What is DJ Mehdi the echo of?

Available on the Arte website, the six episodes of DJ Mehdi : Made in France have already attracted more than 4 million spectators. Young, old, music fans and novices alike, all were stunned by the talent and legacy of the musician, who died accidentally in 2011, at the age of 34. But also by the fact that his journey questions the definition we give to “genius”, while we wonder about those of our time at a time when success is measured above all in figures, algorithms and other statistics .

Beyond social classes

Mehdi Faveris-Essadi quickly ticked the many boxes of an extraordinary trajectory: a mixed-race child raised in a city of Gennevilliers, near Paris, captivated by music, between French song and the Tunisian tunes which bathed his family, he went quickly, very quickly. Self-taught, he made his first sampler at the age of 12, joined a record company at 15 with the group Ideal J, founded his own label, Espionnage, at 20 and signed the music for Tonton you bledthe cult title of the group 113, at 23 years old.

But is genius measured only by its precocity (as with Mozart), or by its dazzlingness (as with the Beatles, twelve albums in just ten years)? In his book The Prodigies (Ed. Transcontinental), the American journalist Malcolm Gladwell popularized the theory according to which the essence of genius is not only a gift for art, science or sport, but also 10,000 hours of practice (at least ) that we devote to it.

British author Nick Hornby, in a recent essay on his two personal idols, Dickens et Prince (Ed. Stock), adds “consumption”: in the case of DJ Mehdi, the passionate immersion in the albums of Kratfwerk, Jimi Hendrix or Curtis Mayfield, in obscure funk records like hip-hop classics . We will add that genius leaves its mark on an era, shapes the features of a society: DJ Mehdi made it possible to transcend the borders which separated rap, song and electro with the hit of 113 Tonton you bledwhose refrain (“Lé, lé, la!”) has remained in the ears of France, all social classes combined, since the year 2000.

“Humans after all”

But every genius also has its dark side. Is it so as not to undermine a myth or out of modesty? If the documentary only touches on the pitfalls of its hero’s career (the fortunes to be paid to the rights holders of the raï sample on which is based Tonton you bledthe failure of his first solo album, the breakup – which we guess is bitter – with 113), he nevertheless reveals that DJ Mehdi stumbled, questioned himself.

He overcame these obstacles by turning towards another world: that of the French Touch of which, within the Ed Banger label, he became one of the pillars, always pushing the limits of his demands (never making two times the same thing was one of his mantras). Contributing to building a new part of French culture for which the whole world knows how to ignite – as the ceremonies of the Paris Olympic Games once again proved. The images of DJ Mehdi, radiant, sweating, behind his turntables in front of a crowd in trance, bear witness to this: a man of the shadows who undoubtedly wanted to finally take the light, he chose that of clubs and strobes to mutate rather than disappear.

Until his death, as brutal as it was absurd. Coming too late to belong to the “27 club.” Too early to pursue a career that we guess would have been brilliant. What we also learn in DJ Mehdi : Made in Franceis that geniuses are made of flesh and blood, of strokes of brilliance as well as of slackness.

And that’s what makes them “human after all”, Human After All, to cover Daft Punk. DJ Mehdi had overcome his doubts by following an essential line: his intuition. No magic formula calculated by algorithms. This is perhaps the most inspiring thing about his story. To also have our own strokes of genius, from time to time.

DJ Mehdi : Made in Franceby Thibaut de Longeville, on arte.fr until July 31, 2027.