Fabio Gragori & Antoine Pichou are IN ANIMA, the Lyon based duo that have been making waves with their emotional techno offerings. Having come to the attention of Nicole Moudaber in 2019, who released their ‘Maelström’ collaboration with Camille Luciani on her MOOD imprint; it was the tumultuous last twelve months that really established the act in the electronic sphere.

Whilst many have struggled for inspiration, In Anima crafted and released two of their finest tracks to date. Both as part of strong compilations for Afterlife and Siamese. Hard to top perhaps, but 2021 does just that as In Anima unveil ‘XXY’ on the label of Fideles, IMPRESSUM.

We caught up with Fabio & Antoine to discuss a crazy few months, and find out what the future has in store…

WWD: Fabio & Antoine, thanks for speaking to us today. We’ve had a nice and concise introduction to In Anima, but for that personal touch can you give us your own introduction?

Hello everyone, so basically we are two french kids messing around their studio (laugh). No more seriously, we are childhood friends. We met each other 20 years ago. Still don’t know how we keep getting on so well with each other (laugh). We used to listen to a lot of music after school and during the weekend. Of course we started to dig into electronic music quite early and it was a real blast! Like a magical world.

The electronic scene in the 90’s was really wide, and it gave us so much inspiration. We knew that we wanted to get into this world. We started jamming on some turntables, trying to feel our way and learn the technical skills. It was just an amazing time … except for our parents… No just kidding, we could not have dreamed of a better lifestyle. We are so grateful for what our parents gave us. Like the chance to get some gear, and obviously their musical education during our childhood. From disco to punk rock, without forgetting others styles like funk, they gave us everything.

We realised that music is and will be forever an important part of our life. That’s why we created our duo «In Anima». The project came naturally and today we would not be able to live without. It’s a long evolving and shared musical vision that, for us, feels very unique.

WWD: It’s been an incredibly tough 12months for the industry… How have you remained productive during this time?

This situation is pretty unique. But we focused, as we always do, on the music, trying to mature our project. We spent a lot of time in our studio, producing, but also listening to a lot of music. We also started working on our live act. This project is really important for us as we feel we’ll unveil our real personality with it. It’s kind of exciting.

WWD: On the music front 2020 was a groundbreaking year for In Anima, with ‘Last Call’ featuring on Afterlife’s ‘Unity’ compilation and the year ending with ‘My Moon’ included in Siamese’s Anthology III. Could you have hoped for two better homes for those tracks?

We are really happy with those two releases. It seems that both tracks were well received by the audience, actually we really felt happy with all those positive feedbacks. And of course honoured that Tale Of Us and Adriatique gave us those opportunities. It was a good and natural step in our project.

WWD: You’re based in Lyon, France. How healthy was the local scene pre-covid and what are your hopes for things when we return to normality?

Actually we haven’t played so much locally and we’re forever locked in the studio. Obviously we hope this will change (laugh). No seriously, we know that the local scene is really cool with some good events and programming. Concerning the future, we hope we will be able to dance together soon ! In fact we should have played in Paris, London, Tulum, .. without this crisis. So, as you can imagine, we are ready to smash everything (laugh).

WWD: How’s the dynamic when working in the studio together? Do you take on tasks individually, each specialise in certain skills, or work as a team on everything?

We spend a lot of time alone, and together, in the studio and we think that is a good way of working. It is actually improving our creativity a lot. But finally all the ideas that become real tracks are fully developed together. We don’t love the idea to share the work, it’s unnatural and feel really sad actually. We need to touch everything, even if it’s just a knob (laugh). In fact we jam a lot in the studio until we find a general idea, then we develop it. And development can’t be achieved if we are not together. It’s a much needed team work.

WWD: Is there anything on the production front that you’re keen to explore or work on perfecting over the coming months?

We will continue to work hard in the studio, in order to produce the tracks that will be in our live set. We want to take the time to develop the idea until we are fully satisfied and proud. We feel that we are close to what we want, but we still need a lot of work. This show is so important to us, it will be the first connection with the public. We’d love to get our hands on some new hardware. We spent all our recent money on our sound card and monitors (laugh). We still have some Roland and Korg gear that sounds really good. Those are quite nice for jamming, this is just pure fun.

WWD: Now 2021 kicks off with your excellent ‘XXY’ EP on IMPRESSUM. Tell a little about the tracks and how you came to sign it with the label?

Thank you for your kind words. Yes, we feel happy about this release. On the first hand we can say that having a solo EP was important to us, it’s easier to unveil our personalities and we feel closer to the public. Obviously after our two compilation tracks it was needed. On the other hand we are proud to share those two tracks. XXY was one of our most awaited tracks so it feels really good to finally share it. Moonwalker is more personal. I think it was one of the tracks that was most fun to produce. We enjoyed it so much in the studio. And as we said, it sounds really personal, reflecting a lot about our personalities and our direction …

WWD: Looking into our Crystal Ball of Positivity… What does the rest of the year hold for In Anima?

Good question … we do have a remix that will see the light this year and hopefully one EP/single coming too. And we can’t wait to share it with all of you.