HEY MR. DJ: Fashion, it seems, has always been last-minute.
Michel Gaubert opens his breezy new autobiography, “Remixed,” with a cold-sweat-inducing anecdote from 1990 in which Karl Lagerfeld rang him at 1 o’clock in the morning to see if the French DJ could come up with something better than the “horrible” soundtrack proposed for his Chanel show set to unfurl in a few hours.
Never mind that Gaubert was already tucked into bed, a sleeping pill already taking its effect: He pulled an all-nighter, stuck his neck out with a little-known track by Chicago house music pioneer Lil’ Louis, “I Called U (But You Weren’t Here),” and saved the day. Phew!
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The 306-page French language tome, published by Editions Fayard, debuted Thursday night at 7L, Lagerfeld’s famous Left Bank bookstore, where Gaubert signed copies for the likes of Rick Owens, Michèle Lamy, Elie Top, Martine Sitbon, Carine Roitfeld and Sarah Andelman.
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The music-meister is probably best known for his long collaboration on runway shows with the late German designer at Chanel, Fendi and the Karl Lagerfeld house, in addition to Sacai, Jil Sander, Gucci, Balenciaga and many other brands over a career that has spanned more than 40 years.
(Some may also remember the outrage he provoked in 2021 when he showcased slanty-eyed paper masks on Instagram that were decried as racist by influencers including Susanna Lau and Bryan Grey Yambao. Gaubert subsequently removed the post, apologized, and Chanel stood by him through the crisis, to the influencers’ displeasure.)
The book offers a chance for him to tell his life story — growing up in a religious household in Paris, his ears always open to the latest French pop stars, and groundbreaking sounds like the musique concrète composed by Pierre Henry in 1967 for a Maurice Béjart ballet, particularly the influential snippet “Psyché Rock.”
He describes having eclectic taste in music as a student, spanning from the Moody Blues and James Brown to Led Zeppelin, but the more eccentric the sound, the more it pleased him.
Among his first fashion discoveries was Kansai Yamamoto, who designed David Bowie’s stage costumes, and Antony Price, who dressed Bryan Ferry and Brian Eno.
“Clothing is a tremendous lever for self-affirmation, and to a certain extent, emancipation. Music too. I’ve always linked the two,” he writes in the chapter “London Calling.”
The book unfurls largely chronologically, delving into the impact musicians like Bowie, Daft Punk, Roxy Music, Aphex Twin and New Order had on various stages of Gaubert’s career, and how evolutions in the fashion industry changed his work — particularly the advent of itinerant shows and of live performances, not only canned music.
To be sure, Gaubert delighted in the challenges set before him, with Loewe’s Jonathan Anderson once giving as his brief: “music with variable geometry,” and “symmetrical cacophony.”