In 2017, Jérémy Frérot and Florian Delavega ended their artistic collaboration. The two singers had been revealed three years previously in the musical TV show The Voice. Jérémy Frérot then decided to continue his solo career, while Florian Delavega withdrew from the media scene. As he makes his comeback with the single Loving people, the latter returns during an interview for Réel Média on his decision to separate from his sidekick. “By the time I let him go, it was in a tuk-tuk in Peru. I couldn’t free him and I told him ‘listen, I think I want to stop, I don’t think I accept the artist’s package which is a hit. I experienced a fantastic rise during the Fréro era. I was a PE teacher in a college and then The Voice came for us. We felt with Jérém that this was going to take us somewhere but we were absolutely unaware that it could take us so far, so high and so fast.” he explains first.
Florian Delavega explains having experienced a sort of “burn-out”
Too much pressure to handle: “I remember the first broadcast. I didn’t really like that moment. I felt a little invaded. It’s wonderful because it works, but there are also a lot of responsibilities. And therefore pressure. You’re anonymous and suddenly you can’t really do what you were doing before. Well, if you can, but you have to accept that you will be very often solicited and looked at, a bit like an animal in a zoo (…) From Thursday you are in concert, Thursday evening, Friday evening, Saturday evening…For three big years.” A frantic pace, which endangered his physical and mental health: “I had two attacks of kidney stones in the same period. The day before the Olympia I could no longer lift my arm. This also affects the mindset: you experience a bit of an emotional elevator. In the evening you are carried by people, you experience an incredible shot of dopamine and then you have the comedown the next day. When you see the list of symptoms of burnout, you say to yourself ‘ah yes, we’re not far from it’. I knew for months that I wanted to stop.”
Towards a return of Fréro Delavega?
A decision that was not easy for Jérémy Frérot to accept:“He took it quite coldly. He welcomed her, and told me I understand. And then afterward there was a trial, a bereavement, it was painful for him but he never held it against me or made me feel that way.” If Jérémy Frérot was a hit with his albums and started a family with Laure Manaudou – they have been separated since – Florian Delavega moved to the Landes with his partner: “I chose a house where there were no neighbors, running electricity, and water. Flee the city, the system, the lights. (…) But this peace also led me to become a little dull, to be a bit depressed. I was turning into a hermit, I didn’t know where I was going.” Today, he has rediscovered his taste for music: “I want to write my songs, my lyrics, and present myself to people in my new version.” And the two artists do not rule out collaborating together again, to the delight of their fans.
