Blonde ambition

Coeur de Pirate strives to make a strong second impression with her new album

Upon completion of her eponymous debut album three years ago, Beatrice Martin, better known as ubiquitous local chanteuse Coeur de Pirate, quantified success as shifting 500 units, dazzling a mostly filled Divan Orange and continuing to make music when her busy post-secondary curriculum would allow it. History, of course, disregarded those modest goals, hurtling the now 22-year-old into a franco-pop stratosphere not normally reserved for CEGEP communications students. Or as she mildly puts it, “things kinda blew up.”

Now anointed the pride and joy of her native province and the unexpected conqueror of finicky France, there’s nowhere to go but deeper into introversion. Blonde is more than just a head of hair (for the anglos) or a relationship status (for the francos), or the continuation of the great Quebec album tradition of having witty double entendres for titles: Blonde is the one-word summarization of a three-year whirlwind for its creator. “Why does it have a negative connotation?” Martin asks about the anglophone interpretation of blonde. “The word represents what the album is about, and not really just because in a way I’ve been a girlfriend to a lot of people and I’ve been in a relationship with my fans, but also because I am blonde, and with Coeur de Pirate people sometimes stop with the first impression they have of me: that I’m that one girl with the tattoos who does that one little song on the piano and that’s it. I hope I get to break that with this second album.”

CANADIAN CONTENT, AMERICAN INK

But in a way, isn’t Blonde more about second impressions than initial ones? Questions about her appearance may linger from the periphery, but the raging quandary is whether Mar­tin can strike lightning twice: if she can duplicate the direct, disarming intimacy of her debut while beefing up everything else. Writing the songs came naturally enough, as she’s been steadily amassing new material since the release of Coeur de Pirate, but to record these new songs and, as she puts it, “give out her little secrets to the world,” was a more difficult step.

“I’ve been playing some of these songs for three years. I felt I needed to do an actual physical version of them for those who have been following me for so long and liked them.”

Being a girlfriend to her fans, it would seem, involves the same give-and-take of any other relationship. “It’s a commitment, and it’s a good commitment, and you learn a lot. When you’ve been invisible all your life, to then be able to say what you’re feeling through song, give interviews and talk about yourself, it’s pretty surreal.”

Coeur de Pirate the artist is by no means a populist forum though, but remains an outlet purely for Martin’s self-professed “venting.” That axiom remains unchanged despite Blonde’s impressive list of guest stars, and attempting to glean anything from the cameos can prove misleading. The most Montreal song of the bunch, “Saint-Laurent,” was written with her Armistice cohort, Torontonian Jay Malinowski. Sam Roberts sings on “Loin d’ici,” albeit in French, and one could be forgiven for not identifying Colin Stetson’s positively jovial horn playing on “Ava.” All but one of the songs were recorded at Hotel2Tango with Howard Bilerman, and even the implication of his presence doesn’t accurately reflect the final result.

“He sees things in my songs that other people don’t see,” she says of Bilerman. “When I first started writing for Blonde, I really liked folk and that was the sound I wanted. It didn’t turn out that way [laughs], but even though the album sounds pretty big, it’s good to work with somebody that truly understands folk music.”

Martin is also preparing a modest two-fold introduction into the U.S., the first being a string of concert dates next January (“at the 9:30 Club in Washington, where Fugazi played!” she exclaims with genuine reverence), and the second being an upcoming cover feature in popular body art mag Inked, quite possibly the most high-profile entry point for a Quebec-based franco artist into the American market.

Linguistic differences aside, the U.S. may prove to be a good fit for Martin. Regaling with tales of her numerous trips to France, Martin eschews conventional anecdotes about sipping mac­chiatos along the Seine, instead describing the Périphérique, the ugly autoroute that outlines Paris. Not a total shock though, if you consider as a teenager she dreamed of visiting Seattle before the City of Light. ■

ALBUM LAUNCH AT THE RIALTO THEATRE ON TUESDAY, NOV. 8, 8 P.M., $30

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