Flying Nuns, a shoegaze/dreampop trio from Brittany, France, have returned in 2024 after nearly two decades away, reissuing early demos and working on a new EP for late 2025.
Formed in 1990 by sisters Nathalie (vocals, guitar) and Isabelle (guitar), along with Frank (bass, programming), the band took shape after a formative Lush and Pale Saints gig in Rennes. “That was the trigger,” said Isabelle. “We wanted to be like them.”
Their early phase, marked by noisy pop and lo-fi experimentation, led to the Parade demo in 1992 and a small but prolific discography until 2006. The band never fully disappeared—recording quietly, distributing CD-Rs with Nathalie’s abstract paintings as covers, and building a catalogue of 50–60 songs.
The reformation brings subtle shifts. “I didn’t want to play the old songs anymore,” Nathalie said. “The lyrics weren’t right anymore. I wanted something more mature, in tune with what we listen to today.” That includes DIIV, Blushing, and New Candys. Their process is still collaborative but more deliberate, shaped by time and distance. “We rehearse once a month,” Isabelle noted, “then listen back at home to shape the structure.”
They’ve recorded Tempérance, with lyrics written by a friend. “It’s very Flying Nuns,” Frank said. “We haven’t strayed far from what we were doing before.” Their upcoming EP will include five new songs and a cover, and possibly one or two live shows. OVVK Archives, run by Jimmy Arfosea (ex-Les Autres), has reissued their first demos, reconnecting Flying Nuns with the shoegaze scene they emerged from.
For now, it’s a quiet return, rooted in the same hazy textures—but with sharper tools and clearer purpose. Check out the full interview with the band below.
Hello Flying Nuns, who are you? What are your respective roles?
Nathalie: singer and guitarist.
Isabelle: guitarist.
Frank: bassist and programming, synths.
When and how did you decide to form the band?
Isabelle: Nathalie and I are sisters, and we met Frank in 1986. We quickly started listening to music together, and then one day we went to a concert by Lush and Pale Saints. That was the trigger; we wanted to be like them. That’s when we bought the guitars.
Frank: Yes, a few weeks or months after that concert in March 1990 in Rennes at the Ubu. We started the band under a first name that didn’t last long, and then we came up with Flying Nuns quickly.
Were you already musicians?
Isabelle: Frank, no; Nathalie and I, yes. We had done a few years of classical piano training. What we wanted was to play and compose our own music; we didn’t want to do covers. We all started at about the same time.
What were your influences or sources of inspiration at the time?
Frank: Lush, obviously, Pale Saints, Slowdive, My Bloody Valentine…
Isabelle: Ride, The Cure a little, Cocteau Twins
Frank: Exactly, Cocteau Twins for the vocals… we listened to those bands a lot… and we still do!
How has the band evolved since 1990?
Frank: For a year and a half, we learned how to use our instruments and bought some effects pedals. At first, we had nothing, then we got a flanger pedal that we took turns using, and then we bought a delay pedal, an overdrive, and then a phaser. We tried to gradually master them and recorded on Isabelle’s cassette recorder. In June 1991, we played our first Fête de la Musique in Rennes, where we performed 10-11 songs. We’d had our instruments for a year. Then, in 1992, we recorded our first demo, Parade.
You continued until 2006, with a style that evolved…
Isabelle: The whole first part, until 1996, was very noisy pop. There were a lot of bands in Rennes playing that style that we played with or were in contact with. After that, we saw each other less and there were fewer bands like that.
Frank: Pop music had evolved, we were listening to Portishead, Massive Attack… so we decided to try and make rhythms like that. Nathalie wanted her voice to be heard more, and Isabelle was finishing her studies, so we rehearsed less. We did quite a few things as a duo with Nathalie, more experimental stuff, in our living room in Paris, and then when Isabelle came to see us, we collaborated a bit more. But we really did something together again in 2000 with the recording of the 4-track cassette Bulles. Isabelle had composed most of the tracks and we said to ourselves, ‘Come on, let’s do it again.’ In 2002, we released Lovesongs. We continued like that until 2006 with The Lady in Black, 10 tracks, on which Isabelle sings.
Isabelle: It became more confidential from 2000 onwards because we weren’t doing any more concerts. We did it for ourselves, in the studio, without ever playing live.
Frank: We burned 10-15-20 CDs with covers inspired by Nathalie’s paintings, which is what we liked, and we distributed them to our friends and family. In the end, we must have written 50-60 songs.
After an 18-year hiatus, you reformed the band in 2024. Is it still the same band with the same desires, the same musical inspirations?
Nathalie: I quickly realised that I didn’t want to play the old songs anymore because the lyrics were from another time, we were younger, the lyrics weren’t right anymore, neither were the rhythms. I wanted something more mature and in tune with what we listen to today. New bands like Blushing, New Candys, DIIV… I also wanted to progress in the use of guitars and pedals.
Frank: It’s a continuation of what we listened to between 1990-95, but with a more contemporary sound… And we’ve added a synthesiser and a drummer – Isabelle’s children, Pierre and Ysaline, who are musicians and who motivated us to start again.
Isabelle: So now we have a real drum kit, whereas before we had a drum machine. It changes the sound but not the way we compose, because we still work with the drum machine in the writing phase.
So, what is your creative process when it comes to music?
Frank: Often, it’s Isabelle who brings in the notes, we listen to them, just played on an acoustic guitar, without drums, and we say to ourselves: ‘Ah yes, that could be a verse, that could be a chorus’, ‘Do it again but reverse that chord’. We build the song very quickly, we dissect it also quickly, saying to ourselves, ‘This will be the verse, this will be the chorus, this will be sung, this will be instrumental, there will be a bridge, etc.’ This phase comes right from the start. In general, I come up with the vocal melodies. I have Nathalie’s voice in my head, which starts to take shape, and then, in an hour or two, we have the beginnings of a song. More recently, for Tempérance, it was Nathalie who came up with the melody ideas.
Nathalie: For Vegvisir, the process was different, more improvised. We were looking for a mood, something atmospheric, effects on the length, not too much tempo, and we were like in a trance… we didn’t have a structure, and it happened naturally… I’d like us to work more like that.
Isabelle: It’s more complicated because we don’t see each other as much to play, we only rehearse about once a month, so we record the rehearsals and then listen to them at home to come up with ideas for the structure. For example, Hey was started in July 2024 and we’ve just finalised the structure, 8-9 months later. It has changed almost completely since the beginning: we changed the tempo, added drums, modified the guitars, the vocals… we changed the key. We love it in the end because it’s fluid and suits us better.
Nathalie: Tempérance too, I looked for other chords using a capo, which allowed us to explore chords we hadn’t used before. I also did a masterclass on effects pedals with Totorro‘s guitarist, which gave me ideas on how to use the pedals or sequences and settings better. The work is more refined, more technical, and you can feel it.
You’ve composed 5-6 new songs. Can you tell us about the music and lyrics?
Frank: The new song we just recorded is called Tempérance. It’s very Flying Nuns, in our style. We haven’t strayed far from what we were doing before. We’re lucky that Nathalie has kept her voice intact. For now, we haven’t written much in terms of lyrics…
Isabelle: The lyrics were written by a friend who writes for us. Curiously, the lyrics fit the music perfectly. It’s funny to see that we were able to adapt them almost without changing a word.
Is there a link between the music and the visual on the album covers?
Nathalie: At one point, I was painting, using acrylics and mixed media, and it was quite abstract, with splashes and movements, and Frank used it for the album covers. Some songs may have been influenced by certain paintings.
Frank: Yes, the lyrics could be inspired by the visuals. I always wrote things that were quite vague and abstract, just like Nathalie’s paintings. They were like poems. They were written more for the sound of the words than the meaning. I even wrote a song called Les Non-mots sens (Non-words sense) to stay in the abstract, both in the lyrics and the visuals.
What are your next steps and projects for 2025?
Isabelle: We’ve started six songs (five compositions and one cover), none of which are finished yet, and we’d like to go back into the studio and record them to release a mini album. We’d like to continue recording them all five of us, if possible, and then do one or two concerts.
Can you tell us about the local alternative scene?
Frank: In 1990-91, we were inspired by the Rennes band Les Autres, whom we saw at the Fête de la Musique.
They got to know us through a compilation cassette and asked us to be the opening act for their concert. We didn’t see them much after that, but for the past year we’ve been in contact with a former member of the band, Jimmy Arfosea. We found out that two members of the band are still making music: Olivier Doreille with Megrim and Jimmy, who has several bands including An Ocean of Embers and Extreme Shoegaze.
Isabelle: Jimmy also has a label, OVVK Archives, which releases archives of French shoegaze bands from the 90s. He has also released our first three demos in recent months, Parade, Métronome and Technicolor. And he continues to release new material on the Ovvk Recordings label. But it’s true that there are few local bands in our style, it remains confidential.
Five musical recommendations to finish?
Mogwai, the latest DIIV, the latest Slowdive, Pills for Tomorrow, New Candys, Miki Berenyi trio, and then Kristin Hersch.
