The album Dynasty bears a title that evokes history, experience or even accumulated wealth. In the communications disseminated by the record company ahead of its release, it is noted that “musically, we [y] notes a certain return to the rock-grunge-indie musical energies of the beginnings”, in 2009. Certainly, the electric guitar finds a more important place in the musician’s sound universe, but never out of nostalgia or to return to the sources: on the contrary, on Dynastysinger-songwriter Benoît Pinette is above all interested in what Tire le coyote can still become, after fifteen years and six albums.
Benoît Pinette had not arranged to meet us at the record store Le Vacarme, rue Saint-Hubert, only to allow us to take beautiful photos of stalls full of albums. The music lover had brought with him a selection of works each having, in their own way, influenced a detail of the creation of Dynastyhe said. This conversation was going to be a chat between music geeks, Pinette putting selected pieces from her beautiful stack of albums on the record player — the best kind of interview!
“Here, listen to how the drums sound on one side and the guitars on the other,” he recommends, after having placed the needle on one side of the exquisite Dragon New Warm Mountain I Believe In You (2022), by the American alt-folk band Big Thief. “When I sent the tapes to mix, I said to the engineer: ‘The finale of All dressedI want it to sound like that!” »
There is Elvis Perkins in his pile, and two albums by his collaborator Sam Cohen, a way of illustrating where this desire to hear folk songs differently comes from, a desire which, timidly, could already be heard on the previous In the first round of the obvious (2022). Early on this new album, fans of Tire le coyote will be comforted by The observatory (with a subtly noisy introduction), a skin-deep ballad of which Pinette has the secret, but from the next, Freedom (is following the plan)the musician looks elsewhere.
” In Freedomthere is still a pop side, in the moderate rhythm of the thing, a rhythm that I had never done before, explains Benoît. I had written a text which still bears a little on death, but at the same time, I did not want to redo The sky is backorder [tirée de Désherbage, 2017]. I think it has been emphasized enough, that I was melancholy! » lets the musician escape, laughing.
Thus, we will hear Dynasty also like the album of a musician looking at his musical project. And recognizing that he had to move beyond the framework he set for himself, with the albums and popular success that followed. “I felt the need to change from the moment I felt like I was becoming a little sick of what I was doing myself. » And this saving ambient-instrumental duo that he forms with his accomplice and co-director Marc-André Landry, named Demain déluge, played an important role in the new artistic direction of Tire le coyote.
“Tomorrow’s a flood, it’s a bit like that: me a little nauseated to hear myself sing, honestly,” admits Pinette. I’m a little tired of having the same reflexes on the guitar. Somewhere, with Tomorrow Deluge, there was this desire to just see if we are capable of living differently elsewhere, artistically speaking. »
In Dynastythere is everything that the duo learned with Demain déluge: the way to integrate other sounds, other orchestral approaches, other production techniques into the song from Tire le coyote. Going back through Benoît’s pile of albums, we come across a Sonic Youth. “The beginning of the song Fireworksthe idea came to me [de la manière du guitariste] Thurston Moore, at least in his solo projects. That, and a mix with The War On Drugs. »
Then, from his pile, Benoît pulls out an album by Canadian indie-folk author Chad VanGaalen, “who works on his recordings in spontaneity,” emphasizes Pinette. “For the new album, we worked differently, [Marc-André] Landry and me: I didn’t wait to have a batch tunes to go into the studio with musicians. Rather, we edited the songs to the maximum of our capacity, the two of us in the studio, before inviting the musicians to join. »
The most important record that Benoît put in his pile before meeting us at Vacarme is the third by Leonard Cohen, Songs of Love and Hate (1971). “It’s the album with Famous Blue Raincoat », recalls Pinette. But it was not she who served as a spark plug for the creation of Dynasty : it’s rather Avalanchewhich opens Cohen’s album, but also Pinette, who made a very free adaptation of it.
Cohen’s memory still hovers at the very beginning of side B: the song Baldy refers to the Mount Baldy Zen Center, where, after a grueling tour in the mid-1990s, the Canadian poet went to recharge his batteries, and which Benoît Pinette visited.
“It had a huge effect on me. The memory of Leonard Cohen is still present on the album, it colored the writing of the songs. I spoke of melancholy earlier, it comes to me quite easily when I write, but at the same time, what I find beautiful in Cohen’s gaze is his lucidity. The search for light and beauty through all the mess of life. I like that the characters in my songs are looking for something, because that’s what touched me about finding myself at Cohen’s Buddhist monastery: I found myself on the scene of his own search for balance. »
Dynastyby Tire le coyote, was published on the La Tribu label.