Moonhattan by Francesca Lee

"Moonhattan" is a full-length album by Francesca Lee, until now unknown to the general public, recorded and released in 1979 on the independent studio GDM Records.

The history of the creation of the disc dates back to the distant 1975.
A young musician and sound engineer, Thomas Vincento Anderson, was learning with might and main the delights of sound recording and sound processing at home.
His parents never believed in him and considered him a disgrace to the family. He did not live up to their expectations, they always misunderstood him.
In order not to upset his parents at all, Thomas entered and graduated from college with a degree in design.
But he earned his first money exclusively by physical labor - during the day as a friendly cashier at a gas station, at night as a loader and a car washer.
This continued until Tom was 21 years old. Having saved up money for the first decent equipment, Thomas immediately began to improve his professional skills and sound engineering skills.
He built a mini recording studio in the attic of his house and began to take orders from friends, neighbors and just those who found out about the studio and wanted to record something.
In addition to young musicians who did not have enough funds, connections and opportunities, but wanted to try to record some of their own material, people also approached him with a request to record an audio greeting, invitation or postcard.

One day, in 1977, a girl came to his home studio and changed his life in a second. He seemed to wake up and see perfection.
Something that he had never seen or heard before, but always wanted to depict and create. It was young Francesca, she was only 19 years old when they met.
She had long wanted to try her hand at recording. Thomas agreed to record it for free as soon as he saw and heard how she felt about music.
It is impossible to explain in words this chemistry that flared up between them further.

Francesca had an amazing absolute ear for music, she did not have a professional musical education, but she could create and invent beautiful and unique compositions “out of thin air”.
To complete the picture and help in creating music, she just lacked the most important character and assistant in her life - Thomas.
He saw her true beauty. For him, her every movement and look was already felt like music. As Thomas himself said: "Francesca is music."
Lee completely trusted Thomas, she fell in love with him as much as he loved her. They were the first of each other. And the last. During the day, they could walk around the city for hours, go to the cinema, admire the sunrises and sunsets.
Thomas always wrote at night. He always outlined in music everything that happened to him during the day. He always wanted to portray his beloved with sound.
When Francesca woke up, he happily showed her the sketches and told her about new and new ideas, which Lee complemented perfectly.

Francesca came up with the title of the album in a dream. Thomas, as usual, did not sleep at night and heard her muttering something under her breath. He heard this word "Moonhattan". And it was perfect.
Thomas has always associated Francesca with the moon, calling him his companion and inspiration for his work. Also, the two of them dreamed of visiting and seeing a place that they had only seen in movies and on postcards - Manhattan.
He dreamed of climbing with her to the top of the World Trade Center. And then Thomas realized: this is it. He instantly figured out how the record of his life would sound and look.

For two years, Thomas and Francie have been hard at work and writing material. Thomas was a true innovator.
While synthesizers had not yet entered the mass circulation all over the world, Thomas already knew and understood that this was a great invention and would help expand the possibilities of sound recording.
He was helped in this by his old acquaintance, who had been fond of the theory and practice of sound synthesis for many years - James Matthews.

Arrangements and accompaniments Thomas and Francesca searched, wrote and collected, literally bit by bit and fragments. This is similar to the modern concept of "sampling".
Only such a concept did not yet exist in mass circulation, as well as samplers. In the course were all available and not available tools.
The tape was leaking in meters. Lee and Thomas wanted to capture elements of their favorite music and compositions in their music, and many sonic references can be found on the album.

To record drums, Thomas rented an instrument in a city bar, literally for 2 days. During this time, almost all the main drum parts were written and recorded. Some were recorded and mixed separately.
Francesca's father, too, in his youth was eager to become a world-famous musician, but was unsuccessfully disappointed in his dream. Luckily, he provided several of his own guitars, including an electric guitar and a Rhodes Piano, which he continued to play for himself at home.
And on which Francesca learned to play. Francesca's friend Angela Sonetti was invited to perform and record saxophone parts.
Parts of wind instruments such as the clarinet were performed by the trio of brothers Go Go from Italy, who moved there from Tom's hometown and with whom he was familiar before.
They also agreed to complement the material with beautiful violins and other orchestral instruments.
As for the vocals, there are practically none on the album. Thomas believed that "there are already too many voices in music that they even forgot about the music itself."
Francesca performed almost all the vocalizations and affectionate (frankly, erotic) whispering in the songs. Thomas' girlfriend, Monica Lafferty, who was also a designer from the college where Thomas studied, was additionally invited to record.
This is exactly what they wanted - the voice, as it were, accompanies you sometimes inside the music, some kind of modern ASMR. In other words, this is how Thomas saw and heard Francesca herself - hot and sexy, like the music that conveys this feeling.

Sleepless nights, long and painstaking work on mixing and processing arrangements led Francesca and Thomas to the long-awaited result.
When they finished mixing and arranging, they wanted the mastering to be done with another, third person, who also feels and sees through the amazing warm sound.
For the final result and the final version of the mastering of the record, Thomas and Francesca flew to Japan, where Makato Minoru, a sound engineer and mastering engineer, whom Thomas had met a couple of years earlier in France, lived and worked.
The flight cost decent money, and in this Thomas was helped free of charge by his best friend, John Gottery. He has always believed in and admired Tom's work.
When he delivered the demos from the album to him, John had no doubts that "this should be recorded and heard."

The final result exceeded any expectations.

Thomas W. Anderson has always avoided any possibility of publicizing his creations, his music and his sound engineering work.
He wanted and aspired only to ensure that all these, I will not be afraid of the word, musical masterpieces were intended only for the closest circle of people - his friends, relatives and beloved woman.

Imagine that you painted the Mona Lisa and hid it from the whole world in the basement...

"Moonhattan" was printed and made in only 11 copies, which corresponds to the number of songs in the album and was presented on the day of release only to the closest people and those who took part in the creation.
Just imagine: almost no one has ever heard of him. The cover depicts a young Francesca in the attic of Thomas' house, where they first met.
The photo was taken by Monica and kept a secret from Tom until the final version of the cover was ready.
Francie wanted the shot, which would preserve her image forever in this form, to be filmed exactly as Tom sees her with his own eyes.

According to Tom himself, it is difficult for him to single out his favorite composition from the disc, he loves them all equally.
The instrumental interlude “I Don’t Exist, I’m Just A Record” was added to the album by Thomas at the last moment to emphasize that you can love your job endlessly and strongly, but don’t forget about your loved ones right now.
Although, he still believes that the pinnacle of this romantic night is composition number 11 "Repeat Me", which literally brings to the final goosebumps.
Francesca thought "A Million Kisses On My Feet" was a gorgeous declaration of love through music.

After that, Francie and Thomas continued to work on new projects, subsequently legalized their relationship and continued to live together, in harmony and love.

Such is the history of this unique record and these mysterious personalities, hidden from the whole world, preserved outside of time.

Francesca Lee is a French-Japanese indie, jazz and soul performer, musician, photographer and sound engineer. In 2023, she released her debut album “Moonhattan”, which many perceived as a work of artificial intelligence.

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