home | news |  discography | reviews | biography |  store | videos |  gallery | contact

A short story:

Founded in 2002 by Frédéric L'Epée, Yang is an instrumental rock quartet which compositions mix guitar counterpoints with a powerful rock pulse. The first line-up of the band was Frédéric L'Epée, guitar, Julien Vecchié, guitar, Stéphane Bertrand, bass and Volodia Brice, drums. It was originally meant to be a harder version of Frédéric's previous band, Philharmonie, but rapidly evolved to become a more direct, and heavy act. In 2006, Julien Vecchié and Stéphane Bertrand have been replaced by Laurent James, guitar and Nico Gomez, bass.

Math Rock - Prog Rock - Art Rock, these words are usually used to describe our music but we prefer Instrumental Rock.
Of course our work is often more complex than just rock, but it always sounds natural. We never search for complexity. These structures, rhythms, melodies are inspired by Rock and Progressive Rock, but also Western Asia/Eastern Europe sounds as well as contemporary new music.
From 2002 to 2022, Yang released four albums, A Complex Nature in 2004, Machines in 2010, The Failure of Words in 2017 and Designed for Disaster in 2022. The rarity of our releases is mainly due to the fact that we live far from each other, from the south of France to Germany.
Our last album "Designed for Disaster" has been released in February 2022 on Cuneiform Records. The first album featuring a guest singer, Ayşe Cansu Tanrıkulu performing on 5 songs, along with spoken harsh voices by the whole band.
We've gone from instrumental rock to chamber rock.
On the next opus, "Rejoice!", to be released on the same label in july 2024, a much shorter time than between the other albums, Carla Kihlstedt, singer and violinist of the band Sleepytime Gorilla Museum, will sing on ten titles out of thirteen.

  Frédéric L’Épée : Founder of Yang, previously founder of bands Shylock (70’s– 2 releases CBS - Musea) and Philharmonie (90’s - 5 releases Cuneiform Records). Studied composition, orchestration, harmony and counterpoint at the Nice conservatory, awarded 1st price of composition (1988). He teaches guitar, harmony and composition in Paris and Berlin.
  - guitar

  Volodia Brice : Studied classical percussion  instruments, then drums at Institut des Arts Rythmiques, Paris. As a drummer on the last Philharmonie line up he played on their last CD “The Last Word” on Cuneiform Records.
  - drums

  Nico Gomez : Studied bass at Berklee College of Music.  Then settled in London where he plays and records with Björk, Roy Hargrove, Steve Williamson and Snowboy.
  - bass

   Laurent James : Studied guitar with Frédéric L’Épée, obtained a license of musicology at the Nice University then leaved to the Berklee College of Music. Back from Boston, he studied harmony, composition and orchestration at Nice conservatory.
  - guitar