Viable geometry, instant poetry

>> French transplant Deweare
finds momentum in Montreal

REALITY OF HIS SURROUNDINGS: Deweare

by RUPERT BOTTENBERG

In retrospect, transplanted Frenchman Franck Deweare (pronounced “de-vair”) has few regrets about his move to Montreal in 2004. “France was, at that time, on the social level, not a very good place to live,” he muses over coffee, “and I think it’s worse today. The anger between people is increasing, and I’m not sure what’s going to happen with the election.

“Why move to Canada? Because I had that thing in mind—let’s go somewhere that’s an example of integration working. It’s not so important to me now because I got it—I’m here, everything works fine and nobody ever lacked respect for me.”

Quite the opposite. In fact, the momentum that has led to his debut CD under the Deweare moniker, High Class Trauma, on the Milagro label, began even before he set foot here. He met Arianne Moffatt on a plane, by chance, she dug his demos and tipped him to some talent to connect with—including high-grade electro-jazz unit Plaster, who ended up as his backing band on High Class Trauma, and the album’s producer, Carl Bastien. Before long, he was joining Moffatt on stage and collaborating with Afrodizz on their tune “Fashion Terrorist.”

The album was his truest goal, though, and while it’s clearly the product a very European imagination (albeit one deliberately expressed in the global tongue of pop-rock, English), it’s also highly reflective of Montreal’s patchwork cool. Sure, the ghost of Gainsbourg hovers over much of it, in Deweare’s rough yet suave vocals and penchant for dark, wry elegance. But then there’s the sleek, propulsive disco of “Swallow,” the shiny, Beatles-inflected charm of “Horny Illusion,” brass-boosted smooth groovers “Magic Bastard” and “Back From Hell,” the Nina Simone cover “New Dawn” with solid vocals by Béatrice Bonifassi (Champion, Triplettes de Belleville) and the rock-out closer “Taste,” a nod to Deweare’s early, aggressive musical efforts.

“Sometimes you do music, you write, record and play, and then you say, ‘Oh! That’s what it gave?’ It’s like writing automatic poetry—afterwards, you try to find a meaning in it. With some songs on the album, that’s the case. Then there are other songs which I wanted to sound like cheap, ’70s spy cinema music. I’m glad people have made that link so easily.”

A standout on the record is “Think,” built on artist/poet Ed Bereal’s “Response to a Bourgeois Nigger,” a powerful piece of Black-pride oratory from the turn of the ’70s. “What I like in that piece is that what he says is, you cannot really see what’s happening to you every day, with a real eye—and that’s what they want. It’s like The Matrix—that’s what they want you to figure is reality, but it isn’t.”

To Deweare, the piece rages against complacency in the face of empty over-stimulation, and worse yet, passivity. “Every day, you can make a poem. You can make poetry out of every instant, every act. Apart from the black-white dilemma, that’s what he’s saying.”

Montreal has certainly been good to Deweare, but it has its hassles, such as trying to assemble a stage show. He’s content with the players he’s rounded up, though. “Live, I’d say it’s a viable geometric ensemble. I try to have the people who can make it, because everyone in Montreal, I don’t know what they do, but they’re always super-busy.”

CD launch with guests at
la Sala Rossa on Monday,
April 23, 8 p.m., $10