Listening to the first track of this new album, we say to ourselves that you are playing it again disco, with the strings at the opening. And that this album is joyful while you put your dark side forward before…
“Do you think it’s happy? It’s funny, I don’t really find it bright. It’s true that there’s this first song called ‘Ce vie’. It’s perhaps the more optimistic and bright, but for the rest, it’s not the album I thought I’d make when I was pregnant, for example. It’s a lot less candy pink than I thought it was going to be. raised profound subjects for me, including the quest for identity. I’m often told that it’s an album about my son No, it’s an album about me It’s how in thirteen songs, I tell my son what I am. let it just be luminous because I’m not luminous, I’m very melancholic. All the better if there is light, but above all it’s an album with which I warn my son of the mistakes I make. do and that I wish he didn’t do The second album was luminous, this one is chiaroscuro, a little introspective.”
Clara Luciani on her childhood: “I was the ugly duckling”
Did you overdose on glitter after Heart?
“Yes. I loved making the previous one so much that I wanted to make a record that was the opposite of this one. I didn’t want to fall back into something too obvious, a Clara Luciani formula, with the super strong bass and We say to ourselves that I only know how to do that. I wanted to experiment, to go towards sounds that we’re not really used to hearing in France. winks to artists who are important to me: the Beatles for whom I have an obsession, the Wings, the Pixies… Teenage loves because telling me without telling about these groups and these sounds would not have been honest. They inspired me a lot and made me want to make music.”
After two albums certified quadruple platinum, did you feel pressure to make this one?
“It seems that the worst thing to do is the third album. I discussed it with Alex (Kapranos, her husband and singer of the group Franz Ferdinand, Editor’s note). He told me: ‘the first album is the discovery, everyone is excited because it’s new. The second is ‘we want more’, the third is ‘but what are you still doing here?’ It’s terrible but I think he’s right, even more so in 2024, in a society where people have changed the way they consume music. You always have to have something new to eat. “It’s very difficult to last. And the third album is the one where we’re supposed to settle down and last. It’s very hard, I already feel it.”
The fear of being forgotten, even if your name is Clara Luciani and your concerts fill up in no time?
“I have a lot of examples of careers like that, especially in singing. It’s very easy to disappear, at least these days. It’s not at all what I want, but yes, it’s is a fear that I still have.”
Clara Luciani criticized after her “exaggerated” demands at a festival: “How can we understand such a lockdown?”
When we look back at your schedule over the last two years, it’s crazy, you never stop: pregnancy, marriage, birth, a musical that’s coming, lots of collaborations and a tour that starts on December 17. How do you manage all of this at the same time?
“I like to be busy, it’s very important to me. I find it very difficult to just sit and stay at home. I’m learning to do it today because having a child changes everything. There , for example, I find myself having to run to catch the last train to Paris to bathe my child. This concept of wanting to stay at home is new to me. I need to be constantly. stimulated and I didn’t want this aspect of my life change. Ok, I have this new role as a mother but I will manage to develop it with my role as a singer and actress in a musical. On the contrary, I didn’t want this birth to reduce the range of possibilities. , I want more than ever to do a thousand things to make my son proud, so that he himself, when he grows up, will say that everything is possible. I have never slept so little but I have never. never had so much energy.”
On this album, there are not only songs about this new side of your life. We have the impression that you are also sending messages to yourself, that you have found a form of indulgence towards yourself?
“Yes, really. The choice of the cover may seem trivial, but for me it’s very powerful to succeed in posing with almost no makeup and a white tank top. It’s huge even if no one realizes it. For me, it’s resilience, gentleness towards myself. I feel this kind of calm, I wanted to show it.”
No selfies for Clara Luciani? The singer explains!
Didn’t this resilience begin with the documentary about you released on Prime Video? You tell your story there from your childhood.
“Yes, but for all that it’s still a documentary in which half the time, I’m in a huge sequinned costume, with hair, makeup. All of this started a long time ago and now I’m arriving at my destination. C It’s a long road. It’s recent to tell myself that I’m going to leave alone. It goes back to the last few months.”
Your husband, Alex Kapranos plays guitars on this album. You don’t want to make a whole record with him?
“It could be nice but I like the idea of it never being too obvious. We’re both quite modest. People know we’re together by force of circumstance, but we’ve never done anything particular communication. We are quite reserved about that, it belongs to us, hence the idea of fairly subtle participation. are almost ghostly presences.”
On your social networks, you published a video where we hear you say that you hear voices, words when you make songs. That’s to say ?
“It’s very strange. I hear words and I hear melodies. Not all the time, unfortunately. Often, that’s how songs are born. ‘The grenade’ was that word . It’s strong. In my phone, I had marked ‘My blood’ for several years, without knowing what it would become. I said to myself, blood is interesting because there is a kind of revolution. This word makes a lot of people uncomfortable. However, blood is magnificent. It’s life, family ties, the idea of transmission, of DNA.
There is also this collaboration with Youssef Swatt’s, the Belgian rapper who won New School on Netflix. This is a title from the musical comedy Hate by Mathieu Kassovitz. How did it happen?
“It was he who proposed me for this title. I always have links with Belgium. I am linked to this country, there is always something that brings me back here, it’s almost mystical. For example, I learned that I was pregnant the evening of my concert at Forest National. As soon as I arrived at Gare du Midi, I saw myself defying everything, it was very powerful. who is from Brussels There is obviously Angèle, which I love a lot. I have a lot of memories here, it’s a special place for me.”
Impossible to end this interview without mentioning your role as godmother of the Star Academy. It’s strange because when you started, you said that you would never have been able to do a telecrochet…
“I’m learning a lot from these young people, from their courage. What they do, I couldn’t do it. From one day to the next, being thrown into the den of the wolf is great, but it’s so dangerous. Especially at their age. I don’t know how they do it.
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How did you get involved in this adventure?
“It’s a show that I watched when I must have been 8 years old, with my sister who is also a singer. Suddenly, it seemed accessible to become a star. Because that’s what Star Academy is. We watched all the songs sung about the bonuses, it’s like a taste of accomplishment, it’s beautiful. I was approached for this edition and I thought it was great. as a position, it is kindness. It’s in my nature I’ve often been asked to be a jury but I’m not capable of doing The Voice or other shows where I have to say yes or no to people. It’s not legitimate to find myself in front of people of my age and say you’re worth it, you’re not. Maybe when I have 30 years of career…”
In concert on January 30 (full) and December 12 at Forest National. Info and reservations: www.livenation.be
