Posted at 8:00 a.m.
Julie and Dany gave us an appointment at the LaTraque studio in Montreal, where they are rehearsing for the launch of their album. “It’s the first time we’ve played these songs again! exclaims Julie Doiron.
These songs, they were composed in a fortnight of confinement, at the very beginning of the pandemic. It was in May 2020, in the house that the couple had just bought in New Brunswick, where they found themselves in extremis alone both. They tell their daily life, with its moments of tenderness, boredom or release, sometimes simply guitar-voice, sometimes in a much more distorted way, but always in a gentle atmosphere of freedom and voluntary simplicity.
“We wrote them in our kitchen,” says Julie. “Basically, it took 10 days,” explains Dany. At the time, the idea was to get bored and not to make an album of it, even if they were already toying with the project of a duo.
PHOTO MARTIN TREMBLAY, THE PRESS
Dany Placard and Julie Doiron
It’s not what we would have envisioned for Julie & Dany’s first album. But it’s fun to get it out like that.
Julie Doiron
The two musicians were already collaborating – Dany plays bass on Julie’s most recent album and often accompanies her on stage. The duo allowed them to get out of their comfort zone, both in the composition, the themes addressed and in the language – there are as many songs in French as in English. But no question of abandoning their respective careers.
“It’s super important that we be independent, not to give up,” says Julie, who we knew as a member of the duo Eric’s Trip and who has a brilliant solo career on the independent folk scene. Same thing with Dany Placard, free spirit with a psychedelic country-rock tendency. “If Julie goes on tour, am I going to be alone at home feeling depressed? No. I’m going to go and record Placard alone on my side. »
But what is the advantage of working as a couple? “As we don’t stay in the same province, it gives us more opportunities to see each other,” says Julie. Danny nods. “For a year, we rarely see each other when it’s not to work. With the schedules, the children, the ten-hour drive between the two…” “That’s the main advantage! »
There is also the pleasure of doing harmonies together, of showing each other new guitar chords, of simply creating.
“Making music is a fairly intimate act,” explains Julie. It’s impossible to make good music if you don’t have a connection with the musicians. As a couple, we are able to be even more intimate, so that’s another advantage. It’s rare that we don’t agree. »
fan of the other
To the question “what do you like most about the other as an artist”, Julie and Dany take time to answer. Dany finally starts. “I think Julie’s lyrics are really cool. ” ” Thanks very much ! Me too, I like your texts, your images. This sentence in Thaws : “I’m afraid that the jelly will catch, and that the stars will collide.” It’s nice ! But we’re both fans of each other. I find it difficult to choose one thing in particular. »
She appreciates his attitude when he composes and his taste for exploration. He admires her creativity and ideas. They like to say that they are complementary musically, but also in the rhythm: as much it is organized and prepared, as much it is often ” all over the place » and « go around in circles » (it’s her who says it!).
“I think we learn from each other, analyzes Dany. Me, I learn to be patient, she, to be structured. »
But beyond their differences and what connects them, it is the obvious joy of being together that emerges from these 11 songs. Could we say that they made a love album? “Yes, really,” Julie replies. I hope there will be no divorce record! »
They laugh loudly. Nevertheless, they could never have imagined themselves writing songs that talk about making a garden or the first shared coffee at the Jean-Talon market, about love from a distance, but also about the fact that there is no got more Cheez Whiz in the fridge, like in the song mayo.
Julia laughs. “Besides, it wasn’t Cheez Whiz, it was Boivin! “Yes, Petit Crémeux is really better.” “But it didn’t rhyme!” »
Listening to the album again reminds them of the pandemic, the radio playing all the time, the daily press briefings. But also the house “not yet loaded with stock”, the “break” of being together, their good humor despite everything. Result: an album created in confinement which is not a confinement album. “I think we succeeded in this bet,” says Dany.
“I hope people will listen to it,” says Julie. But the ideal, it will be to make fun shows. They also have many shows on the agenda, which will allow Julie to shoot in Quebec for a rare time, and Dany, in Canada for the first time.
“I want people to have fun listening to it,” says Dany. Let them smile, let them want to put it back on and turn up the sound, let them come and see us perform. We did it for that, to generate emotions. Make people dance in the kitchen… and make them cry. »
folk-rock
Julie & Danny
Julie Doiron and Dany Placard
Simone Records