Time Out New York 1/25/2008 "Brooklyn’s Les Sans Culottes have taken the whole faux-French-band thing pretty far—the group’s live shows are superenergetic, fake-multicultural events. You might not learn anything about French culcha, but you’ll probably hop around like a lunatic."
	Boston Now 8/23/2007 Many questions arise when you get into the musical world of the band Les Sans Culottes. Are they French? Then why are they from Brooklyn? Are they really singing in French, or are they making it up as they go along? And why was it so hard not to dance when I hear them play? Founding member Clermont Ferrand, who goes by his real, more Anglicized name, Bill Carney, when he's not on stage, cares only about the last question when it comes to explaining his band. "I was visiting friends in Paris, and they turned me on to all this great pop music, and I became obsessed with it. I knew it was something I wanted to create myself," Carney said. "When I got back to Brooklyn, I started putting together a band, but it took awhile to find people who were as passionate about French pop music as I was." Since forming nine years ago, Les Sans Culottes has gone through several different lineups and put out five CDs of the kind of French pop music Carney fell in love with way back when. As to whether he's worried if people "get it" after all these years, Carney just sighed in a very French sort of way. "I think people who come see the show enjoy the music we make and the energy we bring to it," he said. "It's not about understanding everything we say. Some of my favorite bands, like The Clash and Led Zeppelin, can't be understood all the time, and they sing in English."
	The New Yorker July 31, 2007 "The Brooklyn ensemble Les Sans Culottes play raunchy faux-French rock and roll that's both a sendup of and a tribute to the dark tunes of late-period Serge Gainsbourg and punchy ye-ye girl pop."
	The New York Times by Jon Pareles January 26, 2007 "The giddy, light-headed charm of the 1960's French rock known as ye-ye is concept enough for Les Sans Culottes, a Brooklyn band that revives the style...fuzz-toned guitars, electric organ, cooing female voices and know-it-all male growls. All Les Sans Culottes had to do is bring back the psychedelic-patterned clothes, come up with stage names like Kit Kat le Noir and add some extra Franglais to savor the music's loony essence."
	LA Times - Buzz Bands by Kevin Bronson 4/4/2007 And You Said French 101 Was Worthless I'm willing to bet that Clermont Ferrand, lead singer and founder of Brooklyn-based French 60s Pop outfit Les Sans Culottes, is pretty thankful that he paid attention during French 101, while the rest of his peers at the Rhode Island School of Design tried to shake off their box wine hangovers. Indeed the Detroit-raised Ferrand isn't really French; nor are the majority of the Brooklyn-based band. But listening to their sixth record, the upcoming Vibratone Records release "Le Weekender", you'd never know the difference, as the record's 13 tracks are all breezy, lighthearted and fun French pop descended from Gallic legends Jacques Dutronc and Serge Gainsbourg (with a dash of The Kinks thrown in). Writing all the songs originally in French, Ferrand admits to the challenges inherent in writing lyrics in a foreign language, but taking his inspiration from the aforementioned greats and French poets like Rimbaud and Baudelaire, Ferrand sounds as authentic as any man born in the Motor City could ever hope to be. Slated to rock Spaceland tonight supported by Donita Sparks, formerly of L7, be sure to smuggle in your favorite bottle of good French wine. And if you miss them tonight, you can catch Les Sans Culottes this Saturday at the Bordello in Little Tokyo. According to Clermont, it's a 60s-themed party and you can expect some tres cool covers.
	Flavor Pill, San Francisco 4/2007 "Much like our own Persephone's Bees, Brooklyn's Les San Culottes (that's French for "going commando") glean their inspiration from saucy '60s French pop stars like Serge Gainsbourg, Jacques Dutronc, and Jacques Brel. Three cabaret vocalists — Clermont Ferrand, Kit Kat le Noir, and Celine Dijon — preen and croon in French to a raucous garage band, creating a zany party energy surpassing anything experienced in the Love Shack. Openers CarneyBall Johnson — featuring multi-instrumentalist and beloved Bay Area eccentric Ralph Carney (who also plays horns for Tom Waits) — warm up the crowds with their delightfully silly soup of psych pop, blues, hillbilly folk, avant-garde jazz, and world music. (LH) "
	LA Weekly Music, Los Angeles 4/5/2007 "Quel fromage! Named for the “ill-clad and ill-equipped volunteers of the French Revolutionary army,” Les Sans Culottes (meaning “without underpants”) take on the ’60s French pop sound of Serge Gainsbourg and add arrangements à la the 5th Dimension to ridiculously groovy effect. They have names like Kit Kat Le Noir, Edith Pissoff, Theo Neugent, Johnny Dieppe, Françoise Hardly, Jean L’Effete and Max Gauche, and you can expect to have your Gainsbourg thoroughly Serged. "
	MetroMix, Lehigh Valley Keeping it Faux 2/28/2008 Excerpt: When I tried searching for blog posts about Les Sans Culottes, I kept running across French blogs about Britney Spears—I guess because “sans culottes” literally means “without underpants,” right? That’s right—so yeah, she’s one of the most famous American “sans culottes” stylers. I wonder if the release of “Le Weekender” last year was in any way responsible for that. I would like to think it was. I don’t want to take responsibility for any of the other things that have happened to [Britney], because it’s been kind of tragic, but the lack of underpants I’d like to take full credit for. Read More
	Deli Magazine CD Review Click on image for review
	The Washington Post By Christina Tkacik May 14, 2007 LSC INTERVIEW At first, audiences think Les Sans Culottes really are French. They sing in French, after all. They wear go-go boots and sunglasses, just like real French pop stars might, if they were a bit on the nutty side. And then jaded music critics think Les Sans Culottes are a group of Rhode Island School of Design grads who decided to form a progressive-rock fake French band, probably to be ironic, or something. Bill Carney is behind both lies. By day, Carney is a legal aid attorney, defending poor people who are accused of crimes. But by night -- at least on the weekends -- he is Clermont Ferrand of Les Sans Culottes. I met with the pathological Frenchman and his fellow lead vocalist Kit Kat Le Noir, whose real name is Audrey Kellar, in their current home of Brooklyn to discuss "Le Weekender," the group's first new album in three years. When she's not wearing go-go boots and singing in French, Kellar is a graphic designer, and yes, she went to art school, but it wasn't RISD, contrary to what you may have read in Rolling Stone. But all the lies are in the name of supremely good fun. "Sometimes people are very suspicious at the beginning," says Kellar. "But by the end of the show, they're into it. We've had very few bad shows." Carney adds that, despite the band members personas, "I'm not sure our performance is really French -- it's really rockin'." The idea for a fake French band first came to Carney on a visit to Paris when his friends forced him to listen to music by Serge Gainsbourg and other famous French pop stars from the 1960s. After some initial skepticism, Carney was hooked by the combination of pop and intellectualism. As a lyricist, Carney is as comfortable dropping Balzac references as he is with poop jokes, using French idioms, wordplay and cognates to write quirky and clever lyrics that can work in either language. "I'm a Francophile," admits Carney, who was raised in Detroit, a city where people have a difficult time understanding his Gallic vocations. "Detroit's such a gritty city, so it doesn't seem very Detroit to be a Francophile." But Detroit has French roots (pronounce it -- 'Day-twah'). "It's currently under a brutal American occupation." When he came back to New York, near the end of the grunge era, he assembled a group of musicians ready and willing to relive the ye-ye years. So was everyone else in the band a Francophile? Do they sit around eating Nutella and watching Godard films? "God, no," Kellar responds. "I'm a goth girl from Jersey." She grew up listening to the Pretenders, Siouxsie and the Banshees -- "dark, moody stuff." Carney loved the Clash and the Sex Pistols. Those bands, like Les Sans Culottes, were as much about style and persona as the music itself. There was a time when the future seemed uncertain for Les Sans Culottes. For the past several years they have seen members come and go, suffered through creative differences and even a federal court battle over the name rights. "We've had more lineups than Italy's had governments," says Carney. He and Kellar are the only remaining original members of Les Sans Culottes; the other six are relatively new. But with their first new album in three years, "Le Weekender," things are back to normal. The title, Carney explains, refers to the French nickname for a Cialis or Viagra pill, whose effects can last 36 hours. As for Carney's own "weekenders," he says that being in a fake French band helps him to maintain a mental balance against the stresses of work. Kellar, a graphic designer, agrees. "I can't imagine not having this." --Christina Tkacik (June 2007)
	The New York Sun By BRUCE BENNETT May 14, 2007 Without Limits, Or Pants A few songs into Les Sans Culottes' set Friday night at Magnetic Field in Brooklyn, Clermont Ferrand, the group's lead singer and ostensible mastermind, ran down the titles of the tunes his band had just done, FM radio DJstyle. "The song before zat was ‘Merci Beaucoup,' which is French," he deadpanned in a cartoon accent that embodied the disinterested shrug and half-patient condescension at the heart of any parody of l'attitude Française. "It means thanks a lot."Over the last nine years, Les Sans Culottes have employed this kind of arch Franco-American drollery on six full-length albums. While Mr. Ferrand and company do a credible and witty burlesque of such 1960s French pop stars as Jacques Dutronc and "ye-ye girl" vocalists Sylvie Vartan and François Hardy, they're neither a cabaret act nor a purely retro band.Unlike April March, a similarly pseudonymous American performer romancing the Bardot-era beat, Les Sans Culottes' records are equal parts vintage American guitar crunch and Parisian miniskirt fizz. The band's new album "Le Weekender," which was released last week by Vibratone Records, taps one go-go-booted foot in a Parisian café and digs the other converse high-topped foot into the gum-soiled carpet of a New York bar backroom stage.The technical perils that any stylistically rearward-glancing band face in a modern recording studio are more insidious in the digital age than ever. While the songs on "Le Weekender" are smart unions of funny, French-English-rhyming-dictionary lyrical conceits and polished singing and playing in the semi-self-parodying New York Dolls mold, the record itself errs on the side of the tidy.Live at Magnetic Field, however, the seven-piece group — with Mr. Ferrand and co-vocalists Kit Kat le Noir and Edith Pissoff up front, keyboardist Johnny Dieppe, guitarists Theo Neugent and Jean l'Effete, bassist Francois Hardly, and drummer Max Gauche — brilliantly brought down their semi-high-concept act to a lower and grimier level. Crammed onto Magnetic Field's small stage, Les Sans Culottes performed with a ragged expertise that had less to do with delivering bilingual puns and self-conscious showmanship than with bashing out a dozen or so songs with the same timeless controlled abandon that's allowed the rock 'n' roll craze to outlive Calypso and Skiffle.Set highlights were many and varied. During "Les Monstres du Ca" ("Monsters From the Id") and "Les Yeux Grands Sauvent la Monde" ("Big Eyes Save the World"), Messrs. Neugent and Dieppe floated psychedelic, single-string droning notes in among the power chords. Mr. Neugent's feedback solo on " Francois Noir" (you guessed it — " Frank Black") was an appropriate tribute within a tribute to the Pixies frontman for whom the song is named. Mr. Ferrand, Ms. Le Noir, and Ms. Pissoff divided their vocal chores with effortless aplomb and without any of the inertia-inducing changes in onstage energy and focus common to latter-day multivocalist rock bands. Ms. Pissoff appeared close to an inadvertent mid-song explosion of laughter here and there, which was endearing and appropriate considering the lyrical content and between-song patter. Mr. Dieppe's keyboard stylings admirably toed the line between adding texture and dominating sonically. Ms. Hardly and Mr. Gauche, in plunging neckline and vest sans shirt, respectively, shared the gold medal for mixed-gender cleavage. They also formed a rhythm section of such rock-solid, unified ferocity that on songs like "Allo Allo" (from 2004's "Fixation Orale"), it was tempting to speculate that they might be siblings, spouses, or both. On record, Les Sans Culottes favorably compare to Boston's wigwearing patrician AC/DC parody, the Upper Crust, and at times even the pre-fab four themselves, the Rutles, the patron saints of parody bands. But on Friday night, as it purposefully and expertly mangled a French lyric version of Nancy Sinatra's yeh-yeh favorite "These Boots Are Made for Walking," the band evoked the Supersnazz-era heyday of the Flamin' Groovies, San Francisco's 100% pretensionfree keepers of the down-and-dirty rock flame in the pre-punk '70s.
	Baby Sue March 2007 Les Sans Culottes - Le Weekender (CD, Vibratone, Pop) This band is best known for the fact that they are an American band that sings in French. Because of their humorous approach to music, many may mistake Les Sans Culottes as a joke band or a novelty act. But nothing could be further from the truth. Actually and in fact, listening to the band's music...they sound very much like an authentic modern French pop band. And the best part...is that there is meat beneath the surface. Le Weekender presents more of the upbeat, catchy pop tunes that the band is known for. After two or three songs spin past, you begin to realize that it doesn't really matter what language you're using...as long as the intent is right and the music is good. We've been impressed with everything we have yet to hear from these folks...and Le Weekender is yet another bull's eye to add to the list. Thirteen show stoppers including "Merci Beaucoup," "Les Enfants Terribles," and "Medications Dans Une Crise." Simultaneously funny and genuinely entertaining. (Rating: 5+)
	Collected Sounds by Amy Lotsberg 4/13/2007 Le Weekender by Les Sans Culottes My first thought on hearing this band was "party music...eh". But as I always do, I gave it several listens and I will say it's growing on me. Since they were mentioned in Defamer (one of the funniest celebrity blogs ever) I'm guessing they're more popular than I thought. They kind of struck me as one of those bands that people seem to take to right now, lots of members, lots of stuff going on on stage, best seen live. Only these guys have something the rest don't....they sing in French! Read More...
	AM New York 1/26/2007 Although their fauxs-French accents and actual-French lyrics may have you fooled, Brooklyn Group Les Sans Culottes, which means "without pants" and is a reference to a faction from the French Revolution, are not actually French. "We thought it was more interesting for Americans to be singing in French than French people," said singer Bill Carney, who goes by the name Clermont Ferrand for the purpose of the band. "Apparently a lot of French people agree because most French bands sing in English. It seemed only fair that we return the favor." He also noted that the band has yet to play a show in France, though they have amused the natives in French Canada. While the band's premise may be slightly contrived, Les Sans Culottes is not a fake band. Formed in 1998, the group has released five albums and recently finished recording a new one, "Le Weekender." "Our goals for this record were to continue our trademark LSC sound (part Serge Gainsbourg French pop, part Kinks, part 1960s girl group)," Carney said. "But in this case [make it] a bit more rocking and perhaps more diverse than some previous efforts. It's always a challenge learning and pronouncing the lyrics since none of us are truly fluent in French and the songs were fairly new." Besides being curious about the group's nationality, Carney noted that there is one other question many fans pose to the band at every show. "People are often wondering since we are 'Sans Culottes' whether we are wearing any underwear," Carney said. "But I am not sure whether or not they should know this."
	Music Snobbery January 27, 2007 Salon de mercure de Les Sans Culottes @ To end the work week, I took in a performance by America's favorite fake French rock outfit, Les Sans Culottes. They tested out some new material from their upcoming album, This Is Where You Put Your Weed. That could be the best title of an album, EVER! If memory serves me right, it might be a reference to a SNL skit from the Farley, Schneider and Spade years. Pour finir la semaine de travail, j'ai rentré une exécution par l'équipement français faux préféré de la roche de l'Amérique, Les Sans Culottes. Ils ont examiné dehors un certain nouveau matériel de leur album prochain, ceci est où vous avez mis votre herbe. C'a pu être le meilleur titre d'un album, JAMAIS ! Si la mémoire me sert la droite, ce pourrait être une référence à un skit de SNL des années de Farley, de Schneider et de cosse. Read More...
	Time Out New York by Mike Wolf 11/9/2005 New York City's number one fake French band, Brooklyn's Les Sans Culottes have taken the whole faux-French-band thing pretty far-the group's live shows are superenergetic, fake-multicultural events. You might not learn anything about French culcha, but you'll probably hop around like a lunatic, just like the terrific backup singers do (and by terrific, yes, we mean hot).
	Rolling Stone Magazine by BENJAMIN FRIEDLAND 7/17/04 It takes a special strand of rock & roll quirk -- or is it lunacy -- to be an American-born band but sing in French. Yet the seven hipsters in Les Sans Culottes ("Those Without Undergarments") may just pull it off -- and, to be fair, one of the group's singers is originally from Paris. The rest, though, hail from the States, all eventually enrolling in the Rhode Island School of Design, where they formed. And on Fixation Orale, their fourth proper album, the Brooklyn-based septet bops through twelve tightly-wound guitar-songs that might otherwise be Kinks-like, if it weren't for all the French. As it is, this sharp pop is ironically inventive and totally fun. Swirling keyboards and airy, toe-tapping rhythms flutter around boy-girl harmonies that discuss "menage a toi"s and ice cream. Sill, though, it's near impossible not to snicker at the band and wonder if they're for real. Perhaps some questions are better left unanswered.
	The Boston Globe by The Globe Staff 5/21/04 In Les Sans Culottes, Francophiles have found their B-52's. Not since singer France Gall pranced her way through "Teenie Weenie Boppie" in the late '60s has French pop sounded so danceable and infectious. And to think such revelry comes from a Brooklyn band whose name, which once referred to 18th-century French revolutionaries, now translates as "Those Without Undergarments." Gall's perkiness, it turns out, enlightens much of the material on "Fixation Orale." Les Sans Culottes even covers her Eurovision hit, "Poupee de Cire." Band members hail from, among other places, Paris and Detroit, and you can tell they've been listening to equal parts Serge Gainsbourg and MC5, especially on the rollicking "Train a Grande Vitesse." The band's fifth release runs the gamut of styles, from sugary-sweet pop to lean garage rock. Ten of the 11 songs are sung in French, with one in French and English, and one in Esperanto. "Tout Va Bien" could induce a cavity with its gooey, echoed choruses, and on "Menage a Toi" band leader Clermont Ferrand orders, "Tell your ma/ Tell your pa/ I think we can make a menage a toi." But the cheekiness transcends the songs: The two female singers are named Kit Kat Le Noir and Celine Dijon. Can't you just see the beehives? In Les Sans Culottes, Francophiles have found their B-52's. Not since singer France Gall pranced her way through "Teenie Weenie Boppie" in the late '60s has French pop sounded so danceable and infectious. And to think such revelry comes from a Brooklyn band whose name, which once referred to 18th-century French revolutionaries, now translates as "Those Without Undergarments." Gall's perkiness, it turns out, enlightens much of the material on "Fixation Orale." Les Sans Culottes even covers her Eurovision hit, "Poupee de Cire." Band members hail from, among other places, Paris and Detroit, and you can tell they've been listening to equal parts Serge Gainsbourg and MC5, especially on the rollicking "Train a Grande Vitesse." The band's fifth release runs the gamut of styles, from sugary-sweet pop to lean garage rock. Ten of the 11 songs are sung in French, with one in French and English, and one in Esperanto. "Tout Va Bien" could induce a cavity with its gooey, echoed choruses, and on "Menage a Toi" band leader Clermont Ferrand orders, "Tell your ma/ Tell your pa/ I think we can make a menage a toi." But the cheekiness transcends the songs: The two female singers are named Kit Kat Le Noir and Celine Dijon. Can't you just see the beehives?