Yann Pierre's Interview

– Firstly, could you introduce yourself a little, for the unlucky ones who don’t know you yet?
– Well I am Yann Pierre, guitarist, songster. In this order because I began with the guitar. And songster because I’m no real singer. I sing because I write songs, otherwise I wouldn’t.
– Which means you could have your songs sung by somebody else accompanied with you on guitar?
– I already did it for friends. Never went up to the charts. For instance Urbain Lambert. I never did it a lot, but why not. And then I like to sing, I like doing concerts. I began with the guitar when I was 17, and then I missed something, so I started to write songs when I was around 25.

– I’m a bit lost in all your identities. How do we have to call you? Yann Pierre? YPC? I are Bilingue? Glandeur 1st? Brother Yann Pierre?... Can you review them all for us?
– (laughs) My father’s name was Jean-Pierre – R.I.P. – and he deceased by the time I was looking for a stage name. There’s a gypsy guitarist I like who’s called Paco de Lucia: he’s Paco and Lucia is his mother. So I wanted to pay tribute this way.
– "Yann de Pierre" would have looked aristocrat.
– Yannos de las Piedras (laughs)
Otherwise, Glandeur [skiver (translator’s note)], it is with les Glandeurs de Gergolie, with whom we’re going to do a few concerts soon. I like to play with them.

– So now you’re there, you’ve switched to total digital? (See picture.) You’re done with CDs?
– Yes I am. I even don’t have any CD player anymore. I no longer buy any CD, so I don’t sell any as well. Moreover, a CD you’ve got to make 500. The USB sticks I can make them by one, and one USB stick contains all my albums. It’s rather to share what I do.
– So your releases, can we still speak of albums?
– I’m a songster, not an albumster. Album was mostly a business trick to sell 10 songs instead of 1. I make songs one by one, and when some go together I make an album. I try to make more consistent albums now, because before it was the songs made in the year so there was heavy metal and unplugged things. I’m releasing a new one soon called Courtoisement which is very rock. And then I’m going to make a quieter one.

– What’s your stage approach? Are concerts something important for you?
– Oh yes, I like that. I don’t have enough; I’d like to have more. Therefore I launch a signal to whoever wants. I play everywhere: in the bathrooms, ...
And I like to do new things on stage, a bit jazz spirit, some project with a quartet, a duet, a trio... But having a frozen band, all my life, I can’t. I’m rather flighty artistically.
– Would you see yourself doing a full comic entire show, like Oldelaf for example?
– Why not. It’s funny because I heard songs of his which are not comic at all. I do have songs that I don’t do on stage yet, which are not funny at all. About ecology... sometimes it isn’t funny. For example yesterday we did "Château-Gaillard". When it is with musicians, those songs are more acceptable I think. Even though my funny songs don’t please everybody. No, really, it strips!

– Do you prefer acoustic guitar or electric guitar?
– (clear and accurate) Both.
– And for which reasons?
– I started with rock guitar, which really brought me into music: Slash, Van Halen, Hendrix. On the other hand what I like in acoustic guitar is that you don’t need any nuclear power plant to play. That’s total liberty, you can play everywhere.

– Is your song "Le Roi des Conditionnés" directed to someone in particular?
– To me first. I often speak of me, even if I say ‘you’. Everything I am, or everything I could have been. My own stupidity is an inexhaustible source of inspiration. This one was a mix of ideas I had...
– Ultimately, it’s a bit all of us?
– Yes, sure.

– Eventually, Dassault has stopped messing around. ["Arrête ton Char Dassault", one of his old songs, with a pun in title (translator’s note)] Satisfied?
– (laughs) Oh, I’m not glad of anybody’s death, even though I don’t get sad in that case.
– Dominique A did a song which goes: "Don’t ever wish people’s death... it makes them live longer".
– (laughs) Dassault, I met him. In Étampes, in a small Chinese restaurant, he came with the mayor of Étampes, they went to the back room, they talked of the future senatorial elections, there were his 2 bodyguards, I said to myself: "If I bump him off, I’d be famous."
– Not for a long time.
– But what’s the use? If it isn’t him it will be another one. I am less radical than I was before.
– Less anarchist?
– Yes, I’m a believer, but I’m an anarchist too. I believe in God, I have no religion, but I’m rather spiritual. I wonder. But anarchist in that I am seeking liberty. For instance for my courses [he is a guitar teacher (editor’s note)] I am an independent, I’ve got no boss. I agree to serve a god, but I serve no master.

– As it happens, let’s stay in politics. You like to say you wrote left-wing songs under Jospin, right-wing songs under Sarkozy... How about today? Did you start rambling to write songs underway? [“en marche” (underway) is Macron’s party name (translator’s note)]
– (laughs) I’m bicycling a lot! I’m less into politics, I’m writing a fair bit about ecology, and then rather the existential, questioning... But today’s politics, that’s a pain in my arse, it is playacting. Frank Zappa said politics were “the Entertainment division of the military-industrial complex”. And actually those guys are puppets. Trump is a kind of puppet of the American arms industry. And economy. They put him there; if he doesn’t do what he has to he will receive a bullet like Kennedy, maybe.
– He doesn’t do things, people behind do them.
– Yes exactly. Like in France. The new kings are billionaires and multinationals. There’s a proverb from Vialatte which says: "People make kings to cut their head." My feeling is it’s everybody’s responsibility.
– In France we cut his head every 5 years.
– That’s it. I say Bernard Arnault should be nationalised.
– Hey that’s an idea.
– The one who writes this in his programme will be elected I think.
– François Ruffin’s going to like it, Merci patron !
– I love Ruffin, I follow him a lot. He really does politics as I like, with passion. No ego gets the upper hand. He and Christiane Taubira are the rare persons in whom I have confidence. I’m no revolutionary anymore, maybe I’m evolutionary. Rebuild a world over a bloodbath... there might be something better?

– Your songs deal, generally ironically, with state of the world and environment. These subjects concern you to which degree?
– Viscerally I am more worried knowing that I’ve got children. But I worried for the others’ children before even so. I did a song named "Congelez vos Gosses" ["Deep-freeze your kids" (translator’s note)], about the fact that many people don’t care, don’t worry about it, and do have kids. So I wonder which future they predict for them except deep-freezing them. It’s provoking of course.
– Are your songs recyclable? Are you going to put them into the green bin?
– Well let’s say... on Internet it is nuclear. On stage it is CO2. It’s my noise pollution (laughs), I try to make it a bit less manky.

– I propose you to have a look at the list of the albums reviewed in japprecie, and tell me which ones you know, which ones you like?
– I know Daran.
– Is he someone you like?
– Yes he is. I especially know the “Daran et les Chaises” period with Éric Sauviat on guitar, especially Huit Barré album. He left for Québec I think. Yes, I love the lyrics and the voice and the instrument choice.
Then I don’t know many things actually. When you make music you listen less.
Alphaville, I’ve got "Big in Japan" in my Deezer playlist, this is music from my childhood.
– They went on, you see, an album in 2017 which is interesting.
– Then... Gunwood I’ve heard some pieces on Internet, with a kind of raucous powerful voice; he could do heavy metal.
Franz Ferdinand, I’ve got pupils who made me know. Musically it’s interesting, but I know very little about them.
Pomme I’ve heard of her.
Volo, I knew them through the Wriggles. I once was their support act; I met you there by the way. And it’s really a concert I recall.
– It’s one of the biggest venues you did probably?
– Yes and I did le Grand U [Grand Unisson, June festival near Orléans (editor’s note)] where there were quite a few people, a long time ago [2008 (editor’s note)], there was Amel Bent after me, that’s the reason why there was many people.
Frédéric Fromet yes I like.
– It seems logical.
– Then musically it’s less my kind because it isn’t very guitaristic, it’s really chanson à texte as they say, and it’s about the news, but yes of course.
– He’s a pure chansonnier.
– Yes that’s it, even more than I.
De Palmas I know him like everybody. I make my pupils work his songs. He did beautiful ones; he’s got his own sound. In the current landscape he’s a good guy, he’s a musician full stop, not a starlet.
Then, Matthieu Malon I know a little on Internet...
– He’s from Orléans.
– Yes, but I’ve never seen him live. When you go to YouTube and that, very well, but what leaves a mark on you, is a concert.
I must visit your site more often to listen...
As for me I listen to a lot of metal, jazz, jazz-rock, world music...
– As it happens, apart from your idols Christophe Maé, Carla Bruni or Julien Doré, do you have some more to suggest to Appreciators?
– Nicolas Jules, among the alive French singers. His lyrics are apotheosis. He tours a lot, there are a lot of lovesongs and there are a way with words, a voice, a guitar-playing.
Brigitte Fontaine, who I love, regarding the way with words.
Lofofora, for the energy of metal and the powerful lyrics.
Then, it goes from Slayer to traditional Syrian oud.