It was a beautiful moment to witness the first real meeting between Martha Wainwright and Fanny Britt. The first has just released her autobiography, Stories I Might Regret Telling Youand the second ensured the translation into French (Nothing bad has happened yet, coming out this Tuesday). Interview on the reconciliation of women-work-family.
Posted at 6:00 a.m.
When Martha Wainwright is told that she may be revealing too many intimate details in her autobiography, she replies, “I’m talking about what a lot of women go through. »
From being described as “sister to” and “daughter to”, Martha Wainwright has become an “artist mother”. And she reminds us that there is still a long way to go to change certain mentalities. During her divorce, a judge once criticized her for going on stage late at night. “He said to me: ‘You work at night. Is it good for children?” It was so shocking to me. »
Rock often rhymes with excess and celebrity. In her book, Martha Wainwright recounts her trips to New York with the sons of music stars, including Sean Lennon, Chris Stills and Harper Simon, and she even recounts having found the bill for her future wedding ring by mistake in her apartment while searching for his ex’s stash of illicit substances.
If there’s a good dose of sex, drugs and rock’n’roll in Stories I Might Regret Telling Youit is above all a poignant testimony to the reconciliation of women, work and family.
When one is part of the McGarrigle-Wainwright dynasty, let’s say one refers to the extended family, with all the love, conflict, loss and pressure that entails.
Always bring her back to her family? “I contributed to the myth,” confesses Martha Wainwright in an interview with the same quality that we find in her book, that of exposing her contradictions with authenticity.
Beyond all the fascinating anecdotes and experiences lived by Martha Wainwright, the strength of her autobiography lies in her rebellious and fragile pen. Whether it’s when she describes a violent episode with her mother or when she immediately confides on the first page of the book that her father wanted Kate to have an abortion when she was pregnant with her.
Martha Wainwright points out that she started writing her memoir with a husband (and their two boys), but things went downhill afterward. This marked the writing of the book – there is a lot of talk about her rocky divorce from Brad Albetta – and it explains the second, more emotional part.
The big challenge for me was to tell lots of stories in one. When I started, I had several voices in me: tea funny weirdo, the serious voice… I had to find the voice of the author. I found it by rewriting and rewriting.
Martha Wainwright
Was she concerned about the repercussions her book might have? “I never think about people’s reactions,” she says.
At the end, she told her editor: “ Just do it, I don’t care. I’m done. » « We have to assume things and look to the future. »
PHOTO BERNARD BRAULT, PRESS ARCHIVES
Anna McGarrigle, Martha and Rufus Wainwright, in 2017
vivid writing
“Asshole,” writes Martha Wainwright of the critic who wrote in 2010 that she may never have the pen of her father or brother. We are then at some 200and page of the book, following a performance Martha Wainwright gave at the Jazz Cafe, London, when she saw something immeasurable: she gave birth to a premature son in England, while his mother, suffering from cancer, is at the end of his life in Montreal. Doctors still won’t allow the baby to fly.
She will then have to mourn what she has experienced at least once. “My joy of being a mother in the company of my mother,” she writes.
Martha Wainwright has always wanted children. In the book, she insists that there are few role models in music. “For me, it was my mother and my aunt, but Kate and Anna had to work less to take care of their children. »
As we read, we learn that Martha Wainwright refused to be Leonard Cohen’s backing vocalist. If we expect to come across names like Mark Ronson, Emmylou Harris, Linda Ronstadt or the late Hal Willner, we are less expecting those of Robert Plant and Jimmy Fallon, who stayed at the Motel des Pentes, in Saint-Sauveur , at Martha Wainwright’s wedding.
There’s a lot of humor in name-dropping of the latter. We felt the same desire as when reading JustKids by Patti Smith. A desire that boils down to: “I would have liked to be there. »
PHOTO PHILIPPE BOIVIN, THE PRESS
Martha Wainwright
Forward facing
At one point in the book, Martha confesses that she often felt “average in everything”. Does she still feel that way after the release of her book, which received rave reviews?
I feel good just to have finished the book after seven years. I talk about some pretty tough stuff, so that was always on my mind. It brings back a bit everything I say in the past: being in the shadow of my family or, at least, thinking so, the death of my mother, the relationship with my father…
Martha Wainwright
” I had to get rid of the story and make room for my new family, she said in English. My children, my companion, here…”
Here is Ursa, the performance hall (but also the café and community center) she opened on Park Avenue, in Mile End, where we met her on a snowy morning in April (two days after seeing pictures of her and her brother Rufus in Montauk for Easter).
If Martha Wainwright cites the names of Lou Reed and Pete Townshend in her book, she also lists those of Patrick Watson, Elisapie, Ariane Moffatt and that of her great friend Ariel Engle (La Force). And in interviews, she praises the talent of artists who have performed at Ursa, including Anaïs Constantin, as well as the groups Night Lunch, Bon Enfant and Choses sauvage.
We then have the impression of witnessing the meeting of two worlds. Martha Wainwright makes an incredible bridge between the world and the Quebec scene. In the summer, she will perform all over Quebec, including at the Festif! of Baie-Saint-Paul and at the Festival de la chanson de Tadoussac.
PHOTO PHILIPPE BOIVIN, THE PRESS
Martha Wainwright with Fanny Britt, who translated her autobiography.
Who better than Fanny Britt for the translation?
“It’s a real godsend,” she says.
Fanny Britt often talked about Martha Wainwright on the radio. She even once said that she dreams of translating her words. When Quebec America asked him – just last fall – to ensure the French translation of Stories I Might Regret Telling Youshe thanked the heavens despite the very short deadline.
Fanny Britt was raised on the music of the McGarrigle sisters. “It’s a big part of my emotional memory. »
Later, she was seduced by Martha Wainwright’s mix of “ferocity and fragility” in solo performance.
Fanny Britt was 27 when she separated from the father of her first child. She thought she was too young to go through such an ordeal. “Martha’s songs released and legitimized my anger. I listened so much Ball&Chain. »
After interviewing Fanny Britt, and before meeting Martha Wainwright, we witnessed the first meeting between the two women. “In fact, I had already met her after a show, but I was so starstruck that I lost all my means,” said Fanny Britt.
It was nice to see the two women talking about the meaning of such a song or about shared custody. “The frankness in relation to your father and your mother does us good. It reconciles us with our families,” Fanny Britt told her.
When we left the Ursa, Martha Wainwright had not yet told Fanny Britt that she had read the book extensively. Jane, the Fox and Me to his children. And that, often, she couldn’t help but shed a tear.
In the English version of Fanny Britt’s book Jane, the fox and mewe are talking about the music of Kate and Anna McGarrigle.
No doubt: Fanny Britt was the one who had to translate Stories I Might Regret Telling You. For having read the book in both languages, its translation… rock !
Nothing bad has happened yet
Martha Wainwright. Translation by Fanny Britt
Quebec America
288 pages