on top: Tostaky
bottom:L'homme pressé
This might interest you. I used to be into Noir Désir a lot. They were rock n' roll gods in an era of artificial bullshit. When bands like Nickelback dug their way out of mediocrity using pro-tool and shallow lyrics (somebody probably slept with someone important along the way too), these guys cut it out with guitar, bass, drums, vocals and pure guts. They didn't belong to any movement, they just rocked out and showed straightforward left wing politics in their songs. They embodies success without compromise.
Like I said, they were huge into left wing politics. Not all their songs were politicized, but their most memorable were. L'homme pressé (which I posted here), can be translated roughly to In A Hurry, has for a point that most people that media turn into icons of success are terrible people. My favorite Noir Désir song is Tostaky (compound word made from Todos Esta Aqui - Everything Is Here). The lyrics are a little abstract, but it's just a fucked up riot song. It says like: "the world is ugly, the streets are burning, let's fuck shit up". I really love that song. It's chaotic, it's aggressive and yet it's burning with positive energy. It makes you want to overthrow the government.
In an ideal world, they would have continued to rock out and Bertrand Cantat, their frontman, would have probably been president by now. But in 2003, he fucked up pretty bad. See, he was dating that really good looking French actress Marie Trintignant . One week-end, he was with her in Vilnius, Lithuania, on the set of a movie she was shooting about French novelist Colette. What exactly happened that night is still a mystery, but the forensics aren't. According to Cantat, both were very intoxicated, had a huge argument and next thing we know, Marie Trintignant is in a coma, provoked by a cerebral edema. She died in Paris a few days after.
Cantat said it was an accident, that he slapped her because she was out of control and she hit her head on the sidewalk. It's not what happened, it was established that she was punched at least nineteen times, so Cantat was condemned to eight years in a Lithuanian prison for manslaughter. Good for him right? Eight years in Lithuania must be pretty long, like eighty years in Canada. He came out in 2007 for good conduct, restarted Noir Désir, but they recorded only two songs before the band called it quits.
People just weren't into them anymore. I'm struggling with that. Yeah it's a pretty shitty thing to do to beat your girlfriend to death and you totally deserve to be terrorized and raped by Russian mobsters for that, but I don't think Bertrand Cantat is a poster boy for domestic violence. I'm pretty sure it was his first offense and it will be his last. Does he deserve to go back on stage? He probably owes himself not to. He created a strong memory for his band and he ought to leave intact the pieces that are still together. The best thing he could do right now if he wants to stay in the music industry would be to find and produce young promising bands.
Does Noir Désir deserves the ostracizing treatment from the French establishment? No. They made great songs that will forever live in my memory. I look back on them with nostalgia . It just stops in 2003. The legacy he took years to build, was ended with one bad decision.
In an ideal world, they would have continued to rock out and Bertrand Cantat, their frontman, would have probably been president by now. But in 2003, he fucked up pretty bad. See, he was dating that really good looking French actress Marie Trintignant . One week-end, he was with her in Vilnius, Lithuania, on the set of a movie she was shooting about French novelist Colette. What exactly happened that night is still a mystery, but the forensics aren't. According to Cantat, both were very intoxicated, had a huge argument and next thing we know, Marie Trintignant is in a coma, provoked by a cerebral edema. She died in Paris a few days after.
Cantat said it was an accident, that he slapped her because she was out of control and she hit her head on the sidewalk. It's not what happened, it was established that she was punched at least nineteen times, so Cantat was condemned to eight years in a Lithuanian prison for manslaughter. Good for him right? Eight years in Lithuania must be pretty long, like eighty years in Canada. He came out in 2007 for good conduct, restarted Noir Désir, but they recorded only two songs before the band called it quits.
People just weren't into them anymore. I'm struggling with that. Yeah it's a pretty shitty thing to do to beat your girlfriend to death and you totally deserve to be terrorized and raped by Russian mobsters for that, but I don't think Bertrand Cantat is a poster boy for domestic violence. I'm pretty sure it was his first offense and it will be his last. Does he deserve to go back on stage? He probably owes himself not to. He created a strong memory for his band and he ought to leave intact the pieces that are still together. The best thing he could do right now if he wants to stay in the music industry would be to find and produce young promising bands.
Does Noir Désir deserves the ostracizing treatment from the French establishment? No. They made great songs that will forever live in my memory. I look back on them with nostalgia . It just stops in 2003. The legacy he took years to build, was ended with one bad decision.
