Alain Pire Experience is a Belgian trio that has been active for several years now releasing five albums in a 10 years span.

The group is led by Alain Pire, a researcher with doctoral degree for his thesis on Sixties UK psychedelia. The band’s albums evoke the sound of the Sixties with a healthy dose of tricks. The band invest a lot of effort into the atmosphere which makes their album a true psych experience.

Would you like to talk a bit about your background?

Alain Pire: I was a teenager when psychedelia began to burst on the rock scene. I was heavily impressed by the singles ‘Penny Lane’, ‘Strawberry Fields Forever’, Tomorrow Never Knows, A Day In The Life or ‘I’m The Walrus’ by The Beatles had also a deep influence on me. I had a friend who had bought ‘Live/Dead’ by The Grateful Dead. ‘Dark Star’ was on the turntable while we were exploring higher states of consciousness. I started playing drums when I was 15, then I switched to guitar at 18. I then played in ballrooms for quite a time while I was a student, then I played with several Belgian acts over the years. At the end of the 80s, I felt that I was less and less interested with the latest music trends and I began to look back at the Sixties, thus I started to explore that universe once again. I did a PhD about British Psychedelia at the Liège University and got my doctorate in 2009. I then felt that it was the right time to concentrate on psychedelic music only.

When did you decide that you wanted to start writing and performing your own music? What brought that about for you?

I’ve been writing my own music for quite a while. I had several other projects before Alain Pire Experience, but it’s only now that I feel that I’m totally in phase with my own tastes. I’ve been performing a lot as well, but I wanted to form a three piece band like Cream or The Jimi Hendrix Experience, in order to give each member the freedom to express himself. We had the chance to record a double live LP at the Psych Festival on Cardigan which was released in 2020. We did some nice improvisations.

How do you approach songwriting? Is it more of a jam session or are you carefully preparing material at home?

Well, it’s more like “The Loneliness of the Long Distance Runner”. I’m the only composer in the band, so I write all songs on an acoustic guitar and when some structures are complete, they come here to record the basic tracks. I have my own studio at home. I do most of the overdubs myself too, except for some keyboards or strings arrangements that require a collaboration with other people. I always write the music first, then the lyrics and my main tool for writing songs is my iPhone. I record every single bit of ideas, then I listen back and try to add some parts. It’s a very step-by-step method.

Alain Pire Experience | Copyright: Hugues Pagacz Photographie

Can you share some further details how your latest album ‘Purple Skies’ was recorded?

‘Purple Skies’ is a Covid album. We’ve been trapped in a very long lockdown like many people these last two years, so I only saw René and Marcus for a very limited number of recording sessions. So I did most of the music all by myself and I think it had an influence on the overall tone of the album, which is quite different from the other ones that I released in the previous years. I could never have written a song like ‘If Six Was Four’ in normal times.

<a href="https://alainpireexperience.bandcamp.com/album/purple-skies">Purple Skies by Alain Pire Experience</a>

I also did the mix and mastering which was not the case for my previous releases. So, it’s a very personal album I guess.

How pleased were you with the sound of the album?

That’s a tricky question … I took many hours to mix and remix the songs. I’m very picky about volumes and balance of sounds. I’m mostly mixing on headphones to have a more detailed control on the music spectrum. I also listened to all mixes in my car, while driving, so I had an idea on how it would sound on other people’s stereos. I leave the answer up to you.

What are some bands/musicians that have a big influence on you?

Psychedelic-era Beatles, ‘Their Satanic Majesties Request’ by The Rolling Stones, Jimi Hendrix’s first two albums, ‘Live/Dead’ by The Grateful Dead, early Cream, Syd Barrett’s Floyd, but also newer bands like The Temples or Tame Impala, as well as many others.

Do you find yourself to be a perfectionist, in control, or do your ideas lead you, taking on a life of their own?

I think that I’m both. I really want to be satisfied with the final version of the songs, but in the meantime, I like unexpected things, like in ‘Big Trees’ and ‘Open Skies’, the whale guitar sound that I used, was initially a backwards guitar phrase that I cut and to which I added some phase effects, it was not designed in advance

What are some future plans?

My main plan is to write another album as soon as I can, and my idea is to make it as psychedelic as can be … still a long road until reaching the final destination.

How important is improvisation for you?

It is ESSENTIAL! Although my repertoire is divided in two kinds of songs – the more pop oriented, that are very structured, – and the more open ones, which are always different on stage. René Stock on bass and Marcus Weymaere on drums, are real improvisers too, so we tend to develop a deep connection between the three of us on stage in order to improvise together.

Would you please speak to your guitars and the effects pedals you employ?

I’m a Gibson freak, this was the brand that impressed me the most when I was a kid. I mainly play on SG’s these days, and I have two special ones – one painted by a friend in a very psych way and one copy of Clapton’s The Fool which is so nicely done, very colourful! I’m playing on a Marshall JVM 410C which is a very versatile amp, with 4 different stages (clean, crunch and two leads, each with their own tube settings).

About my pedal boards now, I have two of them which are linked. For lead sounds, I mainly use two Xotic pedals, one BB Preamp and on Soul Driver. I have an old MXR Phase 90 that I really dig, and for the Fuzz sound, I use an Earthquaker. On the other pedal board, I use a TC Helicon Harmony Singer to make vocal harmonies, one Line 6 for Tremolo, Uni-Vibe et cetera, one JammanLooper and one Electro-Harmonix Super Ego plus for weird effects.

Let’s end this interview with some of your favourite albums. Have you found something new lately you would like to recommend to our readers?

There are so many different kinds of music that I like, that goes from Baroque Lute Music to Velvet Underground. The bands from last decade that I really dug were The Temples, Tame Impala and All Them Witches … among others.