Le Couleur // The Eisenberg Review Interview

Photo by Andy Jon

A conversation with drummer and producer Steeven Chouinard about musical maturity, defining success, exploring themes of boundaries and renewal on the group’s new record Comme dans un penthouse, and why he makes his own soap.

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There are few bands that I hear that are equally as well-versed in disco and Kraftwerk as they are Stereolab and post-punk. I knew I wanted to talk with someone from the group and you're one third of the group, certainly, and an architect of the group’s sound. I know it's great for radio to remark on aspects of the video, but it's a beautiful studio space that you've got there.

It's our headquarters, actually. That's the first Le Couleur record in this space, in this setup, I would say, because I was next door for the previous one, Concorde. It's funny because each time we are in this recording process, writing process, there's always.... And of course, how we say, I'm not the same person that I used to be, that I was five, six years ago. I don't have the same car, I don't wear the same clothes, I don't have the same diet.

My daughter was pretty young at this time. So I didn't have this piece of equipment, this knowledge, et cetera. So every single time in this process, there's always a new element. I don't have a new wife because I love her way too much, but I have a new house. So every single time there's new stuff, new things. I have more skills, I guess, I'm more experimented. There's always something new that makes the album different and we want to make it different each time.

We don't want to make a copy/paste of everything. You know this recipe, this recipe that works and everything for us. It's very important to do new sound, even if it's still us, new sound, new lineup. We want to integrate a new musician, I would say, new partners in the process. It was fun to record in here, good flow. It took three months and a half to write and record. It was something else, it was fun.

So the new studio, this space, was the catalyst for, that was the new thing that brought this project to bare, or was it a piece of gear, life change? There's a lot in that.

It's probably all of this and we still want to do music, the three of us altogether, since we get along a lot and we have fun to make music together, our reference are still pretty much the same, in common. But we have new reference of course, but we still have very much fun to work together. That was the main purpose, to do another album, I would say. Since the tour was really fun and we were like, "Hey, let's do another one, just to see."

For me, success, it's not about how much money you make, how much album you have sold and et cetera. Success for me, I made it. Because I still have my band and we still have fun together and we are still happy and we can make money on top of it. So we play in front of people and for me, we are a successful band. Even if we're not Arcade Fire, but we're still not your cousin's band playing in this garage, we are in between. So for me, we made it and it's fun. It's fun when you accept that and you realize that.

That's fantastic. And oftentimes it is difficult in creative pursuit because the metrics as you've so astutely pointed out are ill-defined. What is success for one group may not be success for another group. If you judge success by, "Hey, we're not Arcade Fire." Then very few bands get to that point.

Of course.

It's beautiful that the three of you have come to a point where you both still enjoy making music together after a decade of being in this group but that there is success as personally defined along with it. I think it really comes through in the record. It's an exhilarating listen.

It's maturity, I guess.

With age comes wisdom, hopefully.

Well, not on every department, but on this one I'm proud to say I'm enough mature and I'm conscientious as well. I'm really realistic about how big we can be as a band and don't have to think about, "Oh, are we going to sell enough ticket tonight?" And so it's okay, it's very okay. It's very okay as long as everybody's happy and it's not too hot, not too cold. We have food and the sound system is good. The crowd is fun, and everybody's playing well. Everything is fine, guys. Yeah, everything's fine.

You've got the essentials, what more do you need?

Exactly. I'm healthy. Everybody's fine. We are happy.

And it's interesting to hear you revisiting because the new record is a concept record of sorts. You're revisiting a character from your 2016 album, P.O.P.

Exactly.

And it's interesting, the journey that Barbara goes through on this record is one that explores, as we're talking about maturity, realizing that some of the stuff that she's pursuing over the course of the record isn't maybe the most viable or best end goal for her for finding contentment, for finding happiness. It's interesting to hear that theme of maturity actually play out. Did you choose to reapproach this character with that lens of maturity in mind? What led you to record this exact concept?

First of all, we love conceptual album. Big fan of those progressive bands in the seventies.

That's the Kraftwerk I hear.

Exactly. It gives you a certain amount of limits having a conceptual album, but at the same time, it gives you a magical field of experimental ideas and stuff, because you... I think you get what I'm saying.

Absolutely. Limits are freeing in a way, like having boundaries, having lines to color within.

Exactly.

It actually aids in the creative process.

The concept is very fun for us about renewing, I would say when we first start, I said having new clothes, new car, new gears, new wife, new lifestyle, new diet. So we always looking for renew as we are growing up. And we were curious to explore that with this concept with Barbara. She's always looking for a new thrill, a new adventure, a new... We don't know what she's looking for, but at some point she's going to hit her wall because likes it, she likes the speed.

She really seems to push the boundaries and her limits.

Exactly. And she's crashing at the end, so I don't want to sell any punch. But she's crashing because she cannot stop. So is it because of the drugs, speeding, car speeds and stuff? We don't know. But at the end, she's crashing. It's important for us that this renew that's looking for new stuff every single time, every time. It's important to see your boundaries and your limits when it has to stop. So that's pretty much it for this concept with Barbara. She came back for, we don't know, for a ride-

A last hurrah, maybe not.

Maybe not. So we leave the audience to interpret their own interpretation of our story.

I love it. And you're speaking to something that I deeply love about music, which is that you are a different person every time you listen, hopefully if enough time has passed. And in that process, different stuff reveals itself to you. And there's some records, I go back and I listen to that I didn't get when I heard them five, six years ago. But now that I hear them, boom, they make sense.

I feel very strongly that good music is music that you live with. You both have to be able to engage with it as a work of art. But it's also because as you're writing this music, you're thinking about it in the shower. When you're shopping at the grocery store, as you're driving around, you're listening to demos. Good music is music that you live with. It inhabits the spaces of your life.

Music, paint, movies for me and for... Well, hopefully for most of artists, it has to be a two-way situation. You don't do music or art for yourself. Let the listener think about how they received your message and your music. And if it's like this or like this, and if it changes over the years, it's fine. It's fine as well. And you have to be conscientious about that, and you have to accept that. And you have to do music for that, according to me. It has to be, I say 50/50, but I think you're understanding it has to be a communion.

Absolutely. For the work to be realized, it has to be received by an audience. Other people have to engage with it or else it's not heard.

And you have to accept that they receive your message and your art maybe a different way that you were expecting at first.

That's part of the process.

That's part of the process, exactly.

You're making it for people to engage with. Is that why you personally are drawn to making music?

I decided to make music because of my father. He was a musician and I was going with him since I was five years old. I was going to his sound check and sometime to his shows and stuff. And of course since then I never stopped and I don't really know what could I do if music wouldn't exist in my life. Maybe I would do bread and pastries, maybe. I don't know.

I saw in your Instagram bio you also make soap.

I make soap and I don't sell them. I make them for me and my friends. But yeah, I make soap because I try to be no waste as much as possible. So soap and toothpaste. For me, it's very important. Even if I see a guy running his car when he is leaving his car to get a coffee, I try to do my best to save our planet. So for me, it's a very rewarding way to live.

It's a respectful way to live.

For everybody, for my daughter and the future generations. But for me as well, it brings me happiness and I feel good about that as I feel good to do my jogging every morning. So it's just a way to live in this world.

Steeven, I appreciate the time today. The question that I will leave you with is what are three records that you'd recommend to the audience and why?

I would say this... What's it called? Okay, a very new one. You guys know Eddie Chacon?

Yes, I know him! Doesn't John Carroll Kirby play with him? It's on Stone's Throw. Yeah, super cool.

Exactly.

It's kind of like a soul record, but not quite.

No, yeah. It's called, Sundown, and it's been released this year, 2023. And I really dig the sound, it's very soulish but weird at the same time and...

Yeah, it's like left field soul almost.

Exactly. He used to be famous. He had this one hit wonder in the nineties with his partner. So Eddie Chacon, Sundown.

An album that I always do as a reference for the past 15 years, 16 years called, Sexuality, from Sébastien Tellier. Everybody knows this album, but maybe not. But it's a 2008, maybe 2007 or six album. This French guy called Sébastien Tellier, Sexuality, always a reference for our band.

And La Sécurité, their very first and last album. What's it called? La Sécurité...

It's been played on, The Eisenberg Review, before.

Stay Safe!

Stay Safe!

Stay Safe! from La Sécurité.

It just came out this year, didn't it?

Well, a month ago or so. Yeah. Very good friend of ours. They're fantastic. I shared the stage with them five days ago and they are very fun, very good. It's crowd disco, punkish. I really dig that, it's my scene.

That makes complete sense. I hear a lot of similarities in the baselines. You both have a post-punk approach to the base that I always find refreshing because I grew up on a lot of New Order…

That's it.

So any type of driving melodic baseline is always going to win me over, as are good synth textures, which are bound on your record.

Of course. Fanciness with drugs, that's the key man. I'm pretty sure you know what I mean.