His return was eagerly awaited. Woodkid, author in 2013 of one of the outstanding albums of the decade, the epic and orchestral "The Golden Age" (800,000 albums sold and more than 200 concerts in the world) unveiled last Friday a powerful title and clip, "Goliath", very promising precursors of a second album promised this year. The brilliant Yohann Lemoine, 37 years old, director acclaimed for fifteen years by the pop gotha, from "Born ToDie" by Lana Del Rey to "Sign Of The Times" by Harry Styles via the tour by Pharrell Williams, we exclusively tells about his return to music, his return to Paris, his return to earth ...
You announced in 2014 to step back with music. Why this return?
WOODKID. In fact, I never stopped making music, but I did it in a less media-friendly way. I needed to make collaborations which enrich me, make me learn, I needed to potash books of musical theory. After my first album, I realized that I took myself very seriously, I told myself a lot. I thought I knew everything when I knew nothing at all. I had to start turbinating again very seriously.
You wanted to get into cinema ...
Yes, I wanted to make a film. With my production, we embarked on two projects but I completely wallowed. I couldn't find the subject that pierced me, I was a bad screenwriter, a poor developer. Maybe I'm just a director, we'll see ... At the same time, things were starting to boil in me, about what I felt on my small scale of the evolution of the world, and I said to myself that the best the means was to express it in music and images, since both are part of my identity. Five years ago, I started working on an album and made it grow slowly.
With other musicians?
A lot: Tanguy Destable, alias Tepr, Son Lux ... I also learned a lot from People, a collective in which I have participated for four years in Berlin with incredible musicians like Bon Iver and Feist. The idea is to work together for a week and to present our creations to the public at the end. It opened my eyes to many things.
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Where is the album?
It is finished, warm in a trunk. He waits to roar (laughs). I promised it would be released in 2020 and it will be released in 2020. Obviously, the making of the clips is affected by the confinement, but that's okay. I am not going to be killed by this virus.
Why did you choose to come back with "Goliath"?
It is a love song that talks about a larger subject, the notion of dominant and dominated and the hope that the individual can fight against the great forces. In the coal mine of the clip, we can see lots of things, the smallness of man in the face of the ecological challenge, in the face of the rise of the extreme right in our countries, which terrifies me and makes me angry. Musically, I also needed a track that would transition between the two albums. I'll pick up where we left off and take you somewhere else, where my sound and my words went.
Will this disc surprise us?
I think yes. I did it to overcome and heal many things. I am more tender with myself, less strident. The orchestra is still there, but less emphatic and less Hollywood. I still have a crazy love for Los Angeles, New York and my American friends, but I was a bit disillusioned with the American dream that fascinated me. I realized that I missed France and I came back to live in Paris. I also really liked to sing in French with Louis Garrel on this magnificent song by Yves Simon (Editor's note: "L'Aérogramme de Los Angeles", in 2018, on the cover album "Génération (s) éperdue ( s) ”) . I didn't do it on this one - which is in English and maybe other languages - but I will do it again on an album.
You also created music for the stylist Nicolas Ghesquière and his fashion shows for Louis Vuitton.
I had the chance to work with people I admire, like Nicolas, who does an extraordinary job on the collision of colors and textures. In fashion as in music, I love the compatibility of incompatible. The creative freedom he gave me greatly nourished my album.
Where are you confined?
In Paris, in my apartment near the ring road. I am afraid for my parents, my relatives, the world around me, but I have no right to complain, I am one of the privileged, I have work and I am busy ... My tour is postponed (Editor's note: it was to start on May 19 in Poland) but it does not matter. I, who usually have excess moods on these subjects, find myself putting them into perspective. I waited seven years, I can wait a little longer.
