Groups, an increasingly rare commodity in music

It is to imitate their idols that they started: when the five boys of Fire! Chatterton (authors of the beau Clay palace), decide ten years ago to start a group, it is the images of Radiohead or the Beatles that they have in mind.

For others, it is about expanding a sound: at the same time, Charles de Boisseguin created the formation L’Impératrice, with the desire to deploy on stage, with others. “I wondered if this music was made to be defended by itself. The answer was no: it had to be played, organic. ” The group, composed of five musicians and singer Flore Benguigui, released their second album at the end of March, Tako Tsubo.

Same problem for Sacha Got and Marlon Magnée who, after composing the first tracks of La Femme in 2010, quickly surrounded themselves with a happy band, with the punk spirit we know them. “ We had already played our songs with the sounds on a USB key, remembers Marlon. But when we were offered a festival in front of 5,000 people, we needed a group. So we called on friends who were in art school and were doing nothing with their lives at the time. “

A variable geometry entity

Today, they are still together, or almost. There were indeed a few departures, without drama or hatred according to Marlon Magnée, for whom La Femme has always been an entity with variable geometry, governed by the dictatorship assumed by the two pillars: “In a group, everyone can give their opinion, but there will always be one or two very strong personalities who will take precedence over the others. This is what allows us to move forward. ”

All recognize, however, that being together has brought them a family, memories of tours that are all the more unforgettable as they are shared, and a desire to overcome ego crises, mood swings, promiscuity and the smell of socks. for the sake of a single project.

The group La Femme.

And yet, they are increasingly rare to make music together. Across the Atlantic, the singer of the group Maroon 5 deplored in an interview with Apple Music in early March that there are no more groups in the American pop ecosystem. In France, for the emergence of a collective like Catastrophe or the return of Mustang, how many Apple, Hatik, Yseult or Fils Cara are deployed solo?

A trend that can be explained by the current predominance of urban music, where rappers or beatmakers have an image of solitary snipers. But also by a hexagonal tradition resulting from the song, which is a matter of individual: in the years 1960, while England moved to the sound of the Stones or the Who, we listened to Johnny, Françoise Hardy or Cloclo. It was not until the 1980s with Téléphone, Indochine and, later, Noir Désir, that young people made music together in rooms for rent or in their parents’ garages.

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