The Quietus Albums of the Year So Far 2026 (In Association with Norman Records)

39.

FRANTX
IDUTYDU

The debut from Paris-based Franco-Italian quartet FRANTX is messy in the best possible way, a post-everything riot of re-pitched, multi-lingual vocals, mutilated guitars, toy synth, tuba, tumbling drums and concrète-inspired collage. These restless, wayward songs can veer from electroclash to jazzy math rock and back again in the space of the same song (‘Fly Communication’), smash together hyperpop with post-punk, or set the recollections of an elderly Italian lady to Gastr Del Sol-style post-rock (‘Vittoria’). Best of all might be the first-stuttering-then-churning noise-scape of ‘Banana Phone Boi’. Despite the suggestions of social media-induced dislocation – the opening track is called ‘Sorry I’m Feeling Emoji’ – IDUTYDU feels alive and engaged, the sound of a highly skilled unit giving free reign to its collective imagination. 

David McKenna

''Idutydu'', nuovo lavoro dei Frantx uscito il 22 maggio 2026, sceglie di abitare il caos, non di metterlo in ordine. Il collettivo parigino, formato da Fanny Meteier, Andrea Giordano, Pierre Pradier e Marco Luparia, costruisce un album che sembra nascere da una collisione continua tra punk, elettronica, noise e suggestioni hyperpop, senza preoccuparsi troppo di rispettare confini o etichette.

Già il titolo, acronimo di ''I Didn’t Understand That You Didn’t Understand'', suggerisce un tema centrale: l'incomunicabilità. Ma invece di affrontarla con toni drammatici, i Frantx la trasformano in una materia sonora instabile, nervosa e imprevedibile.

Il primo singolo ''Barbiecue'', pubblicato a marzo, è probabilmente la porta d'ingresso ideale nel loro universo. Il brano riesce a essere aggressivo e ironico allo stesso tempo, alternando frammenti melodici e improvvise esplosioni rumoristiche. È una canzone che sembra smontarsi e ricomporsi continuamente, mantenendo però una sorprendente coerenza interna.

Più che una raccolta di canzoni tradizionali, ''Idutydu'' appare come un flusso di idee in costante trasformazione. Le voci vengono deformate, filtrate, sovrapposte; la chitarra elettrica dialoga con elettronica, melodica, synth giocattolo e tuba, creando paesaggi sonori che spesso sfuggono a qualsiasi definizione immediata.

Ciò che colpisce maggiormente è la capacità del gruppo di mantenere un'identità precisa pur lavorando sull'instabilità. Dietro il rumore c'è una ricerca vera, un desiderio di mettere in discussione non solo le forme musicali, ma anche il ruolo stesso dei musicisti e il modo in cui si costruiscono le relazioni all'interno di una comunità artistica.

L'ascolto non è sempre semplice. Anzi, spesso richiede attenzione e disponibilità a lasciarsi spiazzare. Ma è proprio in questa continua tensione tra disordine e invenzione che il disco trova la propria forza.

''Idutydu'' è un lavoro che provoca, incuriosisce e a volte disorienta. E proprio per questo riesce a lasciare il segno. In un panorama musicale sempre più prevedibile, i Frantx scelgono la strada più difficile: quella dell'esplorazione. E il risultato è uno dei progetti più originali e coraggiosi che ci sia capitato di incontrare negli ultimi tempi. (Sara Stella)

Featured on Zaph Mann's "The Beat Goes On" https://inmemoryofjohnpeel.com/2026/06/06/the-beat-goes-on-20260529-069-podcast-playlist/ BARBIECODA by FＲＡＮＴＸ @frantx.mp3 "IDUTYDU" (Carton Records) @cartonrecords 2026 https://frantxband.bandcamp.com/album/idutydu @standardinfi_official

Rockfort - 2 June 2026

David McKenna presents the best in underground and out of left-field French music. This week's show features Agathe Max, Frantx, Parasite Jazz, Aho Ssan, Jérémie Ternoy and OUTRENOIR.

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Buckle up! A wild ride though cacophonous noise, F R A N T X spikes moments of chaos with moments of color.

Anima Mundi with Chinn: Playlist from May 31, 2026

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The world is bound with secret knots. Hermetic meditations on the weird, beautiful, ancient, terrifying and/or confusing, with music! Chunky New Age, contemporary classical, cryptic Western, avant pop, shimmery jams, weird noises, plus old favorites and who knows what else. Everyday magic; magic every day.

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Episode

Thursday,
28th May

idutydu,
f r a n t x 
— chronique

—
par Selma Namata Doyen
photo © Eudes Lemare

line-up
—

Fanny Meteier tuba, voix, toy synth
Andrea Giordano voix, électronique, mélodica
Pierre Pradier guitares, voix
Marco Luparia batterie, électronique, voix

carton records
standard in-fi

mai 2026
—

Le titre est déjà un petit accident administratif : IDUTYDU (I Didn’t Understand That You Didn’t Understand). On pourrait croire à un échange de mails devenu incontrôlable ou à un bug de sous-titres automatiques. En réalité, c’est un résumé assez exact du disque : une musique où les informations arrivent trop vite, changent de fonction en cours de route, puis reviennent déguisées comme si de rien n’était.
Chez ＦＲＡＮＴＸ, les instruments n’ont manifestement pas signé pour les postes qu’on leur avait promis. Le tuba ne sonne presque jamais tuba : il souffle, compresse, parasite, gonfle les contours du son jusqu’à ressembler tantôt à un moteur fatigué, tantôt à une nappe électronique qui aurait mangé trop de gravier. La batterie ne marque pas le temps, elle le découpe en tranches inégales et les redistribue sans prévenir. Les guitares choisissent de ne pas choisir entre riff, texture, objet contondant et meuble sonore. Quant aux voix, elles circulent dans le mix comme des personnages secondaires qui auraient pris le contrôle du scénario. Le plus amusant, c’est que cette organisation apparemment anarchique est d’une précision presque vexante. Les morceaux tiennent par gestion des densités, déplacements de registres, ruptures calibrées et un travail très fin sur la saturation. Rien ne déborde par accident.
PINGU TRAUMA avance comme 4 membres d’un groupe qui se chamailleraient en jouant, tout en restant étonnamment d’accord. ORGASMIC KITCHEN pousse encore plus loin cette économie du faux chaos : motifs abandonnés, retours absurdes, coupes sèches, puis soudain un passage parfaitement construit — comme si quelqu’un avait rangé le bazar pendant qu’on regardait ailleurs Et puis il y a BANANA PHONE BOI, qui étire enfin le temps. Les couches s’empilent : souffles, saturation, électronique, voix, percussion, timbres qui se frottent sans politesse excessive. Là, le disque révèle son vrai talent : produire énormément de matière sans jamais fabriquer de bouillie.
IDUTYDU pourrait donner parfois l’impression qu’un ensemble de musique contemporaine aurait accidentellement surfé sur trop de forums, téléchargé trop de pop et avalé un peu trop de caféine. Trop ? Définitivement non. Ce disque groove souvent et jamais trop. Avec beaucoup plus de tenue qu’on pourrait lui en accorder.

Banlieues Bleues trace de nouveaux chemins

Le 31 mars, à la Dynamo de Pantin, Banlieues Bleues ouvrait une soirée placée sous le signe du risque et de l’invention avec TERRINE, FRANTX et Rojin Sharafi. Trois propositions pour « tracer de nouveaux chemins », lisait-on dans l’édito du festival, et c’est bien cette ligne qui a dessiné la soirée, faite de tensions, de matières instables et de formes qui refusent de se laisser domestiquer.

[…]
FRANTX allait ensuite déplacer la soirée vers un autre type de tension, plus vocale, plus politique, plus fragmentée aussi. Le quatuor franco-italien donne à voir un monde en crise, tantôt hostile, tantôt désespéré ou absurde : Fanny Meteier en keffieh donne le ton avec un discours engagé, Andrea Giordano prend le relais, masquée par un carré dentelé, voix distordue jusqu’à devenir presque sans visage, mais jamais totalement déshumanisée. Le groupe, né de croisements entre improvisation, musique concrète, pop mutante et noise-glitch, travaille le collage comme une dramaturgie du heurt.

La musique avance par à-coups, par surgissements, par motifs qui se défont aussitôt qu’ils se stabilisent. On passe du coq à l’âne, mais sans gratuité : cette instabilité semble constitutive du projet, comme si chaque musicien testait en permanence la résistance du groupe, ses limites de cohésion, ses seuils de chaos. Certaines séquences, notamment celles qui jouent sur les aigus de la guitare et des clochettes dans des textures micropolyphoniques où se répondent Pierre Pradier et Marco Luparia, ouvrent de très beaux espaces de suspension.
Et puis l’humour, indispensable antidote pour ce monde cassé : « celle-là, c’est la chanson du camping, je vous préviens », annonce la tubiste avant le dernier titre, en admettant son émotion à se présenter à Banlieues Bleues en tant que « fille du 93 ». Ce décalage entre la gravité du matériau et la simplicité du rapport au public donne au set une humanité particulière : « Fly Communication » fait sentir avec une lucidité ironique les malentendus et les tensions du collectif transnational comme partie intégrante de leur musique. C’est ce titre qui clôt leur premier album IDUTYDU, dont la sortie est prévue le 22 mai 2026.

[…]

Music: Wiggly Air – Deafkids, My Heart, An Inverted Flame, it foot, it ears, FRANTX, Tom Waits and Massive Attack

Electro blipmares from Paris. The French/Italian four-piece FRANTX sound decidedly more contemporary than does it foot, it ears, but are similarly disorienting, likely because I don’t speak French. They’re super-cute and vaguely anxious, technicolor techno masking what seems to be a disaffected detachment. All four members provide (processed) vocals and synth textures on their debut IDUTYDU (LP, download from Carton Records May 22), although there’s also occasional acoustic guitar and tuba as well. A slow chaos ensues, as on “Pingu Trauma,” in which a robot sing-a-long interrupts what sounds like a cartoon ensconced in a blanket of scorn. There are little melodies at times, but there’s not often much going on in song form. Still, it manages to keep a poppish feel aloft, like comic sans illbient. The lyrics might point a different direction, but that said, the album’s final track, “Fly Communication,” delivered in accented English, is about our inability to converse with bugs, even when they say they understand. Communication is overrated.

IDUTYDU by FRANTX. A fascinating LP from this Paris experimental group where the human voice becomes a pliable instrument amidst drones & electronics.

experimental

IDUTYDU

par ＦＲＡＮＴＸ

Fascinating LP from this Paris experimental group where the human voice becomes a pliable instrument amidst drones & electronics.

Aired on 29.03.26, 12:00pm

Quite a journey today, through genres, countries & continents, emotions and BPMs. This is how we do it in the house of Utility Fog.

Tonight at the top of the show I featured tracks from two big compilations of incredible Lebanese experimental music released by Tunefork Studios on Bandcamp to raise money for the millions of people displaced by Israel's invasion & now occupation of southern Lebanon. Land 01 came out in 2024, and now Land 02 and Land 03 have come out simultaneously. They're jam-packed with amazing music. There's a discount for getting all three, and it will go directly to supporting people in immediate need.

FRANTX – BARBIECUE [Carton Records/Bandcamp]
Andrea Giordano, Kalle Moberg, Jo David Meyer Lysne – D’antorn a lor [Black Truffle Records/Bandcamp]
Two releases here show the breadth of the work of Oslo-based Italian musician & singer Andrea Giordano, mentioned above as an early collaborator with Nicolas Remondino in their electro-acoustic duo ŌTONN and the contemporary classical/jazz Dròlo Ensemble. And while I say she is Oslo-based, Giordano is also leader of the Paris-based “glit-noise” band FRANTX. As far as I know, in FRANTX she is lead singer, also playing melodica and all sorts of electronics (in other groups she plays winds and various keyboard-based instruments including accordion). I intrepret “glit” as “glitch”, but it could also refer to glitter, and the group has a glittery queer punk attitude, tackling the politics of making music in the current context, expressing themselves through electro-acoustic experimentalism, punk noise (or noisy punk) and a weird instrumental lineup (guitar & drums added to Giordano’s melodica and Fanny Meteier‘s tuba). The album’s out on May 22, titled IDUTYU (“I Didn’t Understand That You Didn’t Understand”).

Utility Fog teeters on the cusp between acoustic and electronic, organic and digital. Constantly changing and rearranging, this aural cloud of nanotech consumes genres and spits them out in new forms.

Peter Hollo curates each episode around a narrative of genre-plasticity, deep-diving into artist histories, side projects and influences. Challenging sounds are contextualised within musical movements, surprising connections are uncovered, unfairly overlooked works are revisited.

Come on a journey through music in all its ugly beauty.

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Kiosk Radio is a community web radio station and streaming platform broadcasting 24/7 from a wooden kiosk in the heart of Brussels’ historic 'Parc Royal'. Since 2017, it’s been a place where music drifts between genres without boundaries or rules.
timecode:
37:35

“On ne peut s’empêcher d’être ébloui par la combinaison jaune poussin et les paillettes sur les joues de Fanny Meteier qui, centrale, illumine la scène.” 

“Notamment Marco Luparia, [...] on sait le jeune homme passionné par les rapports entre la percussion et l’électronique dans des soli remarqués où la surface a toute son importance”