Jonathan Richman’s band The Modern Lovers served up a garage tribute to the Cubist master (Pablo Picasso, 1976); Bowie sang the praises of Andy Warhol on Hunky Dory (1971); more recently, John Cale hailed Magritte (on HoboSapiens2003), as Paul Simon did 20 years earlier with Rene and Georgette Magritte With Their Dog After the Warfrom the album Hearts and Bones. Painting inspires rock like the late Jacques Hurtubise today inspires Hippie Hourrah for his second album, Individual exhibition. A casual discussion in the studio of singer Cédric Marinelli.
Rue Saint-Denis, at the very top of Esco, of which Marinelli is co-owner. The small bar has become his painting and screen printing workshop, his most recent canvases hanging on the walls. The singer, as well as guitarist Gabriel Lambert (of the psych-pop group Anemone), awaits us, drummer and co-producer Miles Dupire-Gagnon (Elephant Stone) and us. Bassist and co-producer Samuel Gemme will arrive in the middle of a discussion on the conditions for touring young bands in Quebec.
Alix and her family members told me stories of Jacques, it was all inspiring
The conversation wanders happily, let’s pull the bridle to bring it back to the subject of our meeting: Individual exhibitionthe tangy and conceptual album by Hippie Hourrah, a disc “more pop and more worked” than his first, released in the summer of 2021, believes Cédric Marinelli, who formerly led the group bearing his name, bringing together substantially the same collaborators, starting with the writer Ralph Elawani co-writing the texts, who, on this new album, plays the role of the journalist full of himself pounding Jacques Hurtubise with questions.
Preparing to go on tour for the whole summer, the guys from Hippie Hooray wanted an album “that gives off the energy of live more than the previous disc, but just as improvised in its forms, says Gabriel. The other aspect we wanted was to present more energetic songs”, an effect increased tenfold by the luminous colors of the keyboards which smear each of these songs.
“Nothing right, but nothing wrong”
The initial spark for this album was in a way the death of Hurtubise, in 2014. The famous Quebec painter, known for his canvases with raw and colorful shapes, like the one that adorns the album cover (a reproduction of ‘Onibaba1972), was a member of the family of drummer and percussionist Alix Lepage, who collaborated on the recording of the album.
When he died, says Cédric, the garage rock group Les Marinellis had composed this song entitled Tarot Part 1 2placed at the end of the album Island of dreams (2015). “I had never met him, but I know he loved the Stones and Dylan, I mention it on the new album. I didn’t know him, but I liked his paintings. Thanks to Alix, the musicians had access to his archives, to his very old studio, located in Terrebonne. “Alix and her family members told me stories of Jacques, it was all inspiring. »
Plunging into his work notebooks and the catalogs of the many exhibitions he has presented, the musicians carried out research work to design this album described by Gabriel as “around, from and a little about Jacques Hurtubise”. “A concept album of which the painter, his work and his life, is one of the concepts — for example, you could start from the title of one of his paintings and then make very free associations with text ideas. Other elements were directly inspired by what was found in the catalogs of his exhibitions. It’s almost a report — “from the creative nonfiction in music”, suggests Samuel Gemme instead.
“A bit like in this sentence about [dite par le journaliste et écrivain américain] : “He’s the most accurate, but the least factual”, adds Gem. In the album, there is nothing exact, but nothing wrong either, and it’s a bit in this spirit that we did it — with a bit of humor too”, which transpires in several rhymes, in the very typical, almost theatrical interpretation of Cédric Marinelli (a voice recognizable among all!), and in the interventions of the fictional journalist.
“It reminds me of the album Rise Above [2007] from Dirty Projectors! Gabriel jumps, explaining: Dirty Projectors had the idea of recording their own version of the first album of the legendary hardcore group Black Flag (damaged, 1981), but from memory, its leader, David Longstreth, claiming not to have listened to it for 15 years. “They started from their memories of the album to record this version” by distorting reality. “That was the concept! »
” I find this cool when the common thread of a project seems nebulous, adds Cédric. There are all these disparate elements left and right through which one is looking for a theme to tie them together. On our album, it’s the interviews with Hurtubise, it’s us who talk a bit about painting techniques. There’s a nod to Henriette Valium and this homeless person who went into bars on Mount Royal to recite poems. »