Kevin Bronson on December 12th, 2018

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Red Soul X is the new project from Jules de Gasperis, the Paris-reared songwriter, multi-instrumentalist and producer who has played with the likes of James Supercave, Pompeya, Moon Honey, Low Hum, Jane Machine and Grand Bain. Work has come slowly on his mystical psychedelic rock, in between gigging and studio sessions, and this week he unveils Red Soul X’s debut single, “In the Morning Sun.”

Like many emigrants to the Southland, de Gasperis found inspiration in the vastness of the California desert. “I was in Landers in 2017 and one day I woke up very early, with vivid images coming from dreams and chords stuck in my head,” he says. “So I grabbed my guitar, trying to not wake up my girlfriend, and sat outside, in front of what happened to be a magnificent sunrise. The whole scene was immersed in a pinkish light that was so eerie. It’s one of these songs where everything came so suddenly — vocal melody, chords, lyrics — it all came together in a flash then. I was just looking at the giant sun and trying to decipher what the universe was telling me to do.”

The desert was speaking to him — the challenge was for de Gasperis to talk back. “English is not my native tongue, so lyrically I often go for some kind of automatic writing. Words often come to me in a pretty surreal way,” he says. “I actually find [English] to be much more musical than French, so it’s really fun to write in a language that’s not your first one. It makes you think in a different way.

The end result is a 3 1/2-minute musical mirage with wobbly synths and pleading vocals that sounds like an Electric Light Orchestra song refracted by the heat waves of the Mojave Desert. It’s a wonderfully cinematic introduction to Red Soul X’s vision quest.

||| Stream: “In the Morning Sun”