Vanupié is a French singer-songwriter who was born in Annecy, but grew up in Gif-sur-Yvette between Essonne and Paris. As the son of a guitar playing father, he caught the music virus at an early age and in 2006 Vanupié - a corruption of "va-nu-pieds" (French for pauper, literally "someone without shoes"), a nickname the singer earned for often playing barefoot - started his musical career as a street musician in the Paris Métro, drawing on a repertoire of reggae, soul, pop and electro and resolutely choosing English as his language of choice. In 2013, Vanupié releases his first long player, 'FreeBirds', in 2017 followed by the 'Janus' EP. With 'Fooltime', 'Rockadown', 'Fallin' On You' and title track 'Janus', 'Gold' features no less than 4 songs from the aforementioned EP and a reworked version of 'Good Morning' (taken from 'Freebirds') featuring guests Kim Pommel (Groundation, Rising Tide), Trevor Young (SOJA) and Flox. Classifying 'Gold' as a reggae album, would be doing it short. For the excellent opener 'Mr. Barker' and 'Sharing The Light', a duet with Groundation front man Harrison Stafford, Vanupié still remains within the boundaries of the reggae genre, but 'Oneself Redemption' is lightweight singer-songwriter pop. Vanupié goes reggae again for 'Rockadown', but then opts for a successful singer-songwriter ballad with 'Fooltime'. 'Fallin' In You' is regular r&r-pop, and Vanupié provides some rock influences with 'Kill Time'. We get some soulful reggae again with 'Good Morning', a combination tune with Kim Pommel (taking the song to a whole other level), Trevor Young (SOJA) and Flox. 'Janus' was the title track of the eponymous EP preceding the release of this album, and is another pop song. The same goes for 'A Way We Go', and for title song 'No Gold' Vanupié even throws in some funky electro. Vanupié really concludes with a disco-mix by Terry D of 'Fallin' In You'. In Roman times Janus, the two-faced god, was the symbol of duality, and listening to 'Gold' we couldn't shake the feeling we were listening to an artist who hadn't been able or wasn't willing to make a choice between the alternative and mainstream circuit yet.