Skip to main content
Culture in France

France Inrocks on at November music fest

Issued on:

As the grim November weather cast a pall over France, a well-known music festival managed to lift the mood of music lovers in Paris, Lille, Nantes and Toulouse.

Marjorie Hache
Advertising

The 23rd Festival des Inrocks, organised by les Inrockuptibles magazine, began half way through the first week of November with a line-up fit to attract both music snobs and regular punters alike.

Two headliners stood out in particular: New York’s LCD Soundystem and the Scissor Sisters who ended up pulling out due to insufficient ticket sales across other European countries.

Marjorie Hache

That said, most nights were heavily lined up with bands that were either unknown to non- connoisseurs or members of established groups playing solo … Carl Barât from the Libertines and Kele from Bloc Party, for example.

Giving new indie bands a chance to perform in France is something the festival prides itself on and the line-up is put together with passion.

“I spend my life going to see small gigs in small dodgy venues all over England where I live.” says Inrocks music editor Jean-Daniel Beauvallet, who is the festival’s organiser. “I go to Brighton a lot, I go to festivals a lot and I’ve got spies all over the world, a huge network of people sending me music constantly.”

Bands are very often booked before they’ve even been signed or released a first album. This means Le Festival des Inrocks gets cheap deals when it comes to booking fees and the bands are usually very grateful to be offered a chance to play in Europe.

One new act Beauvallet was particularly excited to was Anna Calvi. He decided to book her after hearing three songs at a concert and describes her music as being “pretty much an obsession”.

Beauvallet was also very excited to have LCD Soundsystem because he feels they represent everything the festival stands for - “music without boundaries that can be dancy, hip hop, dark, melancholic and euphoric at the same time”.

Marjorie Hache

“I think James Murphy, the guy behind LCD Soundsytem, has got the same musical culture as us, which is a ridiculous amount of records and stupid information. He turns all of this into great songs so we’re really proud because he really incarnates something we really believe in.”

 The festival generally lasts for seven or eight nights and takes place in Paris, Lille, Nantes and Toulouse.

Beauvallet would love the festival to hit more venues outside Paris, since the magazine’s readers can be found throughout France, not solely in the capital.

Asked how he’d like to see the festival develop Beauvallet replies, “Proper tours, 10  or 15 dates,”   so as to get a proper holiday camp vibe going among the bands and to discover new and obscure venues throughout France.

On an international level, the Inrocks’ music man plans to take the festival to Sweden and Belgium. But he doesn’t want to make it too big as he’s already busy enough being the magazine’s music editor. 

Marjorie Hache

Maybe foreign audiences would be more responsive than supercool Parisians, however.

Kele Okereke who’s best known for being the lead singer of British rock band Bloc Party was playing his second French gig as a solo artist.

The showman took the festival by storm. Two songs into his set, he finally managed to get the Parisian crowd to jump about. 

Until his arrival on stage most people had been standing nonchalantly observing the various acts - an audience attitude that unfortunately could be noticed throughout the festival.

It generally took two bands to thaw the crowd’s coolness. But by the end of the night the various Festival des Inrocks venues had always heated up.

Looking to the future, JD Beauvallet would like to see unusual combinations of artists in  coming years.

He hints that he'd like to see internationally acclaimed French electro duo Daft Punk play with Philharmonic orchestra combo. Should that ever happen, no one's likely to play it cool and collected.

Daily newsletterReceive essential international news every morning

Keep up to date with international news by downloading the RFI app

Others episodes
Page not found

The content you requested does not exist or is not available anymore.