Cassius is a French music production duo, consisting of producers Philippe Cerboneschi and Hubert Blanc-Francart, better known as Philippe Zdar and Boom Bass. These guys started out in production behind MC Solaar on his second album "Nouveau Western" (1993), sampling Serge Gainsbourg and Bridget Bardot's classic 'Bonnie and Clyde'
In 1994 they named themselves "La Funk Mob" releasing singles on Source Records which was the French mirror to the early UK Ninja Tune sound:
"Motorbass Gets Phunked Up"
Their first album in 1995 was a collaboration with DJ Cam, and Bob Sinclar in his downtempo guise of 'The Mighty Bop'. They also did some awesome remix work...remember this dope track?
"Bomb the Bass - Bug Powder Dust (La Funk Mob Remix)"
In 1999, the duo began creating house music and changed their moniker to Cassius. They released '1999', a house album in the vein of Daft Punk and helping to define the French sound of the early '00's.
'1999'
'Feeling for You'
Their biggest hit came in 2007 with 'Toop Toop' a guitar rock crossover track featured on their album '15 Again':
Here's the thing that makes these guys particularly interesting. In 2009, Philippe Zdar, recorded and produced the fourth studio album for French rockers Phoenix, "Wolfgang Amadeus Phoenix". This album went gold in the US, Australia, and Canada, and won the Grammy for Best Alternative Album. Lead single '1901' was featured on Mixtape 7:
Cassius is still at it, releasing 'The Rawkers EP' in 2010. 'Brotherhood' came up on the shuffle the other day, inspiring this lengthy post about these guys, and reminding me of all my brothers with whom I used to shake it up back in the day! Pump it up!
