Listen to “Un cri”, the final unreleased song by Johnny Hallyday

It is “the last unreleased song” by Johnny Hallyday, “there will be no others”, assures his widow Laeticia. Taken from oblivion six years after the death of “Taulier”, this song called A shout has been available since Thursday November 16 at 1:40 p.m. on all streaming platforms, as a prelude to the Friday release of a new compilation of tracks Made in Rock’n Roll.

A shoutJohnny recorded it in 2017 in Los Angeles with songs from his 51st and final studio album, Mon pays, c’est l’amour, released in October 2018. But the song was ultimately forgotten because “in its basic version”, it “was too similar to other songs on the record”, explains to the Parisian Maxim Nucci alias Yodelice, with whom Johnny made his last records.

“Forget how we nail coffins”

“I had been given nothing, not even a lucky star, a name that traces a line of pride / I had to take blows, dodge bullets, forget like one nails coffins”, sings Hallyday in this song rediscovered in the drawers last January by Parlophone boss Antoine Gouiffes-Yan. Laeticia having given her agreement to take it out, Yodelice took charge of re-dressing with electricity what was initially a “traditional blues”further escorting him “gospel tambourines” and of “brass”.

The same Yodelice who had worked with Johnny for his last album, taken with a sudden urgency to record after learning in October 2016 that he had cancer. “When he begins his fight against illness, he has this visceral, vital need (…) to record a new album. He wants to hold on to music, to his friends”remembers Laeticia Hallyday in The Parisian. The lyrics of the song are written by a French musician based in Los Angeles, Vincent Jacob, who plays in the rock group Yard Of Blondes. It turns out that he is also the music teacher of Johnny and Laeticia’s daughters, Jade and Joy, at the French high school in Los Angeles.