35 years of friendship. If Zazie and Pascal Obispo are today among the French’s favorite singers and whose impact in the music industry is well established, this was not always the case. The two singers and composers already knew each other before achieving the success they enjoy today. While Zazie releases a new single, Never mindreleased this Friday, May 22, and that Pascal Obispo unveils on the same date a new album entitled Heritage Vol. 2in the confrères du Parisian Sunday spoke with the two stars for a cross-interview, the first they have given since 2018, when they were coaches at The Voice.
What was the nice gesture that Zazie made for Pascal Obispo during their first meeting?
The “best enemies” spoke in the columns of our colleagues about their first meeting which “actually goes back to 1991”. “A professional meeting in the form of an observation round between two young singer-songwriters who are still unknown but ambitious, two strong personalities in competition”, details the daily article. Zazie then explains thatshe was looking for titles for her first album I, you, they, which will allow her to receive the Female Revelation of the Year at the Victoires de la Musique in 1992. Pascal Obispo would have made her listen to “around sixty” of his compositions, among which this heiress of the nobility took only one, 1, 2, 3 soleil, “to please him.”
“At the beginning, we were very nervousremembers Zazie on the microphone of Parisian. More the passion for music has never left us too much. And neither does complicity. At times, we saw each other less, but he sends me photos regularly.” The two friends, music fans, then share their best recommendations: if Zazie made “discover Peter Gabriel et Pink Floyd” to Pascal Obispo, the latter made him “know the new French song” and his “new wave groups [qu’il était] the only one to know”. Inseparable, the budding stars also meet at Peter Gabriel’s studio in the United Kingdom, where Zazie records her first album.
Zazie and Pascal Obispo: their secrets behind the scenes of their collaboration
“When Pascal came to join me at Real World, he hallucinatedremembers the interpreter of Zenbefore listing the many memories that the two have forged in these mythical places. You would have seen his face when Peter Gabriel asked us if we wanted to eat pasta or when Seal sang us the melody of 1,2, 3 sun! But the real highlight was when Sting entered the studio…” This appearance of the member of The Police would have had the greatest effect on Jenifer’s ex: “I cried when I left”he confirms to our colleagues. An experience rich in emotions which led to a fruitful collaboration between the two artists: in 1998, they met in particular to compose the hit Light the fire de Johnny Hallyday.
A title proposal made by the Taulier to the young Pascal Obispo while they are in New York: “He told me that he would like to have a song to open his future Stade de France. I called the best author I know!”, he confides. “Pascal contacted me saying: ‘Johnny needs a lyric for the Stade de France. He’s the first Frenchman to sing there. He wants something like: tonight we’ll set you on fire’. I find it so stupid, it reminds me of football. But it takes a gladiator thing. I ask him: ‘When do you want it?’ He answers me: ‘For yesterday!’ And he hangs up. SO It’s the first time I’ve written a text before having the music.”continues Lola’s mother.
Before giving more details on the atypical recording of this legendary song: “Johnny wanted to impress us, he emptied a bottle of expensive wine and he sang so loudly that three microphones had to be changed”. A studio experience that Pascal Obispo is not about to forget: “It was very impressive. On the bridge, ‘All it will take is a spark’, the tone was high, his eyes were all red. The air conditioning was on full blast, we were all in down jackets. This song changed our lives.” Pascal Obispo and Zazie, or the “best enemies”: surely the least well-named duo in the history of duos.
