“I grew up in a family where you weren’t allowed to express your anger.”

Don’t be fooled by her apparent fragility and the false air of an elf that is underlined by the black dots she draws under her eyes. In her first EP, Monstrous, Solann sings of feminine power, demands justice for the mistreated and digs, on pop with mystical accents, her intimate wounds to better sublimate them. At 24, the woman who has just received the Women in Motion Emerging Talent award, presented by Kering with the complicity of Madame Figaroas part of the Twin Sisters Festival, is one of the revelations of the year. She will be at La Cigale in Paris on June 19, at Collatéral in Arles on July 3 and 4, then on tour.

Madame Figaro. – The Twin Sisters Festival highlights music and image. What do you visualize when you compose a song?
Solann. – I often have an idea for a video clip that, most of the time, will never be made! And I am inspired by films, paintings. For the title Narcissefor example, I thought of Mucha’s illustrations of Sarah Bernhardt, theatrical and divine. But also of the painting Echo and Narcissusde Waterhouse.

And your musical inspirations?
Fiona Apple and all those I listened to when I was younger: Nina Simone, Barbara, Ella Fitzgerald… Women with difficult pasts: seeing what they learned from them gives hope.

You say that writing your songs has therapeutic virtues. Is this also the case when we perform them on stage?
Not necessarily, because you have to revisit difficult things. It wasn’t very pleasant at first, but when I see people singing with me, it’s an instant calm.

How do you feel about revealing yourself in such an intimate way? ? Especially in the song Small Body which addresses issues of anorexia.
I don’t know anyone who is 100% at peace with their body: we all have a particular relationship, toxic or not, with it. I felt that people could understand it, even if their problem is not, like mine, not being able to gain weight.

How was the song born? Narcisse which addresses the cruelty of the entertainment world?
In life, we have a certain value because we are young or considered attractive; especially when we are on stage. I would like to be able to detach myself from my image, but I am afraid of getting old, of no longer being interesting because I am less young, less pretty. I am also very afraid of dying. For all these reasons, I had to make this song.

Your EP is called Monstrous . the monster, in the etymological sense, is the one who repels and fascinates at the same time. Is this a definition that suits you?
I would like. It is for this duality that I chose this word. I know what I look like, I know who I am: monstrous, it is not what one thinks of first with me, and I liked this contrast.

This powerful side, which contrasts with your apparent fragility, where does it come from?
I think I’m very angry. I grew up in a family where it wasn’t really allowed to be expressed. Especially me: I was the eldest daughter, I wasn’t the one who was supposed to have problems, and this frustration could only come out in texts. I also think that we try to protect ourselves when we’re little girls, but as we grow up, we learn more and more things, we’re confronted with sexist behavior. I discover stories about my mother, my grandmothers. I don’t see how we can not get angry, want to change things and adopt this monstrous side.

Twin Sisters Festival, until 1^is July, in Rochefort. Monstrous, Cinq7/Wagram.