Mr. Oizo

Mr. Oizo
Background information
Birth name	Quentin Dupieux
Also known as	Mr. Oizo
Born	14 April 1974 (1974-04-14) (age 37) France
Genres	Electronic, Techno French house, Experimental electro
Occupations	Producer, DJ, filmmaker, composer, songwriter
Instruments	Synthesizer, sampler, drum machine, computer
Years active	1991–present
Labels	Ed Banger Records (2006–present) F Communications (1997–2006)
Associated acts	Uffie Feadz Busy P SebastiAn
Website	Mr. Oizo on Myspace

Mr. Oizo (French pronunciation: [ˈməsjø ˈwazo]) is the stage name of French electronic musician and film director Quentin Dupieux^[1]. His pseudonym is a corruption of the French oiseau, meaning "bird". He is currently signed to French electro record label, Ed Banger Records.

Beginning

Quentin Dupieux was born in 1974. At the age of 12, he found a camera and started taking photographs. At 17, he began to play music to illustrate his images, and bought his first synthesiser. In 1997, Laurent Garnier of F Com bought a car from Mr. Oizo's father.^[2] Garnier then found out about Dupieux's talents and let him direct the music video for his song "Flashback". Later Dupieux was signed by F Com Records where he released his first EP, "#1".^{[citation needed]}

"Flat Beat"

"Flat Beat" was a track with a repeated bass loop. As stated in an interview with XLR8R magazine he said that it took him two hours with a Korg MS-20 to make. Dupieux is however most known for this track, which became a hit throughout Europe in 1999 and was featured in a series of Levi's jeans TV commercials. Dupieux also directed the advertisement, which featured a yellow puppet named Flat Eric nodding his head to the sound of the track while riding in an old beat-up car. After "Flat Beat", Oizo spent two months creating his first full album, Analog Worms Attack. The Flat Beat EP has sold over 3 million copies.^{[citation needed]}

Analog Worms Attack

Analog Worms Attack was Oizo's first album, released in 1999. The album's namesake was derived from the album's production – it was composed entirely using analog equipment. The record scratching effects were provided by Mr. Oizo's friend, Feadz. "Flat Beat" appeared as a bonus track, after the five minutes of silence following the final track "Analog Wormz Sequel". There are a total of three singles off of this album. A version of "No Day Massacre" without any record scratching exists on the Flat Beat EP, titled "Monday Massacre".

Moustache (Half a Scissor)

Moustache (Half a Scissor) was Mr. Oizo's second studio album. Released in 2005, the album was composed exclusively using computers as he had by that time decided to eschew the use of analog equipment. The extensive time it took to remodel his studio and master the use of computers in composing electronic music is cited as the reason for the long hiatus between Analog Worms Attack and Moustache (Half a Scissor).^{[citation needed]} Before its public release, a promo CD was released onto the internet featuring three tracks not on the original release: "CPU","Nazis", and "A Nun".

Some songs on the promo differ from the released album versions. For example, "Nurse Bob" is much longer on the final release whilst the promo version splices vocal samples into a much shorter version. This is his only album not to have its debut release on vinyl; in January 2011 it was released through Flying Lotus' label Brainfeeder.^[3]

Ed Banger Records

Mr. Oizo's first EP released on Ed Banger Records is called "Transsexual". The EP features a re-working of the 1979 disco track "Do It at the Disco" by Gary's Gang. The track appeared on Mr. Oizo's MySpace page in 2006 under the title Patrick122. On 16 October 2008, a video appeared on Mr. Oizo's MySpace page, a promo for his upcoming album, Lambs Anger. The first single off the Record was "Positif", which was released 3 days after Lambs Anger. On 15 March 2009, the second EP off the album is released, Pourriture, featuring some self reworked titles by Oizo himself, and a remix of Erreur Jean, by Arveene & Misk.

Lambs Anger

Lambs Anger is the first studio album released by Ed Banger Records, the label Mr. Oizo chose after his split with F Communications, who notoriously referred to Moustache (Half a Scissor) as "unlistenable".^{[citation needed]} "Positif" and "Pourriture" were chosen as the album's singles. It includes a track, "Steroids" which features label-mate, Uffie.

Collaborations with Uffie

Mr. Oizo and Uffie first collaborated on her second single, "Ready to Uff" in 2006. Since then he has produced the following tracks for Uffie: "Dismissed", "Hot Chick", "F1rst Love" (which charted at number 18 in Belgium^[4]), "Steroids" and "MCs Can Kiss".

Mr. Oizo provided both production work and songwriting for Uffie's 2010 debut album, Sex Dreams and Denim Jeans. He worked alongside Feadz, SebastiAn, Mirwais, J-Mat and Uffie to produce and write the album. He produced the first single from the album, "MCs Can Kiss", which peaked at number 48 Japan and 97 in France.^[5][6] He also produced the tracks "Art of Uff", "F1rst Love", "Our Song" and "NeuNeu".

Production and equipment

In his early years, Mr. Oizo used a Korg MS-20, an Akai S1000, and an Atari 1040 computer.^{[citation needed]} Mr. Oizo is known currently for strong use of computers in his music. As he stated in an interview with XLR8R, he started using computers to avoid having to plug in four different appliances, and because the result of music is more or less the same.^{[citation needed]} His first album to switch to all computers was Moustache (Half a Scissor). In Lambs Anger, Mr. Oizo used a Macintosh G5 running Logic Pro to compose all of the songs. During his DJ sets, he uses 2 CDJ's.

Filmmaking

Mr. Oizo's first feature film, Steak was released in France on 20 June 2007.^[7][8] On 25 September, Oizo wrote on his Twitter feed that his next film would be titled Rubber. Shooting started 27 October 2009. In the November 2009 issue of Mixmag, Justice stated that they would be working on the soundtrack for Rubber, saying they had to 'finish working on the soundtrack for Mr. Oizo's new film before we start recording for the new album'.

He directed the absurdist thriller Rubber,^[9] which has a United States Video on Demand release.^[10]

Discography

Albums

• Analog Worms Attack (1999)
• Moustache (Half a Scissor) (2005)
• Steak (2007)
• Lambs Anger (2008)
• Rubber with Gaspard Auge (Justice) (2010)
• Stade 2 (2011)

Singles and EPs

• "#1" (1997)
• "M-Seq" (1997)
• "Flat Beat" (1999) UK #1^[1]
• "Last Night a DJ Killed My Dog" (2000)
• "Stunt" (2004)
• "Nazis" (2006)
• "Transsexual" (2007)
• "Positif" (2008)
• "Pourriture" (2009)
• "Rubber EP" with Gaspard Auge (Justice) (2010)
• "Stade 2" (2011)

Remixes

Year	Artist	Title
1999	Techno Animal	"We Can Re Build"
1999	Demon	"The Nod Factor"
1999	Alex Gopher	"Time"
1999	Ark	"Punkadelik"
2001	Ark	"Sucubz"
2001	Herbert	"Back to the Start"
2002	Air	"Don't Be Light"
2004	Feadz	"Go On Beef"
2006	Jamelia	"Something About You"
2006	Cassius	"Toop Toop"
2006	Kavinsky	"Testarossa Autodrive"
2006	Biz Markie	"Ahh Ah (Remix of 'Vapors')"
2007	Scissor Sisters	"Kiss You Off"
2007	Calvin Harris	"Merrymaking at My Place"
2008	Jamie Lidell	"A Little Bit of Feel Good"
2008	Busy P	"To Protect & Entertain feat. Murs"
2009	Mr. Oizo	"Steroids feat. Uffie"
2009	Tiga	"Shoes"
2009	N.A.S.A.	"Strange Enough feat. Karen O, Ol' Dirty Bastard and Fatlip)"
2010	Boys Noize	"Transmission"
2010	Squarepusher	"Cryptic Motion"
2011	Ryskee	"Horrors of Love"
2011	Justice	"Civilization"

Music videos and filmography

• "Kirk" (1997)
• "M-Seq" (1999)
• "Flat Beat" (1999)
• "Analog Worms Attack" (1999)
• "Inside The Kidney Machine" (1999)
• "Nonfilm" (2001)
• "Stunt" (2004)
• "Steak" (2007)
• "Making Lambs Anger" (2009)
• "Rubber" (2010)
• "Where's the money, George?" (2010) ^[11]
• "Wrong" (2011)
• "Reality" (20??)

References

1. ^ ^{a b} Roberts, David (2006). British Hit Singles & Albums (19th ed.). London: Guinness World Records Limited. p. 371. ISBN 1-904994-10-5. 
2. ^ "Flat Eric's cruise to the top". BBC News. 20 March 1999. http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/entertainment/299803.stm. Retrieved 5 April 2011. 
3. ^ Mr Oizo – Moustache (Half A Scissor) re-release | Reviews. Trebuchet Magazine (2010-12-18). Retrieved on 2011-03-21.
4. ^ Uffie – First Love. ultratop.be. Retrieved on 2011-03-21.
5. ^ MCs Can Kiss – Uffie Billboard. Retrieved 2010-07-10.
6. ^ Uffie – MCs Can Kiss. lescharts.com. Retrieved on 2011-03-21.
7. ^ Steak (2007), IMDb.com
8. ^ [1]^{[dead link]}
9. ^ Second Rubber Clip Rolls Out
10. ^ Discover The Source Of Robert The Tire's Rage In The New RUBBER Clip!
11. ^ "WHERE'S THE MONEY GEORGE ?", Vimeo, Uploaded 2010-01-02, Retrieved 2010-04-09

External links

• Mr. Oizo on MySpace
• Official website
• Repcred – Respect: Flat Eric – Flat Beat music video (Flash)
• Mr. Oizo on Discogs
• Video Interview with Mr. Oizo
• Lambs Anger Album Review
• Video footage of Making Lambs Anger by Mr Oizo
• Review of Mr. Oizo's 'Pourriture' EP on the Daily Music Guide

Persondata
Name	Oizo, Mr.
Alternative names	Dupieux, Quentin
Short description
Date of birth	14 April 1974
Place of birth
Date of death
Place of death