The meeting was to take place in a café on Avenue du Parc. But the location, which was very noisy, turned out to be a bad choice. “Come on, let’s go to the YMCA across the street,” Pierre Flynn told me. That says a lot about this high caliber artist who knows how to leave his ego in the locker room.
It is therefore in a room with unfavorable lighting, without the shadow of herbal tea or apple juice, that the creator of The cursed machine has agreed to look back on a half-century of career, an event that he is highlighting with a very promising tour.
This show, where Pierre Flynn revisits his great songs alone on the piano, is one of the highlights of the French-speaking edition of Coup de cœur which takes off this Thursday.
How can we talk about a 50-year journey, if not by going back to the sources, that is to say to Gladstone, the “school group” that the 16-year-old Pierre Flynn formed with bassist Mario Légaré and guitarist Jean Dorais ? “We mainly did covers. I remember I was singing Woodstock, by Joni Mitchell. »
After a one-year stay in Ottawa, Légaré found his friend Flynn at the Cégep de Saint-Laurent. The latter, a literature student, decides to perfect his piano technique, an instrument that he has until then tamed as an autodidact.
The Légaré-Flynn duo performs in clubs.
PHOTO PIERRE CÔTÉ, LA PRESSE ARCHIVES
The October group with Pierre Flynn in the foreground, in 1974
I recently found a piece of paper on which appears the draft of The cursed machine and our repertoire. All my songs were in English. We had our ass on the fence. The one who changed the direction of the wind was Charlebois.
Peter Flynn
When the group Octobre was formed in 1971 and the members worked on a first record in 1972, it was clear that the songs would be in French. At this time, the groups Harmonium and Beau Dommage were in the making. “Offenbach had a first record, Les Séguin and Gilles Valiquette arrived. »
Pierre Flynn, Jean Dorais, Mario Légaré and Pierre Hébert (drums) created the songs for the first opus during 1972. The sound has nothing to do with what we hear in Quebec. “For us, the label of progressive group did not exist. This sound was that of Gentle Giant, King Crimson or Yes. In our heads, we were rocking. »
Like several musicians of his generation, Pierre Flynn is a child of the Beatles. “But I also loved jazz, Léo Ferré, James Brown and Stravinsky. I made my own poutine from all of that. »
On July 26, 1973, Octobre inaugurated a series of shows at the Petite Bastille, the former Quebec prison, in the company of the Ville Émard Blues Band and Contraction. The group’s first self-titled album was released a few weeks later. It contains some bombs, including If we left, In my city, The alive and of course, The cursed machine.
“It’s all in the tone, lively, enthusiastic, in the firmness that we feel in Pierre Flynn,” writes Gisèle Tremblay of Duty.
After this disc, the group produced at a breakneck pace: The new landsin 1974, Survival, in 1975, and The highway of dreams, in 1977. In the mid-1970s, Quebec experienced an incomparable musical excitement. But also a great nationalist fever.
We vaguely felt that it was our turn to offer contemporary Quebec rock that reflected our generation. We were comrades from that battlefield. There was a brotherhood mixed with a certain rivalry, of course.
Peter Flynn
The apotheosis of this “battlefield” took place on Saturday June 26, 1976, during the show Ok, there we go, at the foot of Mount Royal. That evening, 28 artists from Harmonium, Beau Dommage, Octobre and Contraction, as well as Richard Séguin and Raôul Duguay, sang in front of a huge crowd. Serge Fiori describes the imposing ensemble as “the first popular symphony orchestra”.
But in 1980, after the record Illegals, the members of October decide to end their adventure. “It was not internal disagreement that caused the end. The last record worked moderately and in concert, it had become more difficult. It died down slowly. »
Pierre Flynn goes back on the road with other musicians. He is thinking of making a record. But the big labels that lined their pockets over the last decade are no longer there.
He nevertheless creates great records: The scent of chance (1987), Gardens of Babylon (1991), Mirador (2001) and, more recently, On the ground (2015). Several songs (Possession, On the road, On the run, Traces in the sand) are very successful. “Going to radio was a sign of compromise for some purists. For me, it represented a meeting with a wider audience. »
The songwriter often jokingly refers to his production rate.
PHOTO ALAIN ROBERGE, LA PRESSE ARCHIVES
Pierre Flynn show at the Just for Laughs cabaret, in 2003
Writing is a long process for me, because I attach a lot of importance to it. I have never been the most organized, methodical, or efficient creator.
Peter Flynn
Did the Pierre Flynn who released his first record in 1973 imagine for a moment that he would have a career 50 years later? ” No way ! With my girlfriend at the time, we tried to imagine what we would be in the year 2000. We saw ourselves as very old at 46 years old. »
The Pierre Flynn who is in front of me is talkative, energetic, lively. Time does not seem to have any influence over him. “I am aware that I am 69 years old and I will not make ten albums yet. That said, I still want to write and make music, even if I find it stressful. But hey, if I did another job, I would find it stressful. That’s me! »
This tour, which is in full development, runs until spring 2024. Let’s hope that it will be enriched with new dates.
At Gesù, Friday, November 3, at 8 p.m., as part of Coup de cœur francophone