He is a man of few words, but he handles them with rare mastery. Grand Corps Malade has established itself in the landscape of French song thanks to its sharp pen, its innate sense of rhyme and its tone of voice recognizable among a thousand. He even democratized a hitherto confidential genre, becoming the apostle of slam. But if the general public has come to love the committed poet, few know Fabien Marsaud, the man who hides behind his stage name due to a serious accident. The opportunity was therefore found for Nikos Aliagas to paint his portrait in 50 'inside, Saturday February 6, 2021, and to return in his company on the five dates which marked his career. And among the key moments of the CV of the one who declared his love for women in his last album Ladies, double platinum disc, features his exceptional meeting with Renaud.
"Renaud is my absolute idol"
"A very beautiful memory" he remembers listening to the first notes of his duo on winner Mistral. In 2016, the famous singer joined him on stage at the Trianon to everyone's surprise. "Renaud, he's my absolute idol", he said, stars in his eyes. "He's the guy I've seen ten times in concert. With my father, my sister, my mother, we listened to him in the car. " But the two men shared more than an exceptional moment on stage, Grand Corps Malade being the instigator of Renaud's big comeback to the front of the bill. While the latter was not at his best, the slammer had come to visit him in the South to ask him a favor: to record a song from his future album. "I went to see Renaud, who is not doing well, who stopped singing for seven / eight years, and who was being told 'get back on stage', but he didn't have the courage", he recontextualized, before explaining how he reversed the situation by taking as a theme the simple purchase of a battery for his son. "I stir him up a bit, go down south to his house and get him to write. It really clicked and it was the return of the great Renaud." Or how the Mistral finally turned.
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