Yelle: “I like the idea of ​​pushing the schmilblick forward! »

Last December, you sang “Les glaçons”, with Kalika. How did this collaboration come about?

We had invited Kalika to do our first parts on many dates of our tour for the album “The Age of Aquarius”. The understanding was very good and Kalika told us a lot about her desire to go further in the collaboration… We said yes!

You sing there “You are looking for Kalika, I am Yelle, I am her mother”. Can’t help but see a certain resemblance between this young singer and you when you started out?

Yes, there is a new generation of artists who started listening to us more than 15 years ago! We don’t really realize it but we’re one of the old people now! We can feel common desires, in particular the desire for great artistic freedom and a +++ energy”.

In the book “All for music”, by journalist Chloé Thibaud, you evoke the sexism of an industry in which you have been evolving for 15 years already. Is this something you still face today? It’s also one of the themes of this song with Kalika…

This song, with Kalika, is rather a nod to the evenings in which you are bored with guys who try to flirt painfully. Regarding the music industry, I have the particularity of having my own label and being isolated. I am therefore less exposed to possible heavy situations but I know that they exist. It’s often tied to patriarchy and some form of systemic ancestry.

You also recently collaborated with Bilal Hassani, also a Yelle fan for many years, for a cover of “Sans contrefaçon”. You seem to be a source of inspiration for this young generation of artists?

Bilal has often expressed his love for our music and I met him because Jean-François (known as “GrandMarnier”) produced his latest album (NDLR “Théorème”, written and composed in Saint-Brieuc). There too, the agreement was very good and Bilal is animated by a sincere passion which touched me. Our relationship was very simple, and the idea of ​​collaborating is something friendly.

You both became parents a few months ago. How do we combine music and neo-parenthood?

It’s obviously very difficult at first. Energy is not available for creativity for a long time. We have just returned from a tour of the United States (Editor’s note from February 25 to March 5) on which we took our child. Quite a logistical challenge, but everything went very well! So it is possible! You just have to get started and trust your child and yourself.

Paco Rabanne had this futuristic vision in his designs. It’s a vision that speaks to me, I like the idea of ​​“advancing the schmilblick”.

In January, you unveiled the title “Top fan”, accompanied by a magnificent clip. Was it important for you to sing this new status of parents?

Naturally, we wanted to include what inspired us at the time. “Top Fan” is a double-read song, and you can wander around in the lyrics whether you’re a fan or… kid!

It’s also a declaration of love to your audience, with lots of references to your previous albums: what did you want to say to your fans with this track?

Dedicate a song to them, so that these people who have followed us faithfully for so many years know how much they matter in our daily lives. These are people we interact with regularly on social media but also in real life, while on tour. It’s very strong to feel supported by faithful people.

You paid tribute to Paco Rabanne, who died on February 3, in Portsall (29), in an Instagram post with some images from your “Top Fan” clip. What did the couturier represent for you?

Paco Rabanne had this futuristic vision in his designs. It’s a vision that speaks to me, I like the idea of ​​“advancing the schmilblick”. It turns out that the styling of the “Top Fan” music video was mostly based on Paco Rabanne pieces. We shot this clip just before his death… The concordance was quite disturbing.

Five years after your last visit, you have just made the United States dance. It must be exciting to find your fans across the Atlantic…

This tour was wonderful! It’s always very dizzying to see rooms of 1,300 people filled for us, even “outside the news”. Once again, this loyalty is very promising for us. We hadn’t seen them yet on the tour of “The Age of Aquarius”, our latest album, which was released more than two years ago. We wanted to go see them before moving on to a new creative chapter.

We are really in the first phase, that of research and drafts. We count on spring and summer to find solar energy! So maybe the songs will be sunny. We don’t know yet!

And on the stage side, other dates to come in France? In Brittany ?

It is complicated for us to tour and compose at the same time. We will therefore enter a phase of composition and put the concerts aside for the moment. But we are not against a date from time to time when the idea is exciting!