Singer Arno, a Belgian figure on the rock scene, known for his broken voice mixed with a Flemish accent, his messy hair and his excesses, died on Saturday of complications from cancer, his agent announced.
The 72-year-old artist, sometimes compared to Alain Bashung or Tom Waits, of the same generation as him, announced in February 2020 that he was suffering from pancreatic cancer.
“Damn, damn that was really good. Arno left us on April 23. He will be missed by all of us, his family, his friends, his musicians, but he will always be there thanks to the music that kept him going until the end, ”wrote his Belgian agent Filip De Groote in a press release.
Born on May 21, 1949 in Ostend, a Flemish coastal town to which he remained very attached and which he evokes in his songs, Arno Hintjens began his career with the rock group TC Matic in the 80s, notably with the song ” Putain, putain” (“Damn, damn, it’s really good, we are all Europeans after all”) – a title recently taken up in duet with another Belgian, Stromae.
It was in solo that he then revealed himself to a wider audience, thanks to songs like “The eyes of my mother” or his cover of “Girls by the sea” by another Belgian, Adamo.
The announcement of his illness came while he was promoting an album (“Santeboutique”, released in September 2019). He had to interrupt his tour to undergo an operation.
The coronavirus pandemic and the impossibility of holding concerts then postponed several times throughout 2020 the prospect of going back on stage, even if he was able to record a new album (“Vivre”, with the French pianist Sofiane Pamart , released at the end of May 2021).
At the time of the album’s release, he had been prevented from promoting it by being hospitalized again for chemotherapy treatment.
He finally got back on stage in February 2022, scheduling half a dozen dates in Brussels and Ostend, his hometown, after a first meeting in a small committee in the studios of Flemish public radio on January 12.
During his last shows, the artist, seated in front of a microphone, with an emaciated face, regularly alluded in front of his public to his state of health.
On February 21, in his usual black stage costume, he was received under the golds of the royal palace in Brussels for an interview with King Philippe, who had hailed “an icon of the Belgian music scene”.
“We will no longer see his silhouette in the Sainte-Catherine district. Damn damn, we already miss him, ”said Philippe Close, the mayor of Brussels, a city of which he was an honorary citizen, on Twitter.