A lighthouse in the night since the 1970s, the legendary animator Jacques Fabi is about to hang up his microphone for good. At 69, he will retire next June with a sense of accomplishment, convinced that night radio will survive him.
Too many listeners rely on the telephone forums between midnight and 3 a.m. for this slot to be abandoned by the Cogeco network, the veteran is convinced. Admittedly, technology has considerably transformed the profession since he began to exercise it, in Sherbrooke, in 1972. But social networks will not have come to the end of FM radio, insists Jacques Fabi.
“They say that radio is changing, but [en réalité], not that much. It’s cliché to say it, but it remains a local media. Me, I have seven telephone lines, and every night, it’s full, ”he says, the vaper in his mouth.
A few years ago he swapped tobacco for electronic cigarettes, a must for anyone who knew the time when people smoked in the studios while recording shows. From this period, he keeps the slight hoarse tint that marks his hushed voice. Anyone who’s ever taken a taxi in the middle of the night has heard this unmistakable tone. Because the voice of Jacques Fabi has been part of the daily life of taxi drivers, truck drivers, bar workers and other insomniacs for decades.
Some of them, often the same ones, phone him to tell him of their feelings. On their personal life, on the Canadian, on the news… Some, intoxicated by alcohol, sometimes hold lunar remarks, giving rise to sequences that have become cult. Especially since the host is used to responding with a certain nonchalance that has become his trademark.
“I’ve had people on the air that I knew were hot. We must never forget that the radio remains a show, he admits. But it happened a lot less often than you think. That’s not a freak show, most people are articulate. Sometimes I even talk with someone for 30 minutes because I find what they are saying interesting. »
Significant encounters
The night allows him this leeway, this freedom of tone, this privileged contact with the listener, impossible elsewhere in the schedule. This is why, despite several occasions, he never gave up the night slot. However, the host made a few replacements here and there during prime time, which allowed him to cross paths with several big names in radio, starting with Jean Cournoyer, the former Liberal minister who became host, whom Jacques Fabi considers today as one of his role models.
A certain Justin Trudeau also co-hosted a few weeks with him during a summer in the early 2000s. Jacques Fabi will not soon forget the icy atmosphere that reigned in the studio when he invited director Pierre Falardeau , an ardent defender of Quebec independence, on the show.
“Mr. Trudeau had accepted that I invite him. The interview lasted an hour, and they didn’t look each other in the eye once. Never”, says the one who is not short of anecdotes after 50 years of radio.
He also shared the microphone with some sulphurous characters, like Doc Mailloux, with whom he liked to work, even if they did not always agree. Ditto for André Arthur, whose great intelligence he praises, although he admits to having been somewhat confused by certain flights of the king of Quebec radio.
more difficult times
Jacques Fabi, for his part, has never been controversial and provocative, even if he sometimes lets out a few well-felt rants.
The biggest stain on his file: a listener who, shocked by the escalation of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict in the Gaza Strip in November 2012, called him to praise Hitler and the Holocaust. Rather than cutting the line, Jacques Fabi will continue to fuel the conversation, which will earn him a month’s suspension. “Since I came back on the air, no one has spoken to me about this event, which is very much appreciated. This is surely the worst moment of my career. What people don’t know is that while this woman was talking, I was on another line with another listener. Let’s say that since that time, I manage to do only one thing at a time, ”continues the host of Fabi at nightwho prefers to reminisce about other defining moments of his career.
Impossible to forget, for example, the emotion that won over the listeners on the night of the 1er November 2, 1987, a few hours after the announcement of the death of René Lévesque. The ice storm of January 1998, when the radio had become the only means of communication for a good part of the Quebec population, also remains anchored in his memory.
As for the pandemic, Jacques Fabi has a more bitter memory. On the one hand, the nocturnal telephone forums were a lifeline for some people who lived alone during the confinements, which confirms, in his opinion, the relevance of traditional radio. On the other hand, this period was also marked by a radicalization of the comments of certain listeners, sometimes imbued with a certain violence.
“It’s not easy to talk to antivax, antimasks, and all those people. There are people with whom it was impossible to discuss. I received several threatening emails. It’s much more difficult than before to run an open line,” he concludes, wishing his successor the best of luck.