“I go into the Costes to have a drink / But the waitress blows my mind / I don't have a reservation / I come out looking like an idiot / It annoys me”sang Helmut Fritz in 2009. This hit allowed the artist, who dreamed of himself as a rock star, to become an icon of the decade. Fifteen years after this success as incredible as it was improbable and while he was part of the tour I Got A Feelingthe 49-year-old singer looked back on his career, his good and bad memories and his private life to Tele-Leisure.
Helmut Fritz: “It annoys me, it was to make fun of this Parisian hype at a time when I am unemployed”
Tele-Leisure : You started your career away from Music, as a salesman. Was the song always a dream?
Helmut Fritz: Yes. It was already something that I practiced like many teenagers with rock-star dreams, as an amateur in groups. I sang, I did a lot of covers and I wrote first songs.
Can we look back at the success story of It annoys me ?
It is quite unusual in the sense that it was not at all premeditated. It wasn't the path I wanted to take either, it was really a shortcut that I chose by default when I realized that I had given up everything to practice this profession at the age of 30 years old and I wasn't going to make it because after three years, my pop compositions weren't going anywhere and above all I had no contact in music. One day, I was really desperate, I decided to get crafty and do something so crazy that you'd have to look at what it looked like. I created this character and I wrote this song very quickly and then against all odds, that was the trigger, what changed my life.
Wasn't that planned?
It was a cry for help to say “Oh guys, I play pop, my songs are good, when I send emails, they don't answer me, when I stand around at the bottom of the houses of records to wait for an artistic director, people think I'm crazy, well I'll go through the Internet.” It was thanks to MySpace that I was able to put the song online, that people saw it, that very quickly I met people from the record labels and that I got signed.
How was this very atypical character born, a sort of parody of Karl Lagerfeld?
Seeing the documentary Lagerfeld Confidential in which I see that Karl has really made of himself a puppet and of his life a theater in which he puts himself on stage every day… I found it fabulous. When we see that, I tell myself that I have to take inspiration from it, that I take this accent, that I knock out Paris a little, that I put a big electro beat behind it which will create a little buzz and with this buzz , I will show you my real songs. But the buzz has become the signature, the marker of my musical life.
In It annoys meyou talk about Costes, Ladurée, the Zadig et Voltaire brand… Were you trying to denounce a certain idea of Parisianism?
It was to make fun of all this Parisian hype at a time when I'm unemployed and can't access it. So there is a kind of real bitterness, but at the same time a “second degree” way of describing it. And then behind it, there is above all the cry which says “It annoys me, I don’t exist in this profession, look at me!”
And this song turns your life upside down…
That's it, exactly. Afterwards, it's the change of life, the impressive figures: more than half a million singles sold, more than 150 concerts in nightclubs, the NRJ Music Awards, the nomination for the Victoire de la Musique, the promotion and clubs in Canada, radios in Russia. I'm almost going around the world with this song and it's crazy.
Success and fall into oblivion: Helmut Fritz looks back on his career
What memories do you have of the prosperous years in this music industry?
When things are going well, the danger is to believe that things will last forever and I think that at one point, I was in that state of mind. I didn't want it to end, so I have quite a whirlwind memory of that period. I felt like I was in orbit a bit, and that suited me very well because it's just fun, you're treated extremely well, you travel first class, you sleep in 4-5 stars, you eat in the biggest restaurants, you do showcases in front of packed rooms. Those are the memories of the good years, but then I also have much less pleasant memories with empty clubs, with the famous too many dates.
Do you feel bitter about these more complicated years?
No, not at all, because I have a taste for effort and I have never rested on success. I did lots of other things. I did my pop projects on the side, which didn't explode as much but which worked a little, notably Geronimo. I did artistic direction for record companies because I have a sensitivity to writing and image. I have written songs for very different artists. I reinvented myself all the time.
What did this teach you?
When success goes away, we learn resilience… Before coming back because there, without making a new record, I'm loaded with dates, clubs, festivals and now, there's this tour coming up. We must understand that it is an unfair profession, in which merit does not exist. You have to work but at some point, you need luck, the right encounters, an alignment of planets. When you know it, you can't be bitter, you just have to move on. There are plenty of people who experience it badly, even among very well-known artists. Look at Stromae, who is a genius, but mentally fragile and who has moved away from the scene. Look at Kendji, with all the success and talent he has, where he has gotten. So you have to be careful, you have to protect yourself and when you are fragile, you especially have to get help.
You “killed” Helmut Fritz. Why did it come to this?
Because at a certain point, in what I was doing, Helmut was no longer important to me. So I didn't need it anymore and I was also happy to be able to say “See, I'm not just this hit from 2009, I'm getting rid of it”. Except that what I didn't know is that Helmut Fritz is the cousin of the Chucky doll. So the more you kill him, the more he actually comes back!
There was still a brief revival during confinement…
It was my wife who told me “We’re bored during Covid, make us a 2020 version.” And finally it's also a success, so I tell myself that I can't do anything other than that. Even if in fact, I get there, except that it doesn't have the same impact quite simply because Helmut was too strong, he was perhaps too ingenious, too in tune with the times and too singular for that doesn't work… In any case, I will never make another record with this character. So it has now become a stage playground, my livelihood too, because I prefer a thousand times to do festivals, stages or Zeniths in front of 5,000-10,000-15,000 people as a transformed Helmut, a bit of a rock star and no longer a dandy of the time to really take it on, rather than putting on a suit and selling cars again. That, never!
How fatherhood changed Helmut Fritz
Today you are Geronimo on stage. Have you finally found your calling?
I don't know if we can talk about a path that suits me. I am an anxious person, or rather restless, as my therapist would say. I'm on a road, I don't know if it's the right one or where it's going but in any case, I don't stop walking. Now I have managed to put Helmut Fritz in the right compartment of my head. I made it my business, that is to say it nourishes, and even well, it allows me to have an incredible stage playground and to realize my rock-star fantasies because I am more in this ultra-caricatural dandy outfit from the era. That's how I feel good on stage. And people feel it!
Have you found personal balance thanks to your wife?
That's always been the case. She is also in a particular profession since she works in fashion, so there is a lot of glitter, and she understands me. We have known each other for a very long time, she experienced success alongside me. And then there is the next step, which is fatherhood. When you're a dad, there are a lot of things that fall into place, that align and that settle down. Because at some point, you're no longer the most important person in the world and that does an artist a lot of good.
You tour festivals with other artists from the 2010s. Have you maintained any friendships in the industry?
Yes, there is a real complicity. We see each other very regularly, we write to each other a lot. This is very important, because it is first and foremost human adventures before being a profession.
What should you wish for in the future?
To remain calm, because that's what takes me forward and then to always keep the desire. And it shouldn't go too badly!