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Sébastien Tellier’s sexual healing
Album no.5: Sexuality
Paris
26/02/2008 -
Sébastien Tellier, who rose to mainstream fame with La Ritournelle - an audaciously catchy piano melody lasting over seven minutes - has always been a master in the art of surprise. On past albums he has come across as moodily inconsolable (L’incroyable vérité), politically agitated (Politics) and artistically off the wall (Sessions). Now, on album number five, the bearded electro wonder indulges in a moment of pure hedonism, exploring the world of carnal pleasure. Tellier’s new album, simply entitled Sexuality, is a bold electro-pop, retro-futurist manifesto that talks about sex - and a lot else besides!
On his latest offering, Sexuality, Sébastien Tellier reveals another side of his musical personality, revelling in the joys of the flesh - a subject he appears to have mastered to perfection. “Talking about sex means talking about life in general”, Tellier claims, “exploring the dream side of life and the whole concept of well-being. It’s a theme that’s both extremely lightweight and extremely serious at the same time. The only provocative thing about having chosen sex as an album theme is that it’s so obvious. The ease (with which I talk about sex) may seem shocking to some, but all I’m offering up on this album is a form of entertainment and amusement. It’s a soft, sensitive, romantic Latin vision of sex, oriented towards women and girls.”
With his mane of hair, his luxuriant beard and his mass of elegantly perverse ideas, Sébastien Tellier seems to embody the image of the modern French music star grappling to come to terms with the outer trappings of the music business and his own inner workings. Right from the start of his career, Tellier has sought to find some sort of balance between commercial success and personal peace and quiet, striving towards a way of making himself a household name without succumbing to celebrity syndrome. Some of you may wonder whether Sexuality is an attempt to recapture the mainstream success Tellier enjoyed with La Ritournelle, but the man in question replies that this is not the greatest of his concerns. If there’s one thing Sébastien Tellier is interested in it’s wrongfooting fans and critics on his albums and serving up something radically different each time. “The way I see it,” he says, “the ultimate chance in sex is bisexuality. And that’s an idea I’ve always defended in my music. I’m into the idea of keeping an open mind at all times and enjoying all possible pleasures - in music as well as in life!”
Musical hooks
Tellier has long since abandoned the idea of belonging to any one particular music school. His sound is a wonderfully eclectic affair defying all attempts at musical pigeon-holing, even though certain tracks on his new album bear traces of the ghosts of French music past. Serge Gainsbourg emerges from time to time in the way Tellier approaches the delicate subject of sex, Christophe is very much there in Tellier’s sensual ‘non-singing’ style and there’s even a trace of Lucio Battisti (the Italian ‘70s star whose electro-disco classics could easily feature as B-sides to a number of songs on Sexuality). When pressed on the influences issue, Tellier admits that, "Yes, the artists you’ve mentioned are all part of my musical universe. I use references like that as a sort of guide so that listeners will get my final message. They’re sort of musical hooks if you like."
Sexuality gets off to a rousing start with an evocation of Tellier’s first loves and grand passions in Biarritz. Tellier says he is particularly pleased with the opening track, Roche. "I think it’s my greatest personal achievement on the album. It’s a song in French that sounds really R&B. It may seem a bit big-headed to say it, but I think this is a big step forwards for French music. It points the way to a totally new style." Tellier deftly switches languages after this, however, songs in English making up the majority of his new album. Musically speaking, the electro-pop maverick experiments with a wide range of styles, moving from an upbeat Divine to a slowly voluptuous Pomme (complete with female moaning) and an impressive Fingers of Steel. Sexual Sportswear stands in a league of its own as the only instrumental track on the album while Manti is a neat little touch in Italian, a nod to a country close to Tellier’s heart.
In Tellier’s eyes a concept album should be like a well-structured novel with a clear beginning, a middle and an end. And he closes his riff on sexuality in elegant style with L’amour et la violence, a long piano track with vocals in French which introduces yet another take on love. "The most important thing for an artist at the end of the day, you know, is being appreciated and loved. All you want at the end of a concert is to get out front and find out whether people thought it was good or not. Believe me, art doesn’t go any deeper than that really! That’s all that counts at the end of the day. Do you like it or not? How do you rate me? I’m really happy that I’ve managed to express that particular emotion here."
Guy-Manuel de Homem-Christo
“What I was trying to do on Sexuality is find notes that would really stimulate and excite people,” Tellier says, “I wanted to make this the perfect album for opening a bottle of champagne with your loved one! I composed all the tracks, wrote the lyrics and I sing on the album, too, but the reality of the situation was that the tracks were all based on Guy-Man’s rhythms in the studio. Guy-Man immediately understood the way I wanted to talk about sex, he grasps the noble side of music and I have to say, he’s a truly great producer, too. He works like a master craftsman, honing every little detail to perfection. Sexuality was really a collaborative project between the pair of us. I know I would never have been able to make this album on my own.”
While Sébastien Tellier has occasionally irritated critics in the past with his artistic poses and musical stances, it is clear that music is his real ‘raison d’être’ and his desire to exist in the spotlight a “personal neurosis” that he fully assumes. Love it or loathe it, there’s no denying that Sexuality packs a powerful emotional charge. As Tellier puts it, "Loving a girl gives life its intensity. Love is a more powerful force than career - or even music itself!"
Nicolas Preschey
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