Richard Pinhas was born in Neuilly-sur-Seine on May 7, 1951, a pioneer of electronic rock music with Heldon and later as a solo artist. Coming from a blues and rock background, he played in a band with Klaus Blasquiz (later Magma) and studied philosophy at the Sorbonne, before starting out as a musician in the Paris underground. Inspired by science fiction, progressive rock, krautrock, ambient and minimalist contemporary music, in 1974 he founded the experimental group Heldon, which recorded for the Disjuncta and Cobra labels. He then launched his solo career with a seminal album, Rhizosphere (1977), followed by Chronolyse (1978), Iceland (1979), East West (1980) and L'Ethique (1982). After a decade's hiatus devoted to the study of Nietzsche, he returned to music and opened up to numerous collaborations to develop his sound palette, notably with John Livengood, Pascal Comelade, Merzbow, Oren Ambarchi, Tatsuya Yoshida or the writer Maurice G. Dantec for the Schizotrope project, as well as his son Duncan Pinhas from 2021, on the albums Sources and Britannia. In addition to his work in the studio, Richard Pinhas has also become very active on stage, particularly since the 2010s with his Japanese counterparts Merzbow and Yoshida.
