetely have been harder for us to get a deal in France, there was at that time no scene. There was no label willing to take any risk and put money into this kind of music. Bigdada was looking for a European group that was going in the same artistic direction when they heard our stuff, so we ended up signing with them. Though there's a small scene for our type of music now in France, there was none at the time and no label like Bigdada.

S: What's the difference between American hiphop and French hiphop, in your opinion?
T: They've got a lot in common... But it's not the same kind of stuff that's going to sell in France. For example, if you really want to make some money in the states, you have to be marketable, say some funny stuff, have jewelry and cartoonish video's. In the states it's all about entertainment. In France, you... ehmmm- you basically have to say sad stuff. *laughs*. You have to be emotional in France. But it's mostly superficial emotions: "Oh yeah, I'm a thug, but I also love my mom." That's really popular, because people think that it's so emotional. But it's stuff people in school could write. And ofcourse, there's always a bigger audience for anything you do in the USA. If you do a very experimental twelve-inch, there's always gonna be someone to buy it. In France the audience is much smaller. People respond different to music in general, in France. They have to understand what you mean, before they'll buy it. They won't buy it just for the music of it.

S: The title of your album (Ceci n'est pas un disque, red.) is, at least I think so, inspired by the surrealist painter Magritte. Is surrealism important in your work?
T: It has a certain importance. It's not like we grew up watching Magritte paintings everyday, or that we're really into it and have several surrealistic paintings in our living rooms, it's just that it's an influence. As much as videogames, television, movies, hiphop and other kinds of music. I do think the way we see hiphop has something in common with surrealism: we take traditional elements of hiphop, and turn them into something else. Like a DJ taking a turntable and instead of using it to listen to music, using it to make some music. And like B-boying, instead of dancing like traditional dancers - dance on your head. Like that, we take something from traditional hiphop and pass it through a filter, getting a mutation. And it's the same with surrealism: elements of reality that go through someone's imagination to become something else. It's more personal that way.

S: Can you tell us what CD is in your player this week?
T: Oh la la... That's a tough question. Nowadays I listen to a lot of stuff my friends do, like the producers
who have some beats on the album. Some of them have instrumental albums which I listen to. I have Necro, a CD-R with some Log Cabin stuff, some underground. What else do I have... I have a lot of electronic music, Squarepusher, some bootlegs of Kylie Minogue *laughs*, Britney Spears mixed with electronic music. I listen to a lot of MP3's, and gameboy generated music. There's this group called Teamtendo, we're probably gonna do some stuff with them, they're really good. They make music with eight gameboys plugged to each other. We're really into videogames.

S: Yes, I've heard your single "Game Over" which was also influenced by computer games.
T: Yeah, yeah, we're very influenced by those. But it's not like we're gonna sample those on every song. It's old cartoons, and old stuff from the eighties that influences us. It's the things we grew up with, so it's natural. And besides there's that eighties-revival which we're really a victim of! *laughs*

S: Is there any chance you'll visit the Netherlands any time soon?
T: There aren't any plans for a tour right now, but I'd love to go there some times. If anyone in the Netherlands reads this and would like to book us, please send us an e-mail!

S: In what direction will TTC go from here?
T: Well, we're always trying to explore new directions. Even if it's not in music, but in other media. I've been playing in some short movies, for example. We're definetely about pushing things forward. We get bored very easily, it's like a matter of survival. If we really want to keep doing this, we have to explore new things all the time. Nowadays we're getting more and more into electronic music, we have a lot of friends who listen to that and make us listen to that, like Kid606. There's a lot of stuff to explore, even in things like vocals. In hiphop, vocals have been very under-exploited, there's lot of things you can do with vocals, like cutting them up and emulating glitch-sounds. Also in terms of language of writing there's new things to explore, like taking text-samples from here and there, using automatic translations. You always can come up with some crazy new things, new techniques.

S: Ok, thanks for the interview, and au revoir.
T: Merci, et mais oui, au revoir.

* Dit interview is geschreven naar aanleiding van een gesprek dat Scholieren.com op 28 Mei 2002 had met frontman Teki, en bevat niet de letterlijke tekst. Gepubliceerd op 30 mei 2002

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