(Paris) A few days before his 70and birthday, Renaud treats himself to an album of covers, meticwhere he revisits Georges Moustaki or Jean Ferrat in his dented voice, before appearing in a TV evening dedicated to him.
Posted at 10:36 a.m.
While the public regularly worries about the health of this popular singer (more than 20 million albums sold), who fell into alcohol a few years ago, the first single released is quite a wink .
We hear the “angry singer” resume If you buy me a drink, formerly performed by Serge Reggiani. Other standards by Yves Montand, Georges Brassens, Jacques Higelin or Bourvil follow in the album which is released this Friday.
Why does a singer-songwriter like him dive into the repertoire of others? “All the greatest artists have made cover albums, whether it’s Elvis, the Rolling Stones, at some point, they want to give their version of songs that inspired them”, explains to AFP Christian Eudeline, author of Dico Renaudwith some 2000 entries on the man with the “wild chetron”.
“They say he is not inspired, that he no longer writes at all, no, it allows him to express memories, the song of Françoise Hardy (Friendship), he always loved her, so says his brother; it puts the ego aside, ”continues this journalist.
“My voice stresses me out”
The business risk is the comparison with the original versions, especially in the case of an artist whose voice has deteriorated from past excesses. “My voice stresses me out a lot, when I speak it’s a bit hoarse, when I sing it’s a bit laborious, I find it harder and harder to sing,” he confided recently on RTL.
“What is still to be credited to him is that he does not cheat, his voice is not vocoded (passed through a synthetic filter)”, continues Christian Eudeline. “He is like that, we saw him evolve in public, we saw his love stories unravel, his daughter grow up, he accompanied us, we saw him have problems that he drowned in the ‘alcohol “.
Renaud had already proceeded in the same way, unvarnished, for his last studio album, Kids and children first!on texts to him, this time, in 2019.
Because of this damaged timbre, he “no longer plans to tour on this album”. “I had struggled too much on that of 2016, with my hoarse, gravelly voice, it still is”, he still slipped on RTL, in one of his rare recent interviews.
Fifty years of career in 2025
And to affirm for the umpteenth time: “For a year and a half, I no longer drink a drop of alcohol, I am very satisfied, but I still smoke like a firefighter even if I have gone from four packs to one per day “.
The author of winner Mistral does not exclude “one or two exceptional concerts”. On May 10, the eve of his birthday (he was born on May 11, 1952 in Paris), France 2 offers a special program where “he will sing several titles from his new opus exclusively and will share the stage with his friends during duets created only for this evening,” according to a statement.
We can expect to morgan of you, Manu, Manhattan Kabul, As soon as the wind blows, My redneck or knocked upsung by/or with Patrick Bruel, Axelle Red, Jean-Louis Aubert, Zaz, Bénabar, Vincent Delerm, Dave, Tryo, Raphaël, Calogero or Gauvain Sers.
What’s next? He assures on RTL to have written “two songs, the first two of an album of twelve” which he hopes to release in “April 2025” for his 50-year career. A future record where he “intends” to pay tribute to Yvan Colonna, who died recently as a result of an attack in prison where he was serving his life sentence for the assassination of the prefect Erignac and whom he has always supported.