French Paddleboat was the solo guise of youthful electronic auteur Scott August, who also served as one-half of the duo Vote Robot. A native of the bucolic British Columbia town of Kelowna, August had been making home recordings of electronic music since his early teen years. Although his main inspirations came from the avant-garde realm -- electronic experimenters from Stockhausen to art-rockers Can to glitch pioneers Oval -- his own solo work often sported a greater synth-pop influence, plus some of the analog warmth of Boards of Canada, and a low-key charm commensurate with its bedroom origins. As French Paddleboat, August began issuing some of the material in the mid-‘90s on cassette-only releases for the Granted Passage label, starting with Constantinople. His second effort Rome Loves Tan was recorded over the course of 1997, and featured some live acoustic instrumentation (vibes, percussion, clarinet) alongside the synths and sampled loops. When August's work with Kevin Rivard in Vote Robot started to get some attention, August eventually returned to Rome Loves Tan, retooling and tightening the original tracks for a limited-edition, vinyl-only reissue on Catsup Plate in 2002. French Paddleboat's first CD release arrived on Scratch Records in the form of 1999's Conversions in Metric, which had been recorded in 1997. ~ Steve Huey, Rovi