Keyboardist and sampler artist Diane Labrosse is a core member of the Montréal avant-garde music collective Ambiances Magnétiques. In the 1980s she took part to a string of avant-pop feminist groups. Later she switched from keyboards to the sampler and from rock to electronica improv. Although she has released solo albums, her best known works have been with collaborators Ikue Mori and Martin Tétreault. She also appears on numerous albums by other Ambiances Magnétiques artists, especially Jean Derome, Joane Hétu and Michel F Côté. She is co-founder and artistic co-director of the Montréal-based concert production company Productions SuperMémé.

Labrosse was gravitating around L’Enfant Fort and the Pouêt Pouêt Band, collectives of left-field musicians that predate the beginnings of Ambiances Magnétiques. There she met saxophonist/singer Joane Hétu and drummer Danielle Palardy Roger. Together they formed the all-girls group Wondeur Brass. Her quirky keyboard playing which made use of unusual “post new-wave” sounds gave the band its signature on the two LPs Ravir (1985) and Simoneda, Reine des Esclaves (1988). The trio also performed under the name Les Poules, recording one album in 1986 (the unit was revived as an improv project in the early 2000s) and with bassist Marie Trudeau as Justine in the early 1990s, Labrosse’s closest brush with fame, at least in Eastern Europe where the group built a cult following.

In 1985, along with her colleagues she was asked to join Ambiances Magnétiques. There she developed a special affinity with drummer Michel F Côté both in and outside music. She contributed to his first two Bruire albums (especially Les Fleurs de Léo), recorded a duo CD with him (Duo Déconstructiviste) and together they wrote the music for Robert Lepage’s play La Géométrie des Miracles (Geometry of Miracles) and toured with his technological cabaret Zulu Time.

Labrosse released her first solo CD Face cachée des choses in 1995, at the end of Justine’s career and before joining Hétu’s new group Castor et Compagnie. It focused for the first time on the sampler as an instrument, a soft-noise direction she would stick to from then on. Île Bizarre (1998) with Ikue Mori and Martin Tétreault revealed her work to an international audience. With Tétreault she toured Europe and eventually released the duo CD Parasites (2001).

Diane Labrosse is currently at the Centre for Contemporary Arts of Glasgow (UK) for an installation and a performance in collaboration with the Theatre Cryptic. The “Each and Every Inch” project starts May 9, 2002. Musical performances occurs May 14 to 18. By the end the month, she will join her Parasites companion, turntablist Martin Tétreault, for two concerts in France, May 30 in Limoges and June 1 at Saint-Étienne’s festival “Musiques Innovatrices.”

The Archipel festival of new music, held in Geneva (Switzerland), will see the reunion of Ikue Mori (drum machines), Martin Tétreault (turntable) and Diane Labrosse (sampler) for their explosive trio Île bizarre, on March 21, 2002.

Martin Tétreault (turntable) and Diane Labrosse (sampler), who recently released the album Parasites, will play live with japanese artist Haco (voice, electric mandolin) April 25, 2002 at Casa del Popolo (Montréal). Since the 80’s, Haco, a founding member of Hoahio, is a leading figure in alternative music in Japan and frequently plays with Otomo Yoshihide, Sachiko M and harpist Zeena Parkins.

After the success of their last CD together, Île bizarre (with percussionist Ikue Mori), Diane Labrosse (sampler) and Martin Tétreault (turntable), offers us Parasites, where electronic noises and concretes sounds meets and fights to form yet unheard-of textures. This new CD was launched during a SuperBOOM concert at La Chapelle last November, just returning from a series of concerts in Europe (particularly at the Strasbourg museum of modern arts and at the Instants chavirés). Disquieting, dense and disturbing, Parasites will fulfill every abstract music lover’s desire.

“A rushing brutal liberation from language and cadence…” (The Wire, UK) In the 80’s, Joane Hétu, Diane Labrosse and Danielle Palardy Roger sprung out of the Quebec musical landscape and seduced the world with their vitality, ardour and originality. One of the first Ambiances Magnétiques productions, the lp Les contes de l’amère loi (Tales of a Bitter Law) was out of print for more than a decade. This CD reissue is a wonderful occasion to discover again the work of these three women who help built, as musicians and producers, new music in Québec.