Sarahmée’s new album: for you, Karim (and to all her exes)

“I wanted it to be a very personal album, but yeah, we say that all the time, that it’s a personal album.”

While saying these words, Sarahmée could not suppress a little laugh as she realized that she had just resorted to one of the most worn clichés of the artistic colony.

“I hate to say that, but I made this album a personal matter,” she adds immediately, starting with The Journal a discussion on his fourth album with an already rather intimate title, Don’t cry, my daughter, otherwise mom will cry.

Obviously, how could an album that arrives roughly three years after the tragic death of his brother, Karim Ouellet, be anything other than personal?

It’s him and Sarahmée, very little, on the cover. In a series of thanks integrated into the song Just loveSarahmée dedicates it to him. “We crossed the desert together. Thank you for your love, your music. Thank you for being a big boy, thank you for being my brother”, she told him.

Beyond these direct references, we feel Karim’s soul in this album, even if it is never explicit. “I knew that my family and Karim would be very present, but without it being a specific song,” explains Sarahmée.

“I screwed up some business”

That said, mourning is not the only subject or even the main one of this unprecedented foray into the intimacy and vulnerability of Sarahmée.

On titles such as Way Too Long, It’s not you it’s me et Give me your handthe rapper-singer also looks at her love life – or rather her “love disasters”, she takes care to specify with humor – as she had never dared to do before.

“I have always been modest about my personal and family life. When we are two famous people, it’s quite complicated,” confides the queer artist.

“I come from a modest family for whom it is important not to show everything, but I think that I have managed to speak quite frankly about my romantic relationships, about how I have difficulty knowing what I want and that I have hurt people,” Sarahmée admits, playing the frankness card.

“I’ve often screwed up deals, there are things I haven’t succeeded in, others about which I haven’t been sincere and just naming it more clearly changes something. I feel lighter.”

Jack of all trades

If she has often “screwed deals”, we must admit that her professional life is far from being a nightmare.

Over the past few years, Sarahmée has become a jack of all trades. She worked on the radio at Ici Musique, was a judge on the TV competition The end of the weakpublished a children’s book, participated in the documentary series They and for a second year in a row, on October 30, she will host the ADISQ Premier Gala.

“I’ve always dreamed of doing what I’m doing right now and there are things I haven’t done yet that I dream of doing. I saw myself on TV, on the radio, in films. When I started making music and things started to click 5 or 6 years ago, I already had this vision of who I wanted to be. I am in an environment that allows me to discover lots of things and meet people. One person believes in me and boom, that leads me to something else.”

In other words, you better get used to it, you haven’t finished seeing and hearing Sarahmée.

• Don’t cry my daughter otherwise mom will crynew album by Sarahmée, available now.
• In concert on November 14 at the Foufounes Électriques in Montreal.