Lætitia Sadier

Lætitia Sadier, also known as Seaya Sadier and sometimes as “The Shah,” is a French musician best known as the singer of Stereolab. She is born on 6 May 1968 and spends most of her formative years in France, although her family travels widely and she lives briefly in the United States as a child.

Career

Sadier works as a nanny when she meets McCarthy leader Tim Gane at a gig in Paris in the late 1980s. She has already contributed vocals to McCarthy’s third and final album. Disillusioned with the French rock scene, she moves to London to be with Gane and to develop her career. After McCarthy breaks up in 1990, she and Gane form Stereolab immediately.

The first line-up of Stereolab includes former Chills bassist Martin Kean, drummer Joe Dilworth and Gina Morris on backing vocals. Gane writes most of the music, while Sadier’s singsong alto voice and politically charged lyrics in English and French become central features of the band’s sound. She also plays keyboards, percussion, guitar and trombone, and she is left-handed on guitar.

Other projects and collaborations

In 1996, Sadier forms the spin-off group Monade with Pram’s Rosie Cuckston. She also contributes vocals to a range of other acts and recordings, sometimes alongside the late Stereolab member Mary Hansen. Her work includes French backing vocals on Blur’s “To the End,” a top 20 hit in 1994, and a 1995 recording of Serge Gainsbourg and Brigitte Bardot’s “Bonnie and Clyde” with Luna.

She and Hansen also sing on recordings by the High Llamas, the project of Sean O’Hagan, who is sometimes a Stereolab member. In 2001, she sings on “Sol y Sombra” from Fugu’s Fugu 1 on Minty Fresh Records. In 2002, she sings the chorus on “New Wave” from Common’s Electric Circus. In 2004, she provides lead vocals on “Haiku One” from Sigmatropic’s Sixteen Haiku & Other Stories, an album based on the poetry of George Seferis. In 2009, she sings with Momotte, a band from Toulouse, on an EP released by the French label Deux Mille. She also writes and sings the lyrics to “Quick Canal” by Atlas Sound on Logos.

Solo work

Sadier releases a solo album, The Trip, in 2010.

Personal life

Sadier and Tim Gane remain partners for many years without marrying, and they have a child, Alex, born in 1998. They split up in 2004 but continue to work together in Stereolab until the band’s hiatus in 2009.