Listening is more than pleasant. Of the Preludeand up to Cap des Caissie, ten songs later, we are carried, with tenderness and benevolence: soft melodies finely calibrated, naturally memorable refrains, delicately complementary guitars, regular rhythm as in a vehicle with flexible suspension. Very nice album, what White noisesCaroline Savoie’s third.
But also sometimes disturbing, insomniac, terrifying and nightmarish… The texts are lined, tapped with frightening questions. Not only to the singer-songwriter, but to all of us. Fear and helplessness in the face of fear. Nothing to do, except to express it. apprehensions in Prelude “I’m just dreading the next dyke”. Vertigo of the future in Remains “What are we going to say to our children who will read our newspapers / Where the dark days stretch from one end to the other […] ? “It turns into a horror movie in the title song:” I never know what to say to me did you hear the walls open / Towards a delirious nightmare? »
In the middle of the circus of ignorance
Pleasant and terrible at the same time, therefore, this White noises. “We all have our worries, our very personal fears, but it’s as if now the urgency to act and the feeling of powerlessness were everywhere, not only because of the pandemic, but also with the rise of the right. , the state of the planet, all of what I call “the circus of ignorance” in White noises. We carry our concerns and the concerns of the world. It’s not easy when you’re chronically anxious like me. »
Hence the vital need for a certain balance, brought by this harmonious music which advances without worry or fear, composed by her, alone or with Joe Grass most often, with others too, such as Vincent Quirion and Vivianne Roy. , from the Hay Babies. “I’ve always been afraid of being too much in people’s faces. I needed a way to say what I really feel, sometimes with harsh, intense and even violent words, but without aggressiveness: I sing even more gently, and I did everything to make the music inviting. »
We all have our concerns, our very personal fears, but it’s as if now the urgency to act and the feeling of helplessness were everywhere, not only because of the pandemic, but also with the rise of the right, the state of the planet, all of what I call “the circus of ignorance” in White Noises
The meeting with Joe Grass, the ace of guitars, dobro, banjo, pedal steel, was providential. “He is very, very sweet! We know him better in Montreal, but he was born like me in New Brunswick. Me, after six years in Montreal, I came back home because of the pandemic: we found each other and we found our origins. »
A little Fleetwood Mac in Acadia
Common inspiration? Think Fleetwood Mac. She a little Christine McVie, he a little Lindsey Buckingham. “It’s a good example of pleasant music, with a regular rhythm that reassures, which conveys often very dark words. It is a paradox. Tormented loves, breakups, betrayals, nasty bickering, which are also airs that roll purring on the road. “That’s what I like the most. I really wanted to align songs that are taken well. The music, the melody, is to help us get through. It gives us the courage to ask tough questions, to admit and face our fears. »
“Just because I have a song called Scary Movie that it needed a film atmosphere gory of Halloween. We are all capable of making a film of fear. Yes, she talks about monsters who “always catch up” and she continues to ask questions that give butterflies inside: “Do you feel the hurricane growing / Who sleeps in your belly?” » There is an opera sequence near the end, we think of the famous phantom, but the looped music protects us admirably. Comfort function.
Time of tenderness and pain
The most beautiful and poignant song on the album is about sickness, decline, death. And of life before: “Sometimes I imagine you / Stepping over miles / Long past / Your knees weren’t crooked”. It’s simply called For grandpa. Caroline had just written the song and recorded it when her grandfather died. “Joe had just sent me his track of dobro when I learned it. It was as if it came from my grandfather. He had been ill for twenty years, that was going away, his condition had deteriorated not long before, but still. It’s hard to think it’s by chance. He will never have been able to hear it… In fact, I don’t know, but it played at his funeral. »
In 27, a song whose title refers to all the rock stars who died at the age of 27, and first to Amy Winehouse, who meant a lot to her, Caroline Savoie imagines herself dead, wonders if she will have been “worth it / When will be the end of everything”. And as she is also 27, she draws up a temporary balance sheet, in case: “I don’t know if I have tomorrow / Or the mornings that follow”. The album ends on a good morning, precisely, a day of celebration, joy, reunion. Buckle closed. In Prelude, ten songs earlier, she sang that she “would like to know how to hug for a while”. We understand that this crossing of the territory of apprehensions, anxieties and white fears allowed him to reach Cap-des-Caissie and to savor there… the present. “At the end of my street the day is reborn / And watches over roaring waters”, she sings.
Not alone. Lisa LeBlanc, the three Hay Babies and Chloé Breault are there, and the allied voices of Acadians are making waves. And clean place. The moment is happily entwined. “That was the goal! she exclaims at the end of the line. “Singing at the end of the album that I’m able to feel good in the moment, that it doesn’t take much, in the end, to ‘feel alive’. Good people, good music, and being at home. »