Zombie Zombie

Synths, drums and horror films

Zombie Zombie are Etienne Jaumet on synthesizers and saxophone and Cosmic Neman on drums and voice. Neman had been the drummer of Herman Dune and Jaumet the saxophonist of the Married Monk; the two met around the Mains d'oeuvres studio in Saint-Ouen and formed the duo in 2006. French Wikipedia says the name comes from horror films and a Fela Kuti track, while a 2022 Electronic Sound piece points to the 1984 ZX Spectrum game; the two accounts are unreconciled. Doc Schonberg has joined them as a second drummer and percussionist live since about 2012.

A self-titled EP appeared on Boomboomtchak in 2006, after which they signed to the Paris-London label Versatile and toured the UK. The 12 inch "Driving This Road Until Death Sets You Free" followed in 2007 and the album A Land for Renegades in 2008. Zombie Zombie Plays John Carpenter (2010) and Rituels d'un nouveau monde (2012) were produced by Joakim, Livity came in 2017, and Vae Vobis (2022) and Funk Kraut (2025) are on Born Bad Records; the painter Philippe Druillet drew the covers of Livity and Vae Vobis. Electronic Sound called Vae Vobis a reverberated doom orgy.

They have scored films and played them live as ciné-concerts: Battleship Potemkin for the Cité de la Musique (commissioned late 2009), a tug boat in Jersey Harbour in September 2010, Alan Howarth's Carpenter material at the Fondation Cartier in May 2011, and short films by Jean Painlevé at the Louvre in May 2014. Their cited influences include John Carpenter, Igor Wakhevitch, Harald Grosskopf, Richard Pinhas, Pierre Henry, Sun Ra and Fela Kuti. Their first US tour opened at Austin Psych Fest in 2014; Neman called it a very exciting time for them.