Juste entre toi et moi - Zachary Richard

Episode Date: February 24, 2025

Accompagné par son petit-fils, Émile Cullin, avec qui il vient de lancer un album, Zachary Richard revient sur sa découverte de la culture francophone, sur ses débuts à New York et sur son duo avec Céline Dion. Il parle aussi de l’importance de l’espoir face à la situation politique aux États-Unis.

INTRO Salut, ici Dominique Tardif. Ah, bienvenue à Juste Entre Toi et Moi. Bienvenue à ce dernier épisode de la cinquième saison de Juste Entre Toi et Moi. Welcome to this last episode of the fifth season of Just Between You and Me. Oh yes, already the last episode. But we'll be back, there will be others. I don't know exactly when, but certain things, when we'll be back, there will be less snow. That's for sure.

And speaking of storms, there was a lot of snow outside, a lot of snow that was falling the day I welcomed my guest in the studio, Mr. Zachary Richard. Zachary Richard released, at the beginning of January last year, Handicap Bonheur. This is the second album he created and recorded with his little son Émile Culin. Émile lives in Paris, he is 21 years old and if the album is entitled handicap happiness it's because Émile lives with a neuromotor disability. He was also present during our meeting, you will hear it in a few moments. I also took advantage of it during this interview to go back in time with Zachary. To tell you the truth, I even brought in studio my vinyl from Zachary Richard. And Zachary insisted at the end of the interview to autograph them all

telling me that I could sell them for a high price on the internet. But I think I'm going to keep them anyway. All I have to do is remind you that you can read the article I took from this meeting. You can also see Zachary's big smile, see Emile's big smile. Both of them were taken by my photographer colleague, the magnificent François Roy. You can read and see all of this in La Presse Plus on LaPresse.ca or thanks to the mobile application La Presse. And here is my interview with a happy man, Zachary Richard. It will stay between you and me

For once It will stay between you and me With a beautiful snowy day, we were going to do a snowman. It snowed in Louisiana last week. How many times a year does it snow in Louisiana? Once every five years, approximately. And it happened recently. There was a foot of snow anyway.

So we did... I wasn't there, but my neighbors made good men of snow and put it in the freezer to freeze them. You're joking. Yes. I think you're so serious when you joke, Zachary, that it's hard to discern the truth from the comic. The truth may hurt. And the Louisiana people react when there's snow. They panic. They panic.

Everything is closed. People are both amazed and terrified. So nothing happens. Schools are closed. We don't know how to drive. So the police advise us to stay at home and watch TV. Play some music. Drink beer. Drink beer?

Yes. Do you still drink beer, Zakay? I've never drunk beer. I don't know where you got that from. I've read that in an interview or two, when you arrive and play music, to have a little beer. Or whiskey.

It's fake rumours. Fake rumours, okay. You shouldn't follow what you read in the newspapers. I certainly shouldn't. Emile, do you drink beer once in a while? Yes. Yes, we drank a beer yesterday. Yesterday you had a beer. IPA, yes sir.

A small IPA. Can you introduce us to our guest, Zachary? I have to introduce myself? No, introduce yourself. Emile. My name is Zachary Richard and he is called? Emile Coulant. Nice to meet you, Emile. Nice to meet you, Emil.

You are already in your second album. Yes. Yes. How was this project born? Your musical collaboration project. Well, if we go back to the very beginning. It was in 2013, right? Well, it was long before, because I had...

Emil, as you can see, he has a little neuromotor disability. I had an ACV in 2010. During my therapy, I needed encouragement and advice. and I was a counselor and I liked the summer. And Dacord came from France and we did my training together. And during therapy we started writing songs. We had already had the idea in Cap-Chat in 2010 when I was on tour during the summer. And it was the beginning of...

I love life. But this time, we went with an album that was more in a current style. There's funk, there's reggae on this album, on Handicap Bonheur. Yes, and even rap. And that was thanks to the fact that we're in the 20s now, so it's more like a yoke, playing two guitars.

So we had fun exploring styles that were a bit unusual for me, but also well rooted in my native Louisiana. Yes, because all these musics are present in the Louisiana Melting Pot. It's the richness of our culture. To be able to experience a wide variety of styles, ranging from country to soul music, to funk, especially with the music of New Orleans, Professor Longhair, The Meters, all the people who influenced me and that I had the great privilege and the honor to know. So it's a stylistic adventure, but it doesn't take me far from my roots,

given that Louisiana is really very versatile in terms of musical styles. Can you tell me how your discovery of Professor Long Air influenced your career? Because he's a very important pianist for American music, for blues in Louisiana. I read that it had an influence on this album, Allons danser. Allons danser, yes. I returned to Louisiana in 1981. I have a rather curious career, in the sense that it's a kind of game of ladies where I jump the lock between

French and English cultures from North America. In the late 70s, when I spent five years in Quebec with all this kind of creative frenzy, which is Bayou des Mystères, Madagra, Allons danser, Vendetta, Live in Montreal, all that. Live in Montreal, which album by the way? It's your favorite. Thank you. You have a lot of taste, I see. So we return to New Orleans Orleans and I get lost in the culture.

And Fes, as we called him, Professor Longhair, was one of the luminaries. He was still alive. And I just attended his last concert, which took place in New Orleans, in a club called Tipitina's. It was a Saturday evening and and the next day he died. It was your last call to see him. It was the last call for everyone. And then, well, there's all this left hand, you know, the mambo,

bom bom bom, all that is really very typical of the New Orleans. And I was seduced by this music all my life. I knew it at the very beginning when I started listening to the music. It was with a certain schizophrenia because we listened to The Beatles and The Rolling Stones and then The English Invasion, The British Invasion. At the same time, there was this Louisiana music that was Ernie K. Doe and Irma Thomas and Alan Toussaint and then Henry Roland Bird aka Professor Longhair. So I knew all that. And then back in Louisiana, I was immersed in this style again, which made this album, especially with George Porter,

one of the original meters at the base, with the fire of Denny Farmer. Yes, the great drummer who plays at Carmonium, with Planet Earth and Seas Quebec. And so we recorded that at Studio in the Country in Bogolus, Louisiana. It was my funky period. But in the great development of all purists,

I've always been really unable to remember in a stylistic way. So if I heard something, there's a version of Allons danser Colinda on Allons danser, which is precisely a version called Reggae. So the purists, they cursed me. I couldn't say that it pleased me, but yes, it pleased me to piss off the purists because I think music should be open and not closed. The 80s were the worst time for music because we got back to the 70s, a DJ would arrive at the radio station with his bag full of all sorts of things, and play classical music, Indian music, reggae, funk, pop, whatever. It was really much more interesting. And when I arrived in Montreal, in 1975 for the first time,

boom, Hormonium, Baudommage, Raoul Duguet, in 1910, we have B.T.B. in my country. Oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh,, this culture. First, it happens in French, and it's extremely rich and varied. So I allowed myself to do all my crazy stuff and to do all my adventures without any restraints. We could imagine that your first love is Cajun music, Givoy. We could imagine, but it's not true.

I am a product of my generation. I was 14 when The Beatles went to the Ed Sullivan Show on American television. A milestone for a whole generation. I can tell you exactly where I was when I heard Satisfaction for the first time. I had a cousin who had a guitar. We made a band to piss our parents off. We played in my father's garage at 10 volume, tapping on the drums wake up the dead.

But it was British music, rock and roll music at the time. I didn't discover, I knew it existed, but I didn't really discover Kadjinn music before I acquired the Diatonic Chord. And that was after I had recorded my first album in New York in the 70s, in 72. And I had the money left after I bought an electric guitars. So I went to Max Avois' place and I bought the diatonic accordion, called Cajun, which propelled me in all this musical heritage

that my generation ignored. So I was immersed in it, but later on I already had a great, well, a great, I already had a musical experience. I had started at church, first, to sing. I was already a great musician. I started singing at church. Then I left The Good God to play the music of the devil. My first three albums were Out of Their Heads by The Rolling Stones,

Sounds of Silence by Simon and Garfunkel, and Turn, Turn, Turn by the Birds. And I remained faithful to the blues, folk and folk rock. That's the case of Sable that I've been playing in since forever. What brought you to New York in the early 20s to record your first album at Record Plant, which is a legendary studio?

Love. Love, always. I finished my university and I had discovered music because, well, the Vietnam war, I was 18, I was spared because I was a student. But I fled the United States, I spent my third year in university in Scotland, fleeing this mess that was American politics. And now that I think about it, a generation later, with all the anguishing dynamics that is the American politics today, I remember the 60s, at the end of the 60s, and it was worse, and it was even more violent and more desperate. And I fled, and then I went to Scotland. And all I wanted to do was to scratch my old J-45

and sing the songs of Joni Mitchell and Neil Young, etc. And when I was back, I graduated, by the grace of God, because I didn't make any effort to study at that time. All I wanted to do was compose songs. You studied history, right? Yes. And I had a lover, a young woman I was in Brooklyn, and I went to Pratt Institute of Art. I went between two love sessions. I was playing my guitar in the streets of New York. I had an ex-university professor who was at New Haven, Connecticut.

He worked in a radio station and then at midnight he stopped broadcasting. So I arrived at midnight with my guitar and I recorded a demo that I put in front of all the record companies in New York. I had a call from Electra Records. I signed a contract. I was the last human being to sign before Electra became the E in W-E-A. Warner Electric and Atlantic, yes. Asylum. Warner Electric Asylum. I started when I was 21, and then I had a record label in New York, and life was fantastic.

But the album never came out, or did it come out only 30 years later? That's right. Because David Geffen came, and changed all the buildings in the city. Jack Holzman, who was the former president of Electra, became the vice president of W.E.A. He moved to Los Angeles. There was no one. All my friends at the record company were congested. I was really helpless and without resources. There were 5,000 ready to be shipped. You weren't happy, of course.

I didn't care. I was 21 and I had a lawyer who convinced me, no friendship, no sensitivity. I thought it would be better to listen to my lawyer and find another contract that would make me take two weeks, but it never happened. In the meantime, I started discovering Kadjine music, which ended up taking me to France. And it was the beginning of my Francophone identity, which then strengthened with my arrival in Quebec a year later. Emil, how is Zachary as a grandfather?

He's great. Great, yes? Yes, I am Zachary when I was born. Since I was eight years old. Since you were eight years old? So it's been a while since you've been on stage with him. Yes, but trust me, I'm a little bit sick because otherwise I wouldn't have opened it. No.

But why Zachary? Was it obvious to you that Emile was going on stage with you? That you were making music together? It wasn't obvious. It was because he loved it so much. And well, it's true that he lives in France, so we didn't have the opportunity to see each other very often. And then he started following us on a tour at 8 years old. At 10 years old, he understood everything. So I started inviting him to this stage. And then we started composing songs together when he was 10 years old.

And there we were. It was a pleasure for me to welcome him to the stage, apart from the fact that he was always stealing my Vedette. But you are able to take it. Well, you shouldn't exaggerate. No. But I come back to your youth. How is it possible that you could almost ignore everything about music, specific to your culture,

during the first 20 years of your life? It wasn't a surprise because my whole generation had left this culture. The French-Cadian-Dalusian culture has undergone a rather violent assimilation from the beginning of the 20th century. Public education, which was English-speaking, children who were punished or beaten when they spoke French at school, but parents who are in a kind of cultural ambivalence, schizophrenia between the power and prestige of Anglo-American culture

and the joy and heritage of French. World War II, an irresistible force of assimilation. The young soldiers, so lost, come back and start to find families in which we no longer speak French, because French is associated with ignorance and poverty. I am a bit of an exception. We are. I am not alone. But because I was always intrigued by the elderly and I wanted to talk to them

because I found them much more interesting than the generation of my parents. But my generation, we listened to rock and roll, we didn't know any Canadian music. It was marginalized. It was like staying in a ghetto of settlers, at the edge of American society. I discovered that a bit by destiny or by chance or by divine intervention, but not because it was accessible. It was not accessible in my generation.

It was when I bought the accordion from Max Avois, who refused several times to sell me until they were convinced that I was seriously enough. And then we started to mix the rock and roll of my generation with the heritage of the music in Jinn. And we didn't have any audience when we came. The old people thought we were too rock and roll, and the young people didn't care about us because we sang in French and played the ringard instruments. The only audience we had in Louisiana was the Quebec teachers who worked in the French programs of the Council for the Development of French in Louisiana. And this first accordion, you bought it in Louisiana or in New York?

In Louisiana. In Louisiana. But it was with the money from your first record contract in New York. Yes, yes. There's a very nice song on this first album, by Udi Mistarou, the second one, depending on how you count it, which is called Réveil, which tells the story of the deportation of the Acadians.

When did you take the measure? When did you get in touch with this story, which is also your story? All of this happened at the same time, that is to say 1973, 2014, 2015. I went to France for the first time in 1973, in the summer of 1973, with my faithful comrade James Troussard, the luthier. I was doing the tour of the Folk Festival, because there was Malikorn, and then I met Alain Stivel,

and then the Breton music caught my eye. I was transported by the discovery of this culture, and we must say that culture. And we have to say that we knew we were a deported people. We knew we were Kadjian. But we would never have been able to find the Akkadian on a map of Canada. This historical heritage has been erased, hidden by assimilation. It has never been, it's still not really, in my opinion, it's still not taught in Louisiana in a satisfying way, but we didn't know our own history.

But thanks to the history of the Akkadians by Bona Arsenault, Bona Arsenault from Bonaventure in Gaspésie, who is the first geography, but the Akkadian in the soul. His story of the Akkadians touched me because I discovered what happened. Then the book of the Leblanc, The Akkadian Miracle, which also told the story of the deported Akkadians who arrived in Lusia, which was a revelation for me, because I thought, how did it happen that first of all it's my people, and then with all the upheaval, the enlightenment, the violence in my mind of this discovery. So all of that at the same time.

So I go to France, I hear Alan Stival and Breton music. I go back and then I go down to Louisiana. In Louisiana, I had a red Volkswagen Beetle. An old model. I drove on the highway that just opened, the Interstate 10. I was on the road, I can't describe it in other words, in the Voodoo, we talk about Loa. And we get on a horse by a Loa, by the spirit. So I was on a horse by the spirit. A spirit that descended on you. And I had to stop at the end of the road.

And as it took to sing it, I composed the alarm clock. la route et dans le temps que ça a pris pour la chanter, j'ai composé Réveil, Éfondré en larmes, qui était, j'étais justement pas loin de la maison où j'habitais, je louais une cabane de mon oncle et je suis arrivé quelques minutes plus tard pour transcrire, tel que ça m'a été donné la chanson réveille. Vous êtes arrivé au Québec pas longtemps après ça, autour de quoi, 74, 75? 75, oui, le carnaval de Québec. Puis vous avez participé à l'événement Veillé d'automne, qui est documenté dans un très beau film de l'ONF. Oui. C'était comment pour vous, en tant qu'Américain, as an American to observe the movement of effervescence

around Quebec sovereignty, the sovereignty project? It wasn't as much as American. It was as a French from America that I had just discovered this identity. First I was a Cadet, and then I was promoted into a society in the middle of the infrequencies. Let's not forget what happened in 1976, in November. The election of the Parti Québécois, yes. There was this pride, this confidence, this cultural effervescence. So I was propelled into it. And I, an old protestant of the Vietnam War, here is the cause I was looking for,

which was just as noble and even closer to my heart, and it was the French Francophone identity in North America. And that was POW! Le Québec 75, let's go! I'm here. And then it was really for me an identity revelation that still inspires me today, 50 years later. The discovery that I made of myself in Quebec. And then, well, I am in some way the history of modern Quebec because there was this period of five albums in five years,

75, boom boom boom boom boom, Migration which was a kind of wannabe, harmonium, we went to live in Montreal. All of a sudden, we went to all the corners and the corners and the corners lost in Quebec. And then, well, it's a small country after all. And once we played for years in all the corners and the corners, well, we had to take a break. So I left in 1981, referendum, and I came back in 1991, in a referendum, and I came back in 1996. So, a little parenthesis. The year following the other referendum. I was 15 years old, and I was absent from the Quebec scene, where I was training my burroette in English-speaking America.

I made four albums in English. of English, I was able, thanks to this linguistic tendency, to sing all over the world. Until 1994, when I returned to Canada for the first time for eight years for the Acadian World Congress. And that's when my heritage came to me. I couldn't get my head around it. I was dragging myself off the linguistic side. And it was the beginning of Cap'n Rage. Your two most pop rock albums, let's say, that you're talking about right now, Woman in the Room in 1990 and Snakebite Love in 1992,

what was your ambition at that time? Was it to become an international pop star? International pop... I'm using big words. Yeah, but let's say that I wanted to realize the... the momentum of the Kadjian culture in an American context. the In fact, working is too hard. So, like all my inhabitants, all I wanted to do was build a hut in the savannah. So, me and my father, and especially my father, we built a house. I was implanted in the factory.

It was a major decision that was going to have an influence on my whole life. Because if I had thought a little longer, I might have understood that I had an interest in becoming a Canadian resident, to have access to the disc, among other things. I could have had subsidies that all my Quebec colleagues had, Quebec, which I never benefited from. But I never really followed my head, I followed my heart. So I settled in Louisiana on the land of my grandparents and I started playing for 15 years. But the regional success has become a kind of national occasion. I recorded two albums for Rounder until A&M, a major, arrived. And then I got lost in the heritage because I had abandoned the business model that I had developed, which is to remain faithful, to make albums that didn't cost money.

In a more artisanal way. A little artisanal and then above all authentic. So Snakebite Love is something else. A big production. A big production. I lived in Hollywood for six months. We toured all the studios in Los Angeles. My director Bill Ray, who was also an illusionist, but a rock and roll king guy. We were really going to break the Cajun music into the American territory, by mixing rock and roll, the real, the good, with Cajun music.

I gave myself everything. So six months in Los Angeles, the madness, no financial savings. Let's Go was the manager of Bryan Adams, who became my manager. And since Bryan Adams was on A&M and he had just done Robin Hood, and it was a big deal, we couldn't, and Bruce Allen, we couldn't refuse him whatever it was. He said, OK, that Cajun guy, he's going to be the next big thing. So I went to Houston and I smoked joints with Billy Givens and then... ZZ Top.

Yeah, ZZ Top. But it's not far, Lafayette, Houston, it's not far. with Billy Gibbons and then Zizi Tapp. Zizi Tapp? Yeah, Zizi Tapp. It's not far away, Lafayette, Houston, it's not far away. So it was the American fantasy. How was it to get together with Billy Gibbons? That guy is a cool guy. A cool guy. A cool guy. But I was on another frontier.

I was on another... Because... And I believe that's also the problem with the United States right now. There's no notion of retention. It becomes so big. actuellement, c'est qu'il n'y a aucun notion de retenu. Ça devient tellement grand, tellement big que l'humanité est diluée en quelque sorte. Je peux pas te dire quelle sorte de bonhomme il est, Billy Gibbons, parce que bon, il est tellement déguisé dans un personnage que tu sais pas ce qui est vrai, ce qui est pas vrai. disguised in a character that you don't know what is true and what is not true.

There's Jimmy Buffett who has a credit for backing vocals, from the heart, on Woman in the Room, the 90's album. Was it one of your friends? Yes, I could say that Jimmy was a friend. A great American singer? A great American singer who died not so long ago. Concert de la Peau, god damn it. Jimmy was, he was more accessible.

There was also, when you're really rich like that, it's certain that you live in another universe in a way, parallel. But, that said, he had, I didn't know megastars, apart from him and Céline in a way, but both of them had the notion of humanity. They remained accessible, they remained human. Even though they were separated because of their enormous success and their great fortune, they made an effort to remain human despite their extraordinary success. And Jimmy was like that.

Jimmy was not just a dope smoking margarita drinking guy. He was really a very, very busy businessman. Yes, well, the margaritaita Burger, a great success. A demanding conductor, and he knew what he wanted, but at the same time, he developed an image of himself that was accessible. And there are stories that are very similar, from bars in the corner of Mississippi, on the Gulf Coast, where one day an old singer, a little unaccustomed, came in and said, can I sit in and can I play a few tunes for the guys at the bar? It's Jimmy Buffett. I was really lucky to know him, and lucky to spend some time with Céline Dion,

because I learned from those people a work ethic, because I've never seen anyone more hardworking than Céline Dion. Existing, but above all, close to herself, and with a kind of fierce dedication to quality and to work. Why do you say you got lost in the early 90s? Because these two albums may not have been as successful as they were, but you went to the set of David Letterman, Jay Leno, I was watching your performance yesterday at Letterman with Paul Schaeffer,

it's beautiful. Yes, well, it was at the level of recording, because we made an album that was impossible to recover the investment. So we went from making albums for 35,000 dollars to adding zeros. So the stakes were so important. And the majors at that time, I imagine it's even worse today. They gave me six weeks to break the top 100 billboard. So I went around with the promo guys. I went to Atlanta, Denver, New York, Los Angeles. I was in the car with a promo guy,

and we went to the radio stations, and I look at the priority list. And I'm like number 253. Where did you steal my monkey, which was the first single from the Woman in the Room? It didn't play on the radio, so... We were given six weeks. Well, Woman in the Room was in the still at the time when it had become real. We had spent 35,000 dollars, we sold 75,000 copies, it was a success. But with Snakebite Love, it was like boom!

With Bruce Allen who was still screaming, still money, still money. So we spent a fortune on this album. It had to become a Gold Record album. We had to sell 500,000 copies, Chris, before we could pay the fees. I was seduced by this fantasy of glory, which is American Vedeteria. And I don't regret it, but I learned that it wasn't me. It wasn't where I had to be. And at that moment, with all the possible lack of courtesy,

a secretary called me to say, sorry, Mr. Richard, but we're not going to be able to renew your contract. Have a nice day. The contract is over. The contract is over. So I was like, oh shit, what am I going to do now? I spent all my life and all my career doing that, that moment of glory that just disappeared into the dust. And well, I started to wonder what I was doing on Earth. At that point?

Yes, yes. And well, that was in 1994, in August, I went to New Brunswick and I said, Oh, oh, okay. The Academian World Congress was a memorable moment. Okay. I started composing in French, the songs that became the songs of Caporagé, and again by accident, because there are so many beautiful stories that are coincidences, interventions, I don't know what, Joe Hammer, who I knew before, who came from Texas, who is

settled in Paris, who is a great, great, great drummer. He has the mandate to create a French label. He calls me out of the blue and says, what are you doing? I say, I was waiting for you, then let's go. So we record Cap on Radio, and then we record the out of the blue and says, what are you doing? I say, I was waiting for you, let's go. So we only record cap on Rage, and it's the biggest success I've ever had in my career. And six months before the recording, I was convinced that my career was over.

It's rare for an artist to know his greatest success at 45, 46 years old. That's the age you were at when Capalange appeared. I'm a late bloomer. How do you explain that moment of grace that you experienced in a creative way? I have no idea. Artistic success is a total mystery. Because no matter how hard you work, we have been talented. There is a chance in there. There is unknown. Why a chance? I wrote a few

hundred songs. Why are there two or three or four or five that have become great successes and the others not? I've put so much love into the 350, and in the few that hit the public. There's an element, I know that you have to work. I know that you have to have basic talent. But as Picasso says, success is 90% work and 1% talent. So I know all that. But that said, I was really lucky.

I was lucky and then I look at Emile who is here and I'm lucky to have him in my life because thanks to him, I discovered a sensitivity towards the disabled, towards the disabled, towards people who have no voice. I see him every day with courage and a big smile, facing the challenges that lie ahead. For me, I was very, very lucky in my career. In my career, as in my life.

Jean Batailleur, is that you? No. Pause. In my career, as in my life. Jean Batailleur, is that you? No. Pause. Heavy pause. I'm listening to you telling me about the state of mind you were in before you left, and we could think that there's you in him and vice versa.

Jean Batailleur is the white of Chambly. I came back from the World Congress. I was at the governor's residence on Place Berry, on the route to La Louisienne. I discovered the white of Chambly. The beer? The beer. I went up to my room and then...

Maybe they could subpoena me now. I go up to my room and then, maybe they could subpoena me now, Jean Batailleur who is a totally anti-pod song of my tradition. I am a folk singer, verse, chorus, verse, chorus, bridge, chorus, boom. So there is a loop, a loop more or less long, but always a loop. There is not really a chorus's no chorus, no verse, it's always the same loop that comes back. That's completely out of my habit. Why did it happen? Who is Jean Batailleur?

It's... We lived in Tibet in 1910 in my country in 1910. This part of ourselves is the black wolf. There's the white wolf, the black wolf. And then we become the one we feed. So we each have a tendency to self-destruct, to support, to fight, to master, to take control. That's it, Jean Batailleur. It's certainly a Louisiana tradition of violence.

The Southwest Louisiana was the border between the Spanish and French American empires, so no government. It was also the land of the refugees in the second war, sorry, during the War of Secession. It's a country where we always consider the physical strength, and we see violence. Our heroes are fighters. It's normal that it arises in artistic and creative sensibility, but it's not me, it's us. In fact, we are all Jean Batailleur.

How does it work when you write a song together, you and Emile? It's first his idea. Yes. All ideas of all songs songs come from Emil. It all started with Caraspin. We call ourselves the Festa. We've been practicing for more than a year. We practice Tashi. We composed like that at distance.

One of my first songs is called Funky Dimash. I had made a model on Caraspin this month in Paris. We walked around the Parksouet park, and I said to Zachary, I have a song to play for you. So I bounced back on my idea, saying I have to make lyrics. And that's it. It all started like that.

The ideas come from him. I am more or less the scribe. One day, Emile told me, I want to write a letter to the disabled minister. To the minister. To the minister. Because things can get better. I said, OK, go. I wrote what he said. I'm arranging it a little bit. But all the ideas, one day I call him and I say, how are you? He says, it's hot. Well, it becomes a song. So the spark that lights up the straw is always Emil. I'm here to encourage him and especially to listen to him.

You mentioned the current political context in the United States, Zachary. Donald Trump, what is the symptom, in your opinion? It is the symptom of the notion of ease. The Americans are in some way great children. We can pollute the earth, we can de-nature food, because we will be able to just take a pill and cure our cancer. We have a kind of naivety towards everything. Everything becomes simple and easy, but it's not.

It's much more complex. There is a kind of will to ease things up. We don't need to make an effort, we can just take a pill. We can't imagine that a society that is detached from its social commitment can have a future. So Donald Trump is the symptom of this notion of ease, in which Americans are victims. You have to commit to create a society.

You have to work to move forward. You have to be inclusive because we are all interconnected. We can't push back a part of society and imagine that there will be no possible repercussions. It's a society that is kidnapped by its television. So we watch television to have fun and not to think. And social media now too. And that's it. So we're in a kind of dynamic of ease

seduced by media that entertains us but doesn't teach us. The big mistake of the American society is that after the Second World War, television has become an instrument for advertising rather than an instrument for teaching. They could have done it, but it was kidnapped by advertising, advertising companies from the 50s. And we are here now to sell. We are here to sell and the notion, if we look at Monsanto, if we look at the use of GMOs, if we look at the poison that is put on the land,

agricultural in the United States, it is part of this naivety. We will grow corn and soy on which we can pour industrial quantities of poison, without imagining that there would be consequences in our personal system. So there is this kind of naivety, and Donald Trump is part of it, he is ignorant, he does not know the history, he knows nothing,

he is reactionary, racist, xenophobic and misogynist, and all of this does not matter He is a reactionary, xenophobic, and misogynist racist. And all of this doesn't matter to half of my fellow citizens, because somewhere, at a totally emotional level, it makes the heart of half of Americans resonate. But what does resonate with this half of your fellow citizens? Fear. Fear, yes. the Americans. But what makes this half of you, the people, sound? Fear. Fear. And because, well, I heard a comment the other day that is extremely

just. Democracy is based on trust. We have trust in institutions, we have trust in our fellow citizens. Totalitarianism is based on fear. So we are afraid of others, we are afraid of this, we are afraid of that. So the boss will protect us. So Trump convinces a part of the Americans not only to be afraid, but also to protect them against this fear. So there are Mexicans who arrive, they cross the border, they are criminals, they will eat us up in the night. But don't worry, he's there to protect us. The aliens are coming to threaten us.

Don't worry, Trump is there to protect us. So it's this notion of a strong man that first provokes terror, that provokes fear, and then convinces us that he it is He who will save us. Are you afraid, not of those Donald Trump tells us to be afraid, but of what he represents? Fear, no. I think I have hope. I think we can't be defiant towards hope, quite simply. And hope is not a gift.

Hope is a commitment that becomes a fantasy if there is no action. So we have to act. I work for a better world. I am in the process of responding to the happiness handicap with Emile. We are focusing on that. We shouldn't let ourselves... Because Trump provokes. He will lie, he will say bullshit, he will provoke.

He destabilizes. And if we let ourselves be dragged into this destabilization, we are always in reaction and we are always afraid. So I have confidence that we will get through this, because American politics is a balancer. And then we are on the right, and then at some point we'll go back to the middle and then we'll swing a little to the left, who knows. But I think, having lived the Vietnam War and then this period that was much more

dark and much more violent than what we are living today, it's for sure that there are reasons to be vigilant. I don't hide my contempt for Donald Trump and his policies. But at the same time, I tell myself that if I let myself be kidnapped by this scary dynamic, I won't be able to take care of what is really important in my life. And it's to spread love and take care of those around me that I love. There's Garth Hudson, who was the last living member of the band that left us recently. It was last week when we recorded this interview.

You recorded a very beautiful version of the song from the band Acadian Driftwood. It's on your album Last Kiss in 2009. With Céline. With Céline, who is not the least of the guests. Have you met them? I've never met them, but Robbie Robertson was an idol for me. He was such a great composer. When he died, it deeply touched me. And Jamie Buffett died not so long after.

So it was really two hard blows for my generation. The band, because we were in the Electric Light Orchestra, and all kinds of... In the 70s, it was like... What's going on? But there, it was like, what's going on? But there, it was music that... We were coming back to roots. Pure roots, with freshness, and then,

Liv Anhelm, what a singer. What a drummer, what a singer, yes. They were really all giants, and then, in addition, they started with a Canadian. It was the group, I don't remember what they were called. Ronnie Hankins was an American who came to live here in Ontario and who hired the four Canadians and the American, Lee Von Helm, who became Ben.

So, it's curious because, well, I myself, as a composer, all my influences, Joni Mitchell, Neil Young, Leonard Cohen, they were all Canadians, except for Bob Dylan, but he came from Minnesota. It's as if he were Canadian, for us in Louisiana anyway. of composers who influenced me much more than Irie Lejeune and Doué Balfa and the traditional Louisiana music that I celebrate and that I like very much. But I am, before and after all, a composer in an American folk tradition. It's not for the two of us, but the Canadians have brought me a lot. How was it to make the big request to Céline for this duo? Very, very... Well, it was...

It's a song that talks about the deportation of the Acadians. Yes, yes, precisely. She accepted it with a lot of grace. We did it here in Montreal. And then she arrived in advance and then she was the one who closed the lights and then cleaned around. I don't know at what time it was, but she said, oh no, I can do another one, I can do better. So we were still, we still had 26 extraordinary shots and then she said, oh no, no, let me do it again. So it was a girl, I've never seen a, I saw my father who was a worker, but he worked as much as my father. So I said, okay Céline, that's enough. No, no, no, no, I want to do it again. So it was really a generosity and simplicity that was really really admirable for someone who

didn't have to do anything. He did it with his generous nature. I will always be grateful for that. What did your father do in life? He was an entrepreneur, businessman, and he started his career as a plumber. But he evolved. In fact, he worked for the Boy Scouts, because at the time, we're talking about the years, at the end of 1950, the Boy Scouts were not an organization as it exists today. They were really someone who had the idea of teaching young boys how to bring them into the woods.

And then there was no established financial support. So you had to be a leader. You had to go talk to the Rotary Club or the Lions Club and give us money. We needed it. And then my mother said that my father was terrified because he was really embarrassed to talk. But Mr. Le Boiscauil, he was the mayor of the village. He became in some way a politician lot of ease when speaking in public. And then I learned from him how to do it, I watched him do it, and then I was surprised that my mother said that at first he was totally paralyzed to speak in front of people,

but it was the Boy Scouts who gave him that talent. Was he proud of you? Was he opposed to you? Did you take the rock'n'roll voice? At first, it was a big disappointment because he had worked very long to send me to a university so that I could become an advocate, at least, a doctor.

And when I announced to him that I wanted to be a musician and that I was playing my guitar in the streets of New York, it was with enormous disappointment. But it was my father who financed my first album, Bayou des Mystères. That's a lot of generosity. He wanted to see me reestablished and then they didn't understand my choice because in Louisiana, music is the bomb. So it's drunkards, irresponsible, They belong to musicians, so they're not reliable people. We're not going to lend them money. Musicians are very poorly seen in this society.

Well, they were. And my father was part of this same kind of thinking. So you see his son, where he had sacrificed to send him to a renowned university to graduate and eventually have an international lawyer career, I don't know what, he was very, very disappointed. But when we got the success, he was my biggest fan. And when I needed him, despite his legacy in my career, in my career choices, he was always there for me. His name is Eddie, right? Eddie Joseph. Your mother, Marie-Pauline, died in 2021.

On your previous album, there's a beautiful song, it's the title song, Dance le ciel. Did you dance with your mother? Yes, my father was not very good at dancing, nor at music. He said he played the radio, but still quite badly. My mother was in a tradition of celebrating the Boudreaux. She was a dancer. I danced with my mother in many ways. I was also chosen to take care of her until she died at the age of 99. Yes, I shake my head like that because it's admirable, it's impressive.

Admirable, no, because the last five years were not very happy. She never lost her sense of humour. Even in the summer, she was always alive. She had an extreme sense of humour. Not really, but she was really a pinch without laughing. I loved them a lot and I was lucky. They say that we choose our parents and I chose well. Would you like to live, you will be 75 years old next September, would you like to live

... I'm sorry, it's very unambiguous on my part, indeed. Would you like to live until you're 99? No, I would like to live long enough where I can take care of myself and have fun in life, which is always the case. I wouldn't want to be in the IT, I wouldn't want to be in a home. If I ever look at Emile, if ever when I get to that,

we go to get the trash on Tuesday morning, put me on the road and we'll get rid of me. Emil takes notes. As long as I have something to contribute, as long as I have a project that inspires me, as long as I have enough health to be able to take care of myself, I'm there. As soon as that's not the case, I'd rather not affect the world with my presence.

Before you leave, I'd like to go back to my favorite album of your discography. It's the 1980 live album, which we were talking about at the beginning of the interview, which you recorded at the Clube Montréal, a room that no longer exists. On that album, you play with an exceptional guitarist, who is considered one of the interview, that you recorded at the Clube Montréal, a room that no longer exists. On that album, you were playing with an exceptional guitarist, who is considered one of the... Eric Clapton has already said that he was the most underestimated guitarist in the world, Sonny Landryth.

What can you tell me about this great guitarist with whom you have shared the stage on several occasions? Sonny, well, I had the chance to play with extraordinary guitarists. Bill Dillon, Eric Sauvia, Rick Howard, Sonny Landryth, Freddy Coella and so on. Sonny created a style, he plays slide but with a technique that he created. So he uses the guitar with such technical skills that nobody can... in fact, Roddy Romero, who is another guitarist from our country, holds his head, but not in the same style. It's like these two parallel chords, but Roddy is more, I would say, more root, while Sonny is more ether, he is more in the sky.

He manages to do things that are incomprehensible to most guitarists who hear him. I can't say better than Eric Clapton who says that he's one of the greatest guitarists currently. It's true. He's always a very, very simple guy who lives in Broadbridge. He's in the community, he's an anchor, he never lost the notion of where he comes from. And he's a real road dog. He keeps on filming. He's really...

I saw... I'm going to play at the Jazz Festival in New Orleans in May, and in a club, Chiqui Wawa, I'm going to make an appearance too. And I saw that Sonny Landryt was going to play with the Iguanas. So anyway, I could speak very, very long about Sonny Landryt, but it's about saying that he's a guitarist with a huge talent, and he's a human being like most of the great musicians,

well, all the great musicians I've met, they're all very simple and very disarming. So he's my friend. Another tour I'd like to mention is your 1981 tour, August and September 1981, with Offenbach and Garoullou, about twenty years old in Quebec, Ontario, New Brunswick. How was it to tour with a Hard Rock band like Offenbach? Listen, it's folklore. I remember that we often played in hockey arenas.

At the Forum, yes. souvent dans des arènes de hockey. Au forum notamment. On mettait des contreplaqués sur la glace et puis souvent à cause de la condensation on voyait pas la foule. Donc on jouait pour une nappe de brouillard, ce qui est peut-être la métaphore la plus ample pour parler de cette tonnée en tonnée I'm more than happy to talk about this. We were shooting in a foggy place. With Dieu in his friends. That's it. We were young and frantic, and we were lost in the fog. You're still pretty frantic, Zachary. You look fit. Thank you. We're trying.

I think I like life, and there are projects that keep me young. You're putting your hand on the shoulder of the thousand. There are people around me that I like a lot and who still support me. So everything is fine. You were talking earlier about the spirit that came down on you when you wrote the song, Reveille. What do you believe in? I believe fundamentally in the possibility of good. I was raised in a Catholic tradition

which is excellent for other composers because there is a notion of guilt that never leaves us. Guilt is a good song. Yes, that's right. I am a practicing Buddhist, but I make more spiritual progress by singing. The 15 or 30 minutes I spend day on my Zafu, I practice Buddhism in a rather delightful way. But what I believe in, and this is more of an engagement than a belief, is that in the power of good, the mystery of the universe

is quite extraordinary when you think that in these, I don't know how to say it in French, but trillions, billions, billions, billions of galaxies around the universe. We are on a planet that to protect and promote good. And if there is God, if God exists, it is this possibility to do good. So we each have in our hearts a black wolf and a white wolf, and the one who will grow is the one we feed. And that's what I believe we can feed the good. And that's it. This walk is entitled Just Between You and Me.

I've already made you talk a lot, gentlemen, but is there one last thing that you would like to confide in me, that would remain between you and me? Emile is more dirty than me. What does that mean? I'm already very dirty. When I eat, I put it everywhere. But Emile gives giving me a competition. We are very close in our...

No, I'm just saying random things. I would just like to thank you for the opportunity, Dominique, to come and talk about our favorite subjects, which are Emile and me. So it was a pleasure. And I hope we will have the opportunity to come back and tell you stories in the near future. Are you going to play in the snow? Is that your project for the day?

No, we're going to go drink hot chocolate. That's a good project. And let's try not to get the napkin dirty. Thank you very much, gentlemen. Thank you, Zakiraki. Thank you, Emile.