Because spring evokes renewal, the soft and golden light, the meetings on the terrace, nothing like the new album by Jeanne Galice, alias Jain, to be reborn to life, but above all to love! At 31, the Frenchwoman has a beating heart, you can hear it. After the hits (Makeba, Souldier… 1.2 million albums sold worldwide), a Grammy Award nomination for her music videos, her performance at the FIFA Women’s World Cup, world tours (three hundred dates, including the prestigious American Coachella festival), she took a four-year break, settled in a fisherman’s hut in Marseille, to come back down to earth (and sea?).

However, it is towards a galaxy far, very far away, that she flies away in her new songs, born of a thunderbolt in full confinement. After the energetic tracks with irresistibly dancing melodies and African, hip-hop, pop and oriental resonances drawn from the sounds of his childhood spent between Congo, Dubai, Abu Dhabi and Pau, Jain changes his style. Make way for the organic, dreamlike and orgasmic sounds of the Beatles, Fleetwood Mac, Kate Bush, David Bowie, Michael Jackson, Madonna… Psychedelic, sensual, modern, joyful and catchy disco rock. In case of a slump, listen to The Fool, you’ll see… This third opus, still produced by his accomplice Yodelice, quite simply makes you want to love. Encounter.

Le Point: After the success of your first two albums, you had a hectic pace of touring and decided to take a break… Was it too intense?

Jain: It was intense and most of all, I just couldn’t give it all I could give anymore, it was frustrating. I had a Bercy that I preferred to cancel because I was exhausted and wanted to do it well… And then finally, it was canceled because of the confinement. It was a sign! A tour requires a lot of commitment, to be away from loved ones for a long time.

It was very tiring physically because on top of that, I was alone on stage with my machines, I was doing 1h40, 1h50 of show, alone therefore, and I mustn’t screw up because there are all these wonderful people who work with me, who depend on me… They help me enormously but I also have to perform. I was asking myself a lot of questions: Am I going to be able to do an album again? Do I feel like it? Am I enjoying my life? What do I want to show people? What kind of artist do I want to be? What could I be doing if I’m not making music? I stopped touring in Tokyo in August 2019, and lockdown came soon after.

What’s the first thing you did after saying stop?

What I missed the most during these five years of touring was that I no longer listened to music when I got home, because I was doing concerts all the time, and I needed silence. So I rediscovered that. Starting to listen to whole albums again, like when I was sixteen. I stole all my mom’s records: David Bowie, Kate Bush and her The Kick Inside… I listened to them over and over.

I also needed to be alone. It’s not very intimate, a tour! It smells like a sock, we are constantly surrounded, moments of solitude are rare. So I rented a cabanon at Anse de Malmousque in Marseille, with a completely unobstructed view of the horizon with the sea, and I went there alone with my guitar. It was just a bedroom, really, so I really felt like I was back in my teenage bedroom, with my instrument, writing songs, being completely in control of my time… album was born in a slower time frame, where things came gradually, you can tell.

Why Marseilles?

I love this city. I grew up in Congo, Abu Dhabi and Dubai, where there is the sea, so I always looked for proximity to water and open spaces. In addition, I already had the idea of ????offering an album that would also be a Marseille tarot game…

You did indeed draw the album cover yourself, as well as tarot cards, one card per title. You get the cards when you’re worried about the future, right?

Only my mother draws tarot cards for me, I’ve never been to see anyone, so it’s not really a concern for me, but a moment of family intimacy. I was afraid of disappearing after that break, of course! We are in a world that moves very quickly. An astronomical number of songs are released each year. So obviously, I wondered if people weren’t going to forget me and if my musical proposal so different from what I was doing before was going to shock. But so far the feedback has been very positive!

You also published in October CityZen, a comic about an ideal and post-apocalyptic eco-city…

I had a comic book project for a very long time, but I never had the time… There, I was finally able to take action! I co-wrote the script and the dialogues with my older sister Léa Galice, who introduced me to children’s comics and whose dream was to write one. Our publisher Dupuis gave us carte blanche, and the four-handed work was very fluid, every day we told each other the rest of the story… Then, Marcial Toledano and José Robledo did the drawings.

It’s an album about love, a first for you.

I fell very much in love during the confinement, it was a huge source of inspiration, so the album is about the feeling of meeting someone, having shaky legs and butterflies in your stomach. I had never written love songs. Before, I spoke of a very global, universal love, but not personal. When you fall in love, it takes over everything. To have been able to experience this so fully, without being on tour, without having any time obligations or work, is an immense luxury. And to be able to write it in song, to be able to take the time to question myself about my feelings… It’s the most beautiful thing I’ve had the opportunity to experience.

Female musicians often say how difficult it is to build a romantic relationship.

I think everything is more difficult for a woman than for a man! [Laughs] I have the impression that we feel more guilty for not being present. And, yes, there are more men on tour, including the technicians, because it’s always more acceptable for a man to be away from his family than for a woman.

Even sex on tour for a woman is still taboo, contrary to the myth of the rock star man who sleeps with groupies…

Afterwards, we get a whole idea of ??the tour, sex, drugs, etc., but in fact, it’s not that glamorous.

You will soon be back on the road. What will change?

This album calls for something organic, warm, so there will be musicians on stage, which I’ve never really done before. So we’re going to reinterpret all the old songs like Alright, like the new ones, making sure it’s still super danceable.

The Fool (Columbia). Touring festivals this summer, then touring the Zeniths this fall. CitiZen by Jain, Toledano, Robledo, Galicia, Perez (Dupuis editions).