Almost a year after the launch (in the midst of a pandemic) of his second album, To all the bastards, Frenchman Eddy de Pretto is burning to finally “bring his music to life”. Passing through Star Academy Sunday, back next summer at the Francos, he intends to make Montreal benefit from it.
Posted at 7:00 a.m.
In a meeting room at the Fairmont The Queen Elizabeth hotel in downtown Montreal, Eddy de Pretto greets us with a warm “hello” accompanied by an outstretched fist, a famous substitute for the handshake. His blue eyes express the smile behind his mask.
The French singer-songwriter is happy to be here, he tells us before the interview officially begins. He will be passing through Star Academy Sunday (in the company of William Cloutier, Laurence Jalbert and Paul Piché) and it has just been announced that he will be one of the headliners of the Francos next summer, with a concert at the MTelus on June 17.
In Montreal, “there really is an energy,” says the singer. After playing in a crowded MTelus for the first time in 2018, he knew he had to come back.
I keep saying it, a goddamn thing happened in that room that night. [à Montréal]. I felt something and I will always remember it, I said to my team when I left: “It’s too good, it’s too strong, there is a sympathy, a benevolence, a love that we don’t have in our French cinemas.”
Eddy de Pretto
Again, Eddy de Pretto can consider going on stage to present this album which will soon be a year old, To all the bastards. His tour, which has been postponed many times, should begin in the spring and we announce his presence in several festivals in the following months. When he imagines his return to the stage, the singer says to himself that there will surely be “a particular emotion”. “I’m going to come, I’m going to cry, what! We dreamed of it so much! »
The stage, for Eddy de Pretto, is his reason for practicing his profession. If he is in a hurry to return in front of his audience, he admits that he somewhat postponed his report to the concerts in question during the long pandemic break.
PHOTO SARAH MONGEAU-BIRKETT, LA PRESSE ARCHIVES
Eddy de Pretto at the MTelus in April 2019
“Before, it was just natural. I was excited, but I had no fear, no anxiety. But there, it’s been a long time and there has been so much soul-searching and so many things inside me that have changed with COVID-19. I admit that there is a pressure to go up in front of a room of 5000-6000 people! “His few performances in front of a small audience at the end of last year nevertheless allowed him to make a clear observation: “I forgot all the anxieties, I said to myself: “In fact, this is my life. I wanted to stop everything, but no. [Ces moments] serious helped me get over the pandemic. »
Blocking, then inspiration
With his first album, the autobiographical Priest, released in 2018, the 28-year-old singer-songwriter has carved out a path paved with success. His music, between song, pop, hip-hop and electro, has helped redefine contemporary French song.
His second try, To all the bastards, launched in March 2021. Critics and fans alike embraced it, but something was missing. “It was a union album. I wanted to say that I had heard [les fans] on the first album, I wanted to rally the discourse and that we be together even more, says Eddy de Pretto. There was a bit more universal side that I wanted to get and it didn’t flourish there at all. I did not feel the unifying side. We were all parked at home, alone, waiting with anxiety and stress! »
The last year has been “very hard psychologically”, says Eddy de Pretto. “Not being able to bring the album to life, meet people, project anything… We postponed the tour three times, which we still haven’t done! The tall redhead, pink cap screwed on his head, fiddles with the rings on his fingers, while continuing.
You released an album last March and because you don’t have the opportunity to bring it to life, you have to quickly find your composure and things to tell quickly. You have the impression of having given everything in the album, of being drained of energy and there, you have to renew your speech.
Eddy de Pretto
This pressure, he felt it when he was barely emerging from an amorphous period inflicted by the year 2020. “I was totally frozen psychologically during the first confinement, I did not know what to do, it was very violent for me, he said. I had to cash this. Needless to say, the inspiration was not there. “Nothing came out, I didn’t want to tell anything,” said Eddy de Pretto. But there, I did a lot of work to regain my confidence. »
Il mentionne les collaborations, parues à l’automne, avec Julien Doré (sur son album aimée) et Yseult (les deux chansons Pause et Kiss). S’il ne collabore pas avec d’autres artistes sur ses albums, « [se] nourishing other energies” helped him a lot to get back into creation mode. With Yseult, “we wanted to collaborate, we composed these two songs and we immediately said to ourselves that we had to release them. We liked them, they were soft, and I really needed softness and roundness at that time”.
The infinite self
Eddy de Pretto shows a lot of openness when answering questions from The Press. With a frank gaze, the singer-songwriter gives more than we dare ask of him, while we ask him about his moods and feelings. In his music, it’s the same principle, pushed even further, since he chose the song to explore, understand and tell all his moods.
Does he sometimes feel dizzy when he sees how many (more and more) people listen to his confidences?
“It’s funny that you ask me that, because the older I get, the more I say to myself: ‘Wait, what am I talking about, what am I doing?’ laughing. But I put no modesty in my writing, none. Right or wrong ! It’s my way of feeling entitled to tell my story. I love telling about the infinitely small, the infinitely self. Because I have the impression that these are things that some people will also see in their infinitely small and that it will speak to them. »
To continue to speak to those who listen to him, Eddy de Pretto no longer sees himself going through albums for the moment. “I want to make some sounds again, but I’m going to stop betting on big releases for a while, because I’ve been terrified by all the dynamics [que cela implique] “, he explains. The world of music and the listening habits of the public have changed, also underlines the singer.
“With all that you put on the album, I just want to like it, to go with the feeling, to make sounds, says Eddy de Pretto. And when I like some, to take them out, without putting any pressure on me. I don’t project myself on the idea of making an album, just on the fact of making music. I just want to speak again. »