The Murmur That Won’t Let GoÂ
They didn’t holler for your attention. No neon lights, no megaphones, no cheap tricks. The French Kicks just slid into your life like the smell of rain in a hot alley or the quiet sound of a clock ticking when the power’s gone out. Their music wasn’t about the noise. It was about the spaces between it. The pauses. The breaths. The way a moment can stretch out forever if you’re paying attention, or how it can snap back and leave you chasing something you didn’t realize you’d already lost.
This wasn’t the kind of nostalgia you find in dusty jukeboxes or record-store bins, the kind sold for $2.99 with a bonus track. It was heavier than that, sharper at the edges, full of the kind of sadness that doesn’t ask for pity because it knows how useless that is. French Kicks didn’t wallow, but they didn’t run, either. Their music just stood there, looking you in the eye, calm and quiet, like it already knew how the story would end.
Back in the late ’90s, New York City was a mess—loud, hungry, thrashing. Bands were coming out of the woodwork, all teeth and leather jackets, elbows swinging for a piece of the action. The Strokes had their strut, Interpol had their shadows, but the French Kicks? They weren’t playing that game. They were too busy digging through the rubble, sifting through the cracks, looking for the things everyone else had stepped over.
Their songs didn’t rush; they wandered. The drums tapped out like a heartbeat that just kept going, steady and unbothered. The chords were clean and spare, but they hit somewhere deep, like a word you didn’t know you needed to hear. They made music that felt like sitting alone in a diner at 3 a.m., the coffee cold but the silence louder than anything you could say.
You could hear it, the restlessness. The questions they didn’t bother to ask outright because they knew the answers wouldn’t help anyway. Their sound was full of spaces, shadows, and those little moments you can’t quite put your finger on, like the faint scent of something you remember but can’t place. It didn’t beg you to listen. It just waited until you did.
And when you did, you’d find something you didn’t know you’d been carrying—something raw, something unfinished. It wasn’t pretty, but it was real. And maybe that’s why the French Kicks stuck around in your head long after their music stopped playing. They didn’t shout or demand or beg. They just stood there, steady as an old lamppost in the fog, waiting for you to notice they’d always been there.
That’s the French Kicks for you. Not a scream. Not a roar. Just a murmur. But the kind you can’t ever forget.
The Origins: A Band Learns to Linger
It began unceremoniously, as these things often do, in a Brooklyn basement, though the band’s roots stretched further south to the suburban streets of D.C. Matt Stinchcomb on guitar, Josh Wise on vocals and guitar, Nick Stumpf on drums and vocals. They called themselves the French Kicks, not because it meant anything but because it sounded like it might. In those first days, their sound was raw and unpolished, but it had a strange gravity. They didn’t play to impress; they played because they had to, because the music was already there and demanded to be let out.
Lineups shifted until Nick’s brother, Lawrence Stumpf, joined on bass, solidifying the group’s dynamic. From the beginning, there was a deliberate slowness to their evolution, a refusal to conform to the frenetic pace of the scene around them. Their sound grew in the cracks between genres: too soft to be garage rock, too restless to be art pop, but unmistakably their own. The result was music that felt intimate and sprawling all at once, like a secret you’re hesitant to share but can’t keep to yourself.
French Kicks weren’t trying to be perfect. They weren’t even trying to be remembered. They were chasing something fleeting—a feeling, a moment, the hazy intersection of past and present. Their songs didn’t just exist; they lingered, like a shadow that grows longer with the setting sun. In a city filled with ambition, their quiet defiance made them unforgettable.
The Early Days: EPs and Finding Their Groove
It was the late ’90s, and New York City was a jagged puzzle of ambition, decay, and restless energy. The Giuliani years were smoothing the city’s edges, scrubbing the grime off Times Square and driving artists further out into the boroughs. The indie rock scene wasn’t immune to this gentrifying tidal wave—venues were shutting down, rent was skyrocketing, and everyone was fighting tooth and nail for space to exist. Bands like The Strokes and Yeah Yeah Yeahs were just starting to bubble up, crafting a new sound for a city in transition: loud, confident, unrelentingly cool.
But the French Kicks? They didn’t fit the mold. They weren’t about leather jackets and snarling swagger. Their first two EPs—The French Kicks EP (1999) and Young Lawyer (2000)—felt like something else entirely. The music was raw, jittery, almost hesitant, as if the band was figuring out its place in the chaos. And yet, there was something deliberate in the way they held back, in the way their angular rhythms and off-kilter melodies seemed to avoid the obvious.
Songs like “Wrong Side” were sharp and strange, with rhythms that felt like they were stumbling but always landed exactly where they needed to. Critics couldn’t quite pin them down, tossing out comparisons to The Talking Heads and The Clash, but those labels didn’t stick. The French Kicks weren’t rehashing the past; they were searching for something new, something quieter and more introspective, even as the city around them roared for attention.Â
One Time Bells (2002): The Breakthrough
By 2002, the world felt like it was holding its breath. The wounds of 9/11 were still fresh, and New York City was grappling with what it meant to be a global symbol of resilience and trauma. Nationally, the Bush administration was ramping up its “War on Terror,” and the cultural mood was a strange mix of paranoia and defiance. In the middle of all this, the indie rock scene was thriving, with bands like Interpol and The Strokes grabbing headlines and shaping the sound of a generation. Their music was dark, stylish, and self-assured—a perfect reflection of a city rebuilding itself with a hard edge.
But One Time Bells didn’t play by those rules. The French Kicks weren’t about sharp suits and sultry mystique; they were about movement, about the push and pull of uncertainty. The album was a kinetic burst of jangling guitars and restless rhythms, full of songs that felt like they were held together by sheer willpower. It wasn’t polished, and it wasn’t trying to be.
Tracks like “Close to Modern” and “Wrong Side” captured the messy, fleeting connections of city life—late nights spent wandering through neighborhoods that were equal parts neon and shadow, the hum of a subway car shaking the ground beneath your feet. There was a tension in the music, a sense of barely contained energy, as if the band was constantly on the verge of exploding but chose instead to hold it together just a little longer.
In a scene dominated by swagger and theatrics, the French Kicks stood out by being unassuming. They weren’t trying to be cool. They were just trying to say something real.Â
The Trial of the Century (2004): A New Kind of Tension
By 2004, the indie rock explosion was in full swing. Bands like The Killers and Franz Ferdinand were riding waves of glossy, danceable anthems, while Arcade Fire was turning orchestral bombast into an art form. The French Kicks, though, didn’t follow the trends. Instead, they took a step back, pulling the throttle and letting their music breathe.
The Trial of the Century was a quieter, more introspective record, the sound of a band looking inward instead of chasing the spotlight. The production was cleaner, the arrangements more layered, and the melodies more restrained, but there was still that undercurrent of restlessness, that refusal to settle into easy answers.
This was music for people who didn’t need everything spelled out for them. Tracks like “The Trial of the Century” felt bittersweet and reflective, like watching the sun set over a city skyline and realizing how much has changed while you weren’t paying attention. “Oh Fine” was a perfect late-night anthem, capturing the strange mix of euphoria and regret that comes after a party ends and you’re left alone with your thoughts.
It wasn’t the kind of album that screamed for attention, but it lingered in your mind long after the final note faded. In a world chasing big, bold statements, the French Kicks were content to ask quieter, more complicated questions.Â
Swimming (2008): The Swansong
By 2008, the landscape had shifted again. The indie rock scene was starting to splinter, with some bands chasing mainstream success and others retreating into niche obscurity. The French Kicks, true to form, didn’t follow either path. Instead, they released Swimming, a dreamy, atmospheric record that felt like a goodbye, even if they didn’t say it outright.
This was a different kind of album. It wasn’t about raw energy or restless rhythms; it was about mood, about texture, about creating a space for reflection. Songs like “Abandon” and “Said So What” floated along on waves of reverb and intricate vocal harmonies, less concerned with hooks and more focused on the feelings they could evoke.
Thematically, Swimming was a meditation on impermanence, on the way things slip away when you’re not paying attention. The band members were older now, more aware of how fleeting everything could be, and that sense of fragility was woven into every note. It wasn’t a record that demanded your attention, but if you gave it time, it rewarded you with a quiet, haunting beauty.
By the time the album ended, it was clear that this was the end of the line. The French Kicks weren’t going out with a bang—they didn’t need to. They drifted away, leaving behind a body of work that felt honest, unpretentious, and deeply human. In a scene that often prized image over substance, they were the rare band that stayed true to themselves, and that’s a legacy worth remembering.
The Hiatus: When the Music Stops
The French Kicks didn’t explode. They didn’t implode, either. They just drifted. One day they were there, jangling through late-night venues and filling the air with their peculiar brand of restless, understated magic. And the next? Silence. No dramatic breakup, no emotional farewell tour with teary-eyed speeches and encore after encore. They simply stopped. Like a conversation that trails off mid-sentence, leaving everyone wondering if it was finished or just waiting to start up again.
It wasn’t failure. It wasn’t even exhaustion. It was life. That slow, creeping force that pulls at you in ways you don’t notice until it’s already taken its toll. Nick Stumpf, Josh Wise, and the rest of the band found themselves scattered in different directions, caught up in the unglamorous realities of growing older. Some started families, trading late-night sets for late-night feedings. Others followed creative threads into new projects, chasing muses that didn’t require three-minute songs or tight harmonies.
But you could feel it, even if they never said it out loud—the energy had shifted. The thing that had pushed them through endless van rides, sleepless nights, and sweaty, half-empty clubs was gone. Not dead, but dormant. The music hadn’t betrayed them, and they hadn’t betrayed the music. They had just reached the edge of something, looked over, and decided not to jump.
And so they faded, not with a bang but with a whisper. No headlines screamed their absence, no crowds chanted their name, begging them to come back. It wasn’t that kind of band, that kind of fame. They’d always existed in the cracks, in the spaces between the noise, and now they slipped back into those same shadows.
For the fans who were paying attention, it felt like losing a friend who moves to another city without telling you. You’d catch a whiff of their music somewhere—maybe “Close to Modern” playing in the background of a dive bar, or the soft strains of “The Trial of the Century” crackling through an old speaker—and you’d wonder what happened. Not in an angry, betrayed way, but in the way you wonder about people you used to know, the ones who drifted out of your life without warning or explanation.
The French Kicks didn’t owe anyone an explanation, anyway. They had always done things their own way, quiet and deliberate, without the need for fanfare. Even their silence felt true to form. No overblown declarations of “creative differences” or promises to return someday. Just a quiet retreat into the lives waiting for them outside the music.
Maybe that’s why their absence hit harder than you’d expect. They were never the loudest band in the room, but their music had a way of sneaking up on you, settling into the corners of your mind and staying there long after the last note had faded. When they stopped, it wasn’t just the music that disappeared—it was that peculiar feeling they’d managed to evoke, that sense of quiet, bittersweet restlessness that was theirs and theirs alone.
Years later, you could still feel the absence, like an empty seat at a table. No one else was making music quite like theirs, not then and not now. But maybe that was the point. They were never meant to stick around forever, never meant to be a permanent fixture. They came, they murmured their truths, and then they stepped aside, leaving us to figure out the rest.
And if you were lucky enough to be paying attention, you held onto those songs like keepsakes, tokens of a time and place that could never quite be recaptured. The French Kicks didn’t just stop making music—they slipped away into the rhythm of life itself, quiet and unassuming, but impossible to forget.
Where Are They Now?
Life has a way of scattering people, like leaves caught in a restless wind. The French Kicks were no exception. After the music stopped, they each found their own path, carving out new identities away from the dim lights of the stage.
Nick Stumpf, ever the restless creative, didn't just fade into obscurity. He shifted his focus to production, becoming the man behind the curtain for a slew of indie bands. His fingerprints are on records you might have heard, even if you didn't know it. He co-produced Matt Costa's album Santa Rosa Fangs, a mix of biographical and fictional stories about California.
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But Nick wasn't content to just shape other people's sounds. He had his own stories to tell. He dabbled in solo projects, crafting songs that bore his unmistakable mark—raw, honest, and unpolished, like a good dive bar. Tracks like "The Beatles (When Ringo Shook His Mop)" showcase his knack for blending the familiar with the unexpected.
Josh Wise took a different route. He stepped back from the spotlight, choosing a quieter life away from the relentless grind of the music industry. But his influence didn't just evaporate. It seeped into the next generation of musicians, those who listened to French Kicks records on repeat, absorbing the nuances of his guitar work and songwriting. You can hear echoes of Josh in the jangly riffs and introspective lyrics of countless indie bands that followed.
Lawrence Stumpf, Nick's younger brother and the band's bassist, found his own rhythm outside of music. Details about his post-French Kicks endeavors are sparse, but like the others, he moved on to new ventures, leaving behind the frenetic energy of the indie rock scene.
Matthew Stinchcomb, one of the original members, took a sharp turn from his rock 'n' roll days. After leaving the band, he became Etsy's European Director, channeling his creative energies into the world of online craftsmanship and entrepreneurship. It's a long way from the smoky bars and late-night gigs, but perhaps not as different as it seems—both require a keen eye for detail and a passion for connecting people with things that matter.
The French Kicks may have disbanded, but their legacy lingers. Each member carried a piece of that shared history into their new lives, influencing the worlds they touched next. The music stopped, but the echoes remain, reverberating through the indie scene and beyond.
Why They Mattered
The French Kicks were never the biggest band in the room. They weren’t the loudest, the flashiest, or the most polished. And maybe that’s exactly why they mattered. In an era when indie rock was turning into a parade of swaggering frontmen and perfectly packaged anthems, the French Kicks were chasing something else entirely.
Their music was restless, raw, and unpolished, like a half-finished thought scribbled in the margins of a notebook. But it was honest. It didn’t care about perfection, because perfection is boring. It cared about movement, about discovery, about capturing the fleeting moments that slip through your fingers before you even realize they’re gone.
They embodied the spirit of their time, that jittery, anxious energy of the early 2000s, when the world felt like it was teetering on the edge of something big and scary and unknowable. They weren’t trying to be rock stars. They were just trying to make sense of it all, one chord at a time. And somehow, they did.
They never hit the heights of their contemporaries. No stadium tours, no magazine covers, no million-dollar paychecks. But that feels right, doesn’t it? The French Kicks were never about chasing the brass ring. They were about the music—the raw, imperfect, beautiful music that sneaks up on you and makes you feel something you can’t quite put into words.
And that’s the thing, isn’t it? That’s the whole damn point.
So here’s to the French Kicks. They didn’t burn the brightest, but they burned true. Their sound—that jangling, melodic, endlessly searching sound—is still out there, drifting through the ether, waiting for someone to stumble across it on a sleepless night. Because that’s where it belongs. Not in the spotlight, but in the quiet moments, the ones where you’re not even sure what you’re looking for until you hear it. And when you do, you’ll know.
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