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Catherine Ribeiro + Alpes - Ame debout LP

Label : 1971 France Philips 6332 017 

Extra info: MONSTER RECORD !!

Led by Patrice Moullet, ALPES was founded in 1970 with Catherine Ribeiro as the lead singer. A very original band, highly prolific throughout the 70's and still alive. Their music is rather experimental and hard to define and involves folk, progressive and improvisation. Patrice Moullet is the inventor of several musical instruments amongst which include the "Cosmophone" and the "Percuphone". In a similar vocal style to Brigitte Fontaine, Catherine Ribeiro's low voice tone may also evoke Nico at times and is theatrical and declamatory. There's often an intense dramatic tension in the singing. The debut albums are the best, and "Paix", with its two long suites, is considered the most progressive and is the best one to start with.

Bio Written by Oliverstoned

Born in Lyon during the war, Catherine Ribeiro started her career in acting, even shooting a film for JL Godart, Les Carabiniers, he met future writing partner Patrice Moullet (then under the name of Albert Juroost), before she started singing, recording a bunch of singles throughout the 60’s, both in Portuguese (her parent’s origins) and in French. These singles are now compiled in a set called Libertés. In the late 60’s, Moullet asks her to starts a band, first named 2Bis (one record released under that moniker), than Alpes, where she’ll be the front person. The group was lucky enough to participated to one of the very few festival still organized in France in the early 70’s (most of them being banned to avoid further youth/student riots after May 68 both the group and festival getting the “go-ahead” from authorities a few hours before starting) in Port Leucate, then Avignon, playing to huge crowds and getting wide notice of the public.

During the early 70’s, Catherine Ribeiro & Alpes recorded a string of stunning albums, starting with Ame Debout and ending with Le Temps De L’autre, the most remarkable being Rat Débile Et Homme Des Champs, with stunning tracks such as Poeme Non-Epique and Ere De La Putréfaction (sic). The group is then centered around Catherine, (guitarist) Moullet and (keyboardist) Lemoine (future Gong) and Motron, but by 76, only Lemoine remained with Catherine. The later 70’s will see albums getting wiser in terms of provocations, but will gain in musician abilities and spectrum, but Ribeiro started recording solo albums dedicated to poets (Jacqueries for Jacques Prévert) and semi-anarchists singers (Ferré, Brel etc..).

In 8i, the group will disband in full glory (awards and academy prizes) after la Déboussole, Catherine recording a string of albums increasingly gentle and decreasingly interesting, until she will recontact Moullet for solo collabs. The very same Moullet will reform Alpes in the early 90’s without Ribeiro, and two more records will be released, both sounding a tad new age, but remaining prog records. Moullet is still playing experimental music through his project Atelier Alpes, while Ribeiro still graces discs of her voice.

As a quick conclusion: Catherine Ribeiro & Alpes have recorded a string of fairly successful albums, gathering a few plaudits and yearly awards from specialized press, played throughout Europe and even in Latin America and Northern Africa and are now seen as an iconic group of the hippy 70’s in France. Their use of seldom-seen percuphone and cosmophone (both alpine instruments), their lengthy Poème Non-Epique pieces, Ribeiro’s anarchist avant-garde and ecologist lyrics and doomed atmosphere (there is some VdGG feel in their music) made this group a very distinct and very original group that has their own sound. Their record company will print at the back of the cover that “the lyrics of the group only engage the musicians and them only”, therefore taking a distance to Ribeiro’s incendiary diatribes. This disengagement is to be seen as CR&A’s best compliment, as in their manner, they were at the forefront of the Counter Culture.

Condition of the Product

 Grading (Record/ Cover) : Mint-/EX  (Dream condition !! Top audio !! Cover clean

GRADDING (Record/ Cover)
Records are visually graded
M = Mint (still in new condition, no imperfections, a Perfect Copy !)
M- = Near mint (imperceptible wear, full vinyl gloss)
EX = Excellent (only very slight wear and paper scuffs, vinyl still glossy with very rare noise)
VG++ = Near Excellent (light surface noise and wear but fairly minor, vinyl still plays nicely)
VG+ = Very Very Good (Evident groove wear or minor scuff marks, surface noise noticeable but does not really affect the playing)
VG = Very Good (Wear and scuffs are more evident and many surface noises are noticeable)

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