One of our favorite interviews in 2024 was with the SoapGirls, the French/South African duo who comprise of the sisters:
Camille Debray (Mille): vocals, bass, acoustic bass (2004–present)
Noemie Debray (Mie): vocals, guitar, acoustic guitar (2004–present)
Although the music often escapes the genre box, they tend to deliver a slick fast alt rock sound (sometimes veering to metal) that they have developed from years on the road, they are incredibly hard working and have built up a small army of fans across continents.
This piece includes an interview and live review and was written up and recorded during the UK leg of their tour in November 2025.
We started off chatting to the sisters with a quick hello again and a bit of mutual agreement about the increasing use of AI in reviews and music journalism (we DO NOT use AI for reviews, our reviewers do actually listen to the music!), a practice that none of us were especially pleased with. We then went on to discuss the loss of ex-Kiss guitarist Ace Frehley last month, us all being fans (the girls owning a wonderful Kiss jacket!).
Mille: I think he was extremely underrated. If you look at how he influenced even metal music, even his persona on stage, his style was very different for that era as it…he wasn’t perfect, he would roll with whatever he was feeling at the moment.
I think a fan podcast (Three Sides of the Coin) described him as a ‘sloppy’ player. A general discontent on that term from the girls!
Mie: I wouldn’t use the word sloppy, I would say more reactive. Whatever he was feeling he would play it, he was an intuitive player. He would get out whatever he had inside and he expressed what he felt at that moment. I wish more people played that way as it was honest and the melody he was playing you could hum and that is quite rare when it comes to guitar work.
Mille: There is, I think, his solo on “Black Diamond,” I’m not sure if he wrote the solo himself, but I just love how he delivers it, and on “Detroit Rock City” the harmonics I love.
Mie: I love it when people make the instruments sing, it becomes like another voice in the band.
Taking an enormous leap in conversation…on an Instagram post from the girls a few months ago from their home in South Africa there was a video of them sitting with a load of baboons who were all coming to say hello. Now we do love baboons, but what on earth were they all doing at the house?
Mille: We are passionate about animals and huge advocates for animals and we are lucky enough that where we live in South Africa it is a nature reserve and these baboons live in the wild but they come down because people build homes in their territories and by their homes. I would say it is unfortunate because people can be assholes and be horrible to them. Sometimes humanity and animals do not mix in a good way. But we always make sure our area is a safe space for them because they get persecuted a lot. But with us they feel comfortable, bring their babies and relax, they have nothing to fear. I think they see us as very weird, albino baboons.We also have massive porcupines that come in at night, those we feed, but not the baboons as you can’t get them used to taking food from humans, so we don’t. But the porcupines…yes. We leave them carrots in the garden and they bring their porcupine babies.
Mie: When we were recording our new album then the big male came into our music room and my sister was terrified!
Mille: I love animals, but can be a bit of a scaredy cat, even when it comes to dogs.
Mie: My sister was doing these metal growls and making the noises which may have shocked them. We love people who care about animals, but a lot of people don’t. We are guests here.
On the road, these girls are incredibly hard working, unbelievably busy bees. Whenever we hear of them they are in a new town, a new country. What keeps them going?
Mie: Our fans!
Millie: Our fans and the music, just getting up on that stage and feeling that connection and knowing you are giving the fans something to be happy about.
Mie: Also we came from a far-away place and we know the struggles and how hard it is to get out and to be able to tour. We will be forever grateful for that and we will take the chance to tour even if it is difficult sometimes. I always think back to when we were little kids selling soap and then it was our dream to go to this country or that. We would ask tourists what their country was like.
Mille: And we would live through them, so to be able to go out and do this, I think back on days when we are tired….
Mie: We left home at the end of April this year and we are only going back at the end of November, we still have Japan to go to.
Where the SoapGirls have one of their favorite drummers we think to work with?
Mille: Indeed! It is like Spinal Tap, we have played with 13 drummers this year. Unprecedented for us. Normally we have 2 or three session drummers at maximum and this year was just crazy as sometimes a drummer couldn’t get a visa to join and we would have someone who could only do five dates…
Mie: Or someone was really horrific and we would just say no!
Our favourite story from the last interview was of a drummer who was really a bass player and he never told them until he got on stage!
Mille: We had something similar recently when someone just sounded like shit and we had to wonder if he knew what he was doing. It’s unfortunate because it is our music, but if your drummer is shit then the backbeat is crap and everything sounds like…
Mie: We had an instance recently when the drummer decided to reinterpret our songs and we just looked at each other and we had to make up this whole long messy intro…what the fuck is he doing? But being professional we smile rather than drop kicking the cymbals! My intrusive thoughts may be ‘don’t do that or you will go to jail.’
During the awful COVID period, the girls were known for their live streaming (over 400 live streams) – how do they reflect on that period and have the live streams remained as part of their world?
Mille: The one positive thing that came out of all that COVID period is that people who may never have discovered our music did.
Mie: We still do the live streams whenever possible, on the road the wi-fi constraints and time makes it difficult, we can’t just plug in and play when on tour. But at home we Monday live and 2 themed live streams a week.
Mille: We have a warped sense of humor, so when at home we are like fucked up puppet shows.
Before doing this interview we dipped in and had a relisten to the 2017 album “Societies Rejects” of which two songs jumped out, “Bad Bitch” and “Drag You Down to Hell” which has a very different vibe to “Bad Bitch” but has an interesting vibe and energy. How do the girls see that album now, was it a stepping stone to where they are now?
Mie: 100% we develop our sound from every album we do we evolve, we have to. We write from a place of experience and things that we have gone through and maybe things happening in the world, that can change your material.
“She Don’t Wanna” brings us more up to date, a slick video to that one as well.That one is very commercial and radio friendly (if we draw a slight veil on some of the language!) but the whole track is modern and slick. Is that an indication of where we are now with a new album on the horizon?
Mie: No! The new album, the very new album, the fifth album is going to be very different. “She Don’t Wanna” came from album 4. But one thing, did you watch the video for “Kill Breed” (we indicated the negative) – if you watch that one, they are different songs and music videos but they were filmed at the same place and same day. The two songs are very different. “ She Don’t Wanna” is written from the perspective of someone who is depressed, that moment when you are in a room full of people but you are as lonely as you have ever been in your life. Then “Kill Breed” is an angry song about corrupt people who blindly follow the orders of the politicians without thinking the consequences through. The new album is heavier leaning.
Mille: We had a lot of issues touring recently, we had a lot of costs that almost broke us. We had visas for the US and then we had difficulties getting in and had to hire immigration attorneys and so $10,000 for that, never mind the flights…we couldn’t afford to get the new album out, but this album was recorded from home and we had the chance to sit with the songs more. It is exactly what we want to bring the songs alive. We have a song called “Closer” – initially what it was, it was completely different. We tested it out on Sam who we do everything with and she was ‘what the fuck’
…. So we went back and it is great to have the freedom to try different ways.
Last question. You have a night alone, the van has broken down, the wind is blowing, a lonely abandoned cottage awaits…
Mille: You have just described what happened a couple of months ago!
Well…what book and what film would you have with you to get you through the night?
SoapGirls: (General ideas from both!) Book, Memoirs of a Geisha (Arthur Golden, 1997) and Far From the Madding Crowd (Thomas Hardy) – movies The Wedding Singer or Matilda.
From Mark (doing the interview) – the book would be Bram Stokers original Dracula and the film would be one of the two Scooby Doo films from the early 2000s with Freddie Prinze Jr. and Sarah Michelle Gellar or maybe the original Ghostbusters.
Soap Girls: We love Scooby Doo, the Spooky Island. We are mad Scooby fans too, and Kiss did a Scooby Doo video!
Mie: In that movie, Scrappy Doo, I fucking hated him! But I never liked him generally.
Mille: My favourite character in the animations was Scooby Dooby Dum, “Dum dum dum DUM!”.
And we finished our talk with some appreciation of Scooby Doo on Zombie Island… But interview over, we turn to:
And now for the review:
The SoapGirls – Assembly Halls, Islington, London, November 4, 2025.
Upper Street, Islington on a drizzling November Tuesday is a grey, heads-down
affair – the kind of night that begs for color and life. Enter The SoapGirls.
For the uninitiated, The SoapGirls are a sister duo playing alt-rock edging ever
closer to metal. French-born via South Africa, they’ve got four albums, a decade
of relentless touring, and a lifetime of playing to – and up to – audiences.
Mille (bass/vocals) and Mie (guitar/vocals) took the stage under full lights,
forced to set up their gear in plain view (no roadies or techs for this DIY band) –
an unfair bit of production logistics that momentarily broke the expectation. But
the spell was cast the moment they shrugged off their faux-fur coats, revealing
shredded red and gold stage wear and pink neon platform boots, looking like a
don’t-give-a-fuck Wonder Woman. With that, the SoapGirls detonated into a
beautiful explosion of glitter, sweat and distortion.
“Society’s Reject” kicked the room awake, a fast, bouncing opener that barrelled
straight into “Jonny Rotten” to loosen up the crowd. Early nerves from the stand-in
drummer surfaced now and then, but the sheer conviction of Mille and Mie’s
performance bulldozed through them. Mille’s growling lead vocal found its bite,
while Mie’s harmonies cut clean through the mix. The lighting, to its credit, was
excellent – sharp whites, shock pinks and pulsing reds gave the show a real
sense of atmosphere.
“Rise Above” was introduced with a brief speech about not being silenced by critics
or negativity, which resonated with the audience. The song’s plaintive yet
defiant tone showcased the sisters’ best-ever vocal blend: tight, emotional and
genuinely moving. It’s easy to be struck by the band’s visual impact and
overlook how well they sing together, but tonight the harmonies were the real
star.
The set leaned heavier, pushing through grunge to metal, with less of the stage
acrobatics and more of the grind and it suited them. By “God of War,” the energy
was set. Mille’s expressive eyes, demonic doll-hair and gritted-teeth delivery
drove home the conviction behind the lyrics, while Mie flashed conspiratorial
grins through every riff, acting as both ringmaster and instigator to make sure
every person in the room knows they’re part of the exchange.
There were still flickers of their trademark playfulness – Mie’s throwaway quip
about pickled eggs (earning a classic older-sister eyeroll from Mille), a cheeky
glance at the crowd, a few appreciative yelps from fans. But the tone overall
was more focused, drawing cheers for its political outspoken stance.
The deep bass in “Enemy” rattled the floorboards, and “Psycho” slunk in with dark,
swaggering menace.
They closed with “Real,” a pounding anthem that left the crowd wanting more.
The lights hit perfectly in sync with the final chords, wrapping the night with a
sonic and visual shock and awe.
Tonight, may have been one of their most musically assured. The sound was
strong, the vocals the best they’ve delivered yet, and the message clear: The
SoapGirls aren’t just spectacle, they’re substance.
Set list
“Society’s Reject”
“Jonny Rotten”
“Rise Above”
“Reaper”
“God of War”
“Enemy”
Devil
“Closer”
Psycho
“Real”
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You can stream music from The Soap Girls Here
Review By Chris,
All Photographs by Dawn Osborne
Interview with Mark C. Chambers
