TALK | Under a lucky star

Not long ago, TALK dreamed of having an agent, a record deal and chart success. He already had all that – and even hundreds of millions of online listeners – before launching The Lord of the Flies & Birds & Beesan album where he embraces his penchant for rock that thinks big and hair metal.




TALK is not yet a household name, but it already resonates in Quebec much louder than anywhere else in America. Not so much because he made a good impression on the show Everyone speaks on October 15 because he made two notable appearances at the Quebec Summer Festival: in 2022 as the opening act for Luke Combs and last July just before Imagine Dragons.

He too was marked by it. Before singing in front of a huge crowd on the Plains of Abraham – 60,000 or 70,000 spectators – on his first visit to Quebec, he gave his biggest concert ever in a room of 400 people… We are not surprised to hear him say that this gigantic walkabout is one of the great moments of his young life.

TALK is the artistic name of Nicholas Durocher, born in Ottawa to a mother from Val-d’Or and an Ontario father. From his Quebec roots, he still has his name and French colored with a thick Anglo accent. And a song, The ziguezonwhich he enjoys singing at all his shows in Quebec and which he even had added to the Quebec version of his album The Lord of the Flies & Birds & Beespublished Friday.





The discrepancy between La Bottine’s response song and his own could not be greater. TALK likes catchy rock that displays its ambitions. We find in his songs a grandeur inspired by Queen (History) and Elton John, but transposed into tunes that also recall the tights-wearing rockers of the 1980s.

“My father listened to the Stones, the Beatles, The Mamas & the Papas, good songwriters,” says the young man, to explain his rock heritage.

Around 10 or 11 years old, I discovered KISS, Def Leppard and hair metal. I really liked that, because it wasn’t very serious. I like color and sparkles and they had that.

TALK

TALK finds that rock is too self-conscious these days. He wanted to bring back madness, positivity and theater. He also showed off when he was invited to the Late Late Show by James Corden to sing about his success Run Away to Mars : he wore a kind of space suit and had a star drawn on his right eye.





Arena rock

No doubt, this guy has showmanship. He has to, because he never wanted to play bar rock. The image that emerges when listening to his songs, almost all colored by a guitar solo, is a jubilant arena.


PHOTO MARTIN TREMBLAY, THE PRESS

TALK launched its album The Lord of the Flies & Birds & Bees Friday.

When I write, I always wonder if it would sound good in an arena. If I can imagine the crowd singing along, it’s because I have a good chorus.

TALK

TALK discovered her powerful voice late, towards the end of the high school, when he started singing to “impress the girls”. He says this with a smile, knowing full well that entire generations of guys before him have picked up a guitar or stood behind a microphone in the hopes of getting noticed by the opposite sex. He had the voice. “It took me a while to realize that I could also write songs,” he emphasizes, however.

If, musically, his songs have something light, his lyrics are not necessarily. Run Away to Mars talks about loneliness and To Little Bit Happy, to learn to love yourself. Afraid of the Darkon the other hand, is not as dark as it may seem: among other things, it invites us to tell people that we love… that we love them.

“My songs that people like the most are the real songs, which are also important to me. They come from the heart and I think people feel it, says the 28-year-old. Run Away to Mars no longer belongs to me. She passed me. She now belongs to everyone who loves her. I think that’s why we make songs: to offer them to people. »

TALK opens for Shania Twain on Wednesday at the Bell Centre.


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