Asian Core Expands: Nearly 300 FLINTA Artists in France

The Asian Core database serves as an innovative platform designed to enhance the visibility of FLINTA (Female, Lesbian, Intersex, Non-binary, Transgender, and Agender) artists of Asian descent within the French experimental music scene. Founded in 2025 by Laeti Muong, Asian Core meticulously documents and connects nearly 300 artists from 34 countries through a diverse set of over 500 music tags. This extensive database supports the discovery of ambient, experimental, and techno sounds, embodying the community’s dynamic cultural contributions. The Asian Core’s mission is not only to document but also to promote these underrepresented artists through its database, curated online presence, and in-person events that challenge traditional visibility norms within the music industry.

Asian Core is a French database founded in 2025 by Laeti Muong, established under the name Asian Core to record entries related to artists of Asian descent who are active in France’s experimental music scenes. The database has listed nearly 300 FLINTA artists of Asian descent navigating experimental scenes, with that figure presented as the extent of its current listings.

The listings are described specifically as FLINTA artists of Asian descent operating within experimental musical contexts in France, and the database’s compilation of these entries is identified by the same project name, Asian Core. Asian Core intends to continue expanding its listings.

The article references several cultural and musical works relevant to representations of Asian descent in French music. It cites Charles Trenet’s 1966 song “Le Chinois” and reproduces the quoted line: “Le Chinois— a portrait of a sneaky, thieving, murderous opium-smoking Buddhist-worshipping merchant. He even has yellow skin, that man / Beware, he is a Chinese.”

The text also names PNL’s track “Tchiki Tchiki” (2016) without an accompanying lyric excerpt in the article, and it cites Kaaris’ track “Chaos” with the line “I don’t speak Chinese, no Konnichiwa.” Algérino’s “Les Menottes” is mentioned with the line “she’s going to tching tchang tchong you.”

In addition to recorded songs, the article references a winter 2025 teaser by GIMS in which the artist wore a conical hat and a kimono to celebrate the Chinese New Year. The article includes an additional lyrical fragment presented without attribution: “Eh I don’t speak tching tchong tching tchang / play crazy in my room.” No further titles, years, or performer attributions for that fragment are provided in the reproduced text.

Linh-Lan Dao states that “East and Southeast Asians have been living in France for one hundred and fifty years.” The article references Charles Trenet’s 1966 song “Le Chinois” and reproduces the lyric: “Le Chinois— a portrait of a sneaky, thieving, murderous opium-smoking Buddhist-worshipping merchant. He even has yellow skin, that man / Beware, he is a Chinese.” These quoted items are presented as statements about historical presence and social representation in France within the article.

The article also cites contemporary musical references, naming PNL’s 2016 track “Tchiki Tchiki” without providing a lyric excerpt. Kaaris’s track “Chaos” is quoted with the line “I don’t speak Chinese, no Konnichiwa.” Algérino’s “Les Menottes” is quoted with the line “she’s going to tching tchang tchong you,” and the article includes an additional un-attributed lyric fragment: “Eh I don’t speak tching tchong tching tchang / play crazy in my room.” The article also reports that in winter 2025 GIMS released a teaser in which the artist wore a conical hat and a kimono to celebrate the Chinese New Year.

• Charles Trenet’s song “Le Chinois” (1966): “Le Chinois— a portrait of a sneaky, thieving, murderous opium-smoking Buddhist-worshipping merchant. He even has yellow skin, that man / Beware, he is a Chinese.”
• Kaaris’s track “Chaos”: “I don’t speak Chinese, no Konnichiwa.”
• Algérino’s track “Les Menottes”: “She’s going to tching tchang tchong you.”
• Unattributed lyric fragment: “Eh I don’t speak tching tchong tching tchang / play crazy in my room.”

The Asian Core database is presented in the article as a documented resource focused on FLINTA artists of Asian descent within France’s experimental music scenes, intended to support their visibility and recognition. The project is described as compiling entries about artists active in experimental musical contexts in France and as a tool for discovering performers across ambient, experimental and techno registers.

The article reports that Asian Core has listed nearly 300 FLINTA artists of Asian descent and notes that the initiative intends to continue expanding its listings. The article frames the database as an ongoing, searchable compilation that records artists’ presence in French experimental scenes and situates the project as part of a developing infrastructure for documenting these practitioners.