Éric Serra, the composer of the music for “The Big Blue” and “GoldenEye,” met with about a dozen subscribers of La Dépêche du Midi at La Cité de l’Espace. He took part in a video shoot about the LuneXplorer attraction on the occasion of the release of his new album “Space Projekt U.M.O.”
La Dépêche du Midi: You are at La Cité de l’Espace like a fish in water or an astronaut in space.
Éric Serra: I’m passionate about it. I just made an album about it. I was recently lucky to be invited by Sophie Adenot to its launch. It’s already very impressive when you see it on TV. Here, on a different scale, it’s crazy. The sound, the image, the light: it feels like witnessing the birth of a sun.
La Dépêche du Midi: Your new album is called “Space Projekt U.M.O.” Is this acronym a signal?
Éric Serra: It’s a nod, of course, to UFO (Unidentified Flying Object), but this time it’s U.M.O (Unidentified Musical Object). It looks like “uomo,” Italian for human being. I thought it was appropriate. It’s not a space opera. It’s an album about the emotions that astronauts feel.
La Dépêche du Midi: Your passion for space has been with you since childhood. Did this album also require you to meet astronauts?
Éric Serra: Yes, I had some knowledge in this area. I wanted to put myself in the shoes of an astronaut. I watched all the interviews that Thomas Pesquet gave, rewatched all the films on the subject like “The Right Stuff”: pure gold for astronauts. I met several astronauts like Thomas and Luca Parmitano. I was like a kid at Disneyland.
Frédéric Saint-Paul (subscriber): Your latest album is based on the vastness of space. What are your inspirations for creating sounds and music that transport us into these universes?
Éric Serra: The universe at stake. Real experience nourishes inspiration. I delved so deeply into it. It’s borderline psychiatry. Sophie Adenot said to me: “But how do you know all this?” Listening to the last piece of the album “Return to my Planet,” astronaut Jean-François Clervoy had tears in his eyes. He said to me: “Damn, you made me relive my return.” It was the most beautiful compliment anyone could give me.
Chrystel Pincemail (subscriber): How did you capture the atmosphere of “The Big Blue” without seeing the film being edited?
Éric Serra: I usually wait to have the film. I do custom work. The inspiration for “The Big Blue” was the documentary about free diver Jacques Mayol’s record dive to 105 meters at the time. Narrated by Mayol himself, it completely shook me. It was a sporting and spiritual achievement. I wanted to feel that, so I immersed myself in free diving with Luc, Jean Reno, Christophe Lambert who was supposed to be in the film, a skipper, and me. After three weeks, I could hold my breath for two and a half minutes underwater and dive to thirty meters deep. I stayed lying at the bottom for over two minutes. You feel things that don’t exist elsewhere. That was the main inspiration for the film’s music.
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Boris Beaudoin (subscriber): I wandered around La Cité de l’Espace listening to your album. It added another dimension to the visit. For “Space Projekt,” you wrote the concept album. Does that change the way you write music compared to film music?
Éric Serra: A bit. For film music, I am at the service of the director to realize their dream. Here, it’s mine. When a director has the chance to meet a composer they understand, usually, they continue. This explains all the duos: Luc and me, Sergio Leone and Ennio Morricone.
La Dépêche du Midi: You met Luc Besson in 1979, worked with Jacques Higelin. “It’s Only Mystery” is one of your successes that we all know.
Éric Serra: I never wanted to make film music. I was on my way to have a career as a musician. It was in a studio where I was recording that I met Luc Besson. We hit it off, and he asked me to compose the music for his first short film “L’Avant-dernier.” I initially refused. He insisted, making me improvise. Luckily, it had nothing to do with improvisation. I thank him for insisting.
After that, I received my first Victoire de la Musique for “Subway.” I was still working as a bassist with Higelin. I sold more records than him, and he teased me about it all the time on stage. It annoyed him a bit, but we remained very good friends until the end. I stopped playing for him to focus on “The Big Blue.” With the success of this film and especially its music, I said to myself: “I must be a composer.”
La Dépêche du Midi: After “The Big Blue,” you still had some beautiful scores: “Nikita,” “Atlantis,” “Leon.” You switched to the job of film music composer, even though you had other projects on the side?
Éric Serra: The success of “The Big Blue” changed my life financially. I started traveling a lot. That was the most enriching thing in life. I returned from time to time to work with Luc: all successes. And “GoldenEye” for James Bond as well. I went gold every time, but I missed the stage. I started thinking about forming my own band, then I released my first solo album, “RXRA,” in 1998. With my jazz fusion band, we play my music, completely differently and improvise on it.
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La Dépêche du Midi: Tell us about your concert scheduled at the Zenith in Toulouse on November 25.
Eric Serra: It’s not with the jazz fusion band. It’s a retrospective concert of my career with versions close to the original music.
La Dépêche du Midi: What instrument will you play, you who play many? How many will be on stage?
About thirty. It’s a “pop” band: drums, guitar, keyboard, saxophone. Seven musicians, two singers, and a classical orchestra of twenty musicians behind. Depending on the pieces, I will play the bass, percussion, drums, and also sing.
