Alain Souchon has been one of the major figures of French song since the 70s. His career is notably marked by his collaboration, his very strong friendship with Laurent Voulzy since 1974. We welcome, with pleasure, Alain Souchon at franceinfo to pass the week together and come back to five of his essential titles as an opportunity to reread his career. He released a best of a few weeks ago: (New collection, including three CDs with 57 very well-known titles or a little less and today, we are talking about the song: The bagad of Lann-Bihoué (1978).
franceinfo: In 1974 with the arrival of Laurent Voulzy in your life, the titles Can and I’m ten years old testify that your career is definitely launched. Has Laurent Voulzy’s musical writing changed your writing?
Alain Souchon: Completely. That is to say that I am really a music lover. That is to say, I don’t know anything about it. And he is a real creator with sophisticated harmonic suites, he is a real musician, so his way of seeing things dazzled me. It is harmony and that is beautiful. So, I took advantage of it. Its pop side fed me. I was happy to come up with something that I was looking for without knowing it.
It is also the period of Rockollection which will be a huge success and mark the summer of 1977. But one does not go without the other. I have the impression that you have accompanied each other, helped each other, that you have grown up together.
It’s not a job like any other to make songs, that is to say that all of a sudden, you find yourself among the people, on the radio stations. So it’s a job that fascinates us because we are in our room, we do things and then, all of a sudden, it flies away like that. So the fact that these things fly away on the condition that we are both together, that dazzled us a little and united us.
Your third album will be released: Never happy (1977). You highlight the difficulties of your time, also express your personal emotions, depression even with Hello mom bobo. This song will make an impression. Did it also mark a period in your life?
Yeah, I found it funny. I had a small incident in skiing. I had been very scared. And my brother, who was a mountain guide, joined me and said: “You know when you fell, you screamed: Mum“ and I was 27 years old and I was 3000 meters above sea level!
“Shouting ‘Mom’ didn’t make much sense, but that kind of instinct fascinated me. And the song came like this: ‘Hello mom bobo’. Men are marked by their mother, and it’s beautiful, that instinctively, in a nervous way, even at 60, you can say: ‘Mum, mum’. It is overwhelming. “
Alain Souchonto franceinfo
What do you keep from your mother?
She was a cultivated, pleasant, funny, somewhat light-hearted, easy-going woman who had it all because my father died. Since she was very fond of literature and everything, she said: “Should make a living writing but I’m not Kafka“, because I remember she liked Kafka a lot,”and I am not Balzac“. She started writing for the Harlequin collection. She knew what she was doing and laughed at herself. It was hard work anyway! So she did plenty and she raised us like that with my brother, Patrick.
She has accompanied you a lot in this discovery of writing, reading too.
Yes. I was left at night in an apartment, because my parents went out every night, with a lady looking after me and there was a huge library at home. I remember books like Letters from my mill by Alphonse Daudet that I read quite early, obviously Robinson Crusoe, books that have marked me a lot.
You kept that storytelling side.
That is to say that afterwards, I became interested in the song because I liked it a lot.
“The songs that I liked were the songs that got you on board with the lyrics. That’s when they told a story.”
Alain Souchonto franceinfo
French songs were strong for that because she told a lot of stories with ingenuity, with the choice of words. All the songs of Georges Brassens are sublime, those of Léo Ferré too.
You have always evoked the company and its faults, throughout your career, I would like us to talk about the song The bagad of Lann-Bihoué. Do you care a lot about this song?
Yes. Brittany is a place that I really liked, where I was going to spend my holidays when I was little and Laurent too. The music, with this particular rhythm of the bagad, inspired Laurent a lot. It reflects this kind of disappointment that you have when you’re a teenager, a disappointment in life, you tell yourself that’s not how you imagined life. It’s less good after all! All human beings have this reaction.
Alain Souchon is currently on tour, he will for example be on January 3, 2022 in Montbéliard, on 4 Nantes. Also in January 2022, he will pass through Marseille, Dijon, Amnéville, Paris, etc …