“That people might think that I’m a snob terrifies me,” confides Clara Luciani

“I would like people who listen to this album to say to themselves: 'It's a true record. She didn't lie to us. She welcomed us into her home, in her living room, we sat down and she told us who she was, without artifice and without fuss.” » This is what Clara Luciani answers when we ask her the impression she would like to leave with the listeners of My bloodhis third opus which comes out Friday, November 15. She conceived him last year, during her nine months of pregnancy. The themes of motherhood, filiation, bonds run through the thirteen songs, sensitive, with pop and rock elegance. Like their 32-year-old author and performer.

20 Minutes met her on Wednesday, at the bar of L'Hôtel du Temps (Paris 9th). While there is no doubt in our minds that new success is on the horizon – his previous two albums, Sainte-Victoire et Heartpublished in 2018 and 2021, are certified triple platinum for more than 300,000 copies sold – it seems less serene. She says she feels “a form of pressure to want to do as well and not to disappoint people”.

Was it obvious to design this album during your pregnancy?

It was more of a bet to myself. Making a record in a given time was a challenge. I always took a long time to make my albums. I was really afraid of finding myself immobilized for nine months because this had just happened to a friend who had to spend her pregnancy almost bedridden. I dreamed of an active and creative pregnancy. I was very lucky because in the end my body and mind aligned and I was able to be in the studio for up to ten days before giving birth.

Does the fact of physically experiencing a pregnancy, with all that it implies, have an impact on the way of writing, of making music?

There are physical and physiological upheavals which influenced the writing of the texts, that's certain. I tend to be hyper-emotional and it's true that with the hormonal upheavals, I was all emotions. I feel it when I listen to this record, through the skin-deep lyrics but also through my voice. I think it has to do with the state in which I created it.

Did you write a lot, rewrite, throw away texts?

I have a very strange relationship with texts, I don't throw away and I don't correct. I write everything in two hours maximum and it stays in its basic form. For me, a successful text, in my repertoire, resembles what I could say orally. There has to be something very spontaneous. If I worked on the texts too much, I would gain in perfection, in poetry, but I would lose in naturalness.

Do you really only take two hours to write a song?

It is the fruit of work that took place before I started writing. I mature my ideas, my thoughts, before putting them down on paper and that can take years.

Being buoyed by the success of the previous tour and your first two albums, does that help?

I don't know if I felt buoyed by this success. I felt burdened, somewhere, because with success comes the idea that it can stop. I'm not appeased by the popularity of the last record because it puts a form of pressure to want to do as well and not to disappoint people.

We understand that you wrote the song “Seule” in a moment of melancholy. So was writing it cathartic?

All the songs are cathartic. Loneliness is a subject that comes up quite a bit on this album. It's not necessarily a negative thing. I say that sometimes we are no worse off, as in Romance : “We find ourselves like an idiot, but serene”. I think I like it, being alone. It's funny: I fell in love with this solitude at the moment when I was about to lose it. If there's one thing that's impossible to do when you've just become a parent, it's having time alone with yourself.

Still in “Alone”, you sing: “Where to go when even the family hurts”. This almost sounds like a subversion in an album that talks a lot about the importance of family ties or, more generally, in a society where the family is seen as a protective cocoon…

In this record, I wanted to be completely honest. I always wanted to show things as they are. There are certain subjects that suffer from the Instagrammable image that we maintain. I don't like this thing where everything is smooth, everything is pink, everything has to be photographable. There are rough edges and complexity everywhere. This is the case of pregnancy, motherhood, and the family. I don't want to make people believe that everything is rosy all the time. I wanted this pregnancy extremely much. When she arrived, it was fabulous, but there were plenty of moments when I didn't feel well physically, where I found it difficult. Motherhood is the same. It's the greatest gift, the most beautiful adventure of my life, but obviously postpartum is very complicated. Same thing for family. Obviously, it's my safe placewhere I feel the best. But at the same time, because I love them more than anything, the slightest scratch that my loved ones can give me causes me a lot of pain.

So these are the messages that are important to you to convey?

This is very important because we are maintaining a lie that does a lot of harm. I think there are plenty of moms who find themselves with their babies and ask themselves, “Am I normal if I’m sad?” » Listen to the podcast Bliss did me a lot of good. Women talk, in an uninhibited way, about not having liked being pregnant. It's good to hear that. Pregnancy is also an introspective time, which shakes up a lot of things. The woman, biologically, is hormonally turned upside down. There are identity quests that are suddenly raised, a lot of emotions… It's very intense.

So you've listened to this podcast. Were there books or films that also nourished you?

Yes, I need to find the name of the author… (She searches on her smartphone) It’s a book called New mother by Cécile Doherty-Bigara. It's fabulous. All new moms should read, it's so liberating. Right now I'm reading Mona Chollet's essay on guilt [Résister à la culpabilité] and that too is very good. At the maternity ward, we should be given a little bag with some essential reading material. If we all went home with these books, we would breathe a little easier. And I would like to end up putting this album in this little bag because I think it says a lot about the state we can be in at that moment in our lives. Especially the song Courage. I think it will resonate with a lot of new mothers.

“Courage”, “Allez”… We find this notion of unifying anthems, urging action, like “Breathe Again” on your previous album. Speaking of which, did you expect this song to become what it did?

No, just like I didn't expect anything for In Grenada. You never expect a song to work or not work and it shouldn't be what inspires the desire to create a song. When I wrote In Grenadait was not easy. I was a young woman of 23 in a world where, when we talked about feminism, people rolled their eyes and sighed. The reception of this piece, at the very beginning, before #MeToo, before the Weinstein affair, had nothing to do with it. It was, “What is she saying and why is she wasting her time singing that?” » And suddenly speech was freed and this song began to resonate. Breathe againit's the same. It took on a particular meaning because it was released, I believe, the day before the day when wearing a mask was no longer compulsory… I don't think that will happen again with this record, it is less societal.

“Come on”, in the current context, of great gloom, can resonate in a certain way…

You are right. It can take that meaning. But this song sounds like what I sang to myself when I was a very young woman trying to make music and it wasn't working. I repeated these self-talk mantras to myself. I told myself it was going to be okay.

Is there a misunderstanding about you that exasperates you?

I don't know, because I don't know what people think of me. I think I'm too sensitive to take a close interest in the question. On the other hand, what terrifies me is the idea that people might think I'm a snob. That's really what I can't stand in people, Parisianism, elitism… It's not like me at all. I couldn't bear to seem pretentious. I hope that's not the case.

Being godmother of “Star Academy” this season on TF1, is that a way of proving that you are not into snobbery?

That sounds like me. It's stupid to say that, but I've always had within me the desire to take care of those younger than me. This is also what motivated my desire to become a mother as quickly as possible in my life, which pushed me to get involved with Unicef. This taste for care and support undoubtedly comes from my mother, who is a caregiver and who passed on to me these values ​​which are very strong in her. This idea of ​​supporting young artists, of giving them advice that I would have liked to have received when I started this profession, at 19, made a lot of sense to me. It was the right time to do it. I have about ten years of difference with the students of “Star Academy”. I tell them a lot about myself, my experiences, my missteps, etc. What surprised me is that I didn't expect to learn so much from them.

That's to say ?

I'm very uncomfortable on stage, for example. Making TV is super hard for me. They do it so naturally that they really support me. I'm dizzy. During the bonuses, they all ride on elevated machines. It's thanks to one of the staracademycians, Ebony, that I managed to do the same during a duet. She was so cute, she held my hand…

We saw you very involved during the week devoted to you on the show. Did you become attached to these students?

Yes, even more than I thought. I'm not one to do things by halves. I experience everything quite intensely and I take this role seriously. Even if it means doing it, you might as well do it well. I am 1000% with them.