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Hélène and Célia Faussart, who sing as Les Nubians, proved their Afro-French pop worthy at Somerville Theatre last Friday night. Supported by only a four-piece band and two back-up singers, they delivered a sweetly melodic, softly funky, jazz-fusion-flavored performance that had the sound of something distinctly foreign and exotic. They brought no pyro, no laser-light show, no video-cam projections, no smoke and mirrors — nothing but music. And yet they kept the crowd — a full house — enraptured. And why not? The Faussart sisters, who grew up in Bordeaux, home to France’s leading rock band, Noir Désir, have found a way to combine variété — a uniquely French style of pop music — with the rhythms and grooves of hip-hop, which has been adapted in equally unique ways by French artists over the past decade and a half. Add to that the incandescent fluidity of the their harmonies, which transcend any language barrier, and there’s no need for an extravagant stage setting. Touring in support of One Step Forward (Virgin), their second CD, Les Nubians were greeted by a young-adult audience that, to judge from its response, is attracted to the soul and disco decades in which Afropop first made its mark. Some of the Faussarts’ themes and vocal stylings brought Sade to mind; they even did a sensuous cover of Sade’s "The Sweetest Touch." Some of their soft funk recalls the O’Jays’ mid-’70s disco hit "I Love Music." At the same time, the swing of the rhythms in "Temperature Rising" owed much to the intricacies of Senegalese mbalax, one of the most dramatic pop idioms in the world. The crowd had no trouble with the French-language pop of "Amour à mort," a sensual ballad with multi-layered harmonies and a difficult (but suavely murmuring) rhythm, or "Que le mot soit perle," a lilting, jazzy, Brazilian-tinged tune. The Faussarts did offer visual flash in the form of their colorful costumes and brightly painted faces. And they invited two local poets to join them on stage to recite verse to the accompaniment of keyboard and guitar. The audience reached out to shake the poets’ hands and also to touch the Faussarts. The only disappointment came when the show ended without an encore. Back in 1998, when Les Nubians concluded a Paradise show with no encore, they lacked fire, presence, and direction; no encore was necessary. This time, they had all of that and more — enough to justify at least one additional song.
BY MICHAEL FREEDBERG
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