Solo survivor

>> Muriel Moreno is nobody’s pop kitten

by RUPERT BOTTENBERG

The electronic music environment, according to Muriel Moreno, is ideal for expressing a spirit of melancholy. It’s odd to hear this, because the mood of Surviving the Day—the latest solo disc from Parisian Moreno, once the voice and face of French pop act Niagara, now a lefthanded e-pop composer—is less sad than dark and nervous, shot through with touches of subtle black humour.
“I’m happy to hear you say that,” Moreno tells me, “because for me, my music is maybe a little bit too sad. I must say that this album is a little happier than my previous one, Required Elements, which was like, [makes desperate strangling noise] hgglkk!
“The reason why I do so much sad music is because it happens in sad moments. It’s a question of surviving the moment. You become depressed because something is going wrong—it happens to me every day. I have to survive this day, so what can I do? I have two choices, I can put a bullet in my head or I can write music. So it’s always the moment when I’m stuck in reality—I have to abstract myself from it. I find the music helps me to make the path between the concrete and abstract. Music is the architecture between them. It’s very noble.”
If Moreno could survive a decade or so of vacuous pop stardom with Niagara (“I was a soldier, that’s all”) then fleeting bummers shouldn’t be too tall an order. She and her collaborator in Niagara parted ways in ’92, after a string of hits—“Tchiki boum,” “Assez,” “L’amour à la plage”—and outstanding videos. She survived, but the scars remain in that she now has a hard time being accepted as a serious composer rather than a photogenic pop kitten. In her book, this is squarely a question of gender imbalance—she notes the astounding dearth of recognized female composers through history.
“It means that me, if I want to do music for movies, which I’m starting to do now, it’s like I’m not credible. I was very famous before, in France, and always people ask me to make movies, but as an actress. That’s not my job. I’d always go to meetings, because I wanted my music up there. I had a good argument—you can’t use me as an actress, but if you want my music, voilà.’”

Doing it for herself

Moreno points out that people have a hard time believing that any woman might prefer creative solitude over social involvement. Too often, she points out, feminine creativity is little more than “yes, dear” servitude wrapped up in a pretty package. “Most of the time, women do it because there’s a man, the father or husband or boyfriend, who says, ‘Do it! Do it! Do it!’ They can’t be themselves, only a tribute to those around them. I’m against this idea, but it’s true. I feel like I’m the only one, you know? I must admit, I’m a stranger to my own sex.
“I know a lot of men who create, writers like Michel Houellebecq—he’s had a woman for 15 years, this guy. Don’t think he’s fucking alone! It’s absolutely not true! Most of the writers and composers have women who prepare their coffee and make their beds. Compare that with the women—Tori Amos, she doesn’t have a husband. PJ Harvey doesn’t have a husband. Björk doesn’t have a husband. Me, I don’t have a husband. We’re all alone! Because women are prepared to be servants. I mean, the worst enemies of women are women themselves.”
In that respect, Moreno stands as a conscientious objector to the whole damn mess. She’s content to hole up in her home studio, fashioning cool, dense, idiosyncratic musical episodes. Amon Tobin comparisons have popped up in that Moreno’s music also has both the sly chuckles and the noir, filmic quality. The cinematic aspect can be chalked up to both Moreno’s fascination with film, from Hitchcock to Hong Kong, and the fact that the handy-cam she totes around everywhere doubles as a portable sample snatcher. Her sounds come from everywhere—even the neighbour’s cat. “He’s always coming to see me when I’m working. He’s my angel, my black angel. He’s always purring, so I took a big tube, put a microphone inside and recorded his purr. It was like a big didgeridoo, very bassy.”
Montreal, which she considers something of a second home, will see the more sociable side of Moreno over the holidays, as she’s DJing at a number of places leading up to New Year’s Eve. Her unpredictable but carefully controlled sets run from German click-dub to sexy house, from Minneapolis neo-soul to fossilized hits from back “dans le jour.” Expect the unexpected—that’s the kind of woman she is—but don’t expect any Niagara. n

At Newtown tonight, Thursday, Dec. 20, 11pm, $6; With les Jardiniers at Ministry’s Bamboo Lounge on Friday, Dec. 21, 10pm; With Sylvain Houde, Martin Dumais and more at Lion d’Or on Saturday, Dec. 29, 9pm, $10 and at Room 1635 (1635 St-Laurent) on Monday, Dec. 31, 10pm