Salomé Leclerc

Can’t you stop raving about the filles from Québec?! You might ask yourself. Well, no. They keep surprising and pleasuring us with great tracks. So why quit? Take sultry Salomé Leclerc. We (well, Maks did, credit’s due) spotted her back in 2010. We raved about her debut: “The guitar-driven songs are the perfect field for her voice to play on and simultaneously kidnap the listeners mind to drop it somewhere under the trees.” Somehow we missed her Le vent nous portera cover. We loved her bass-heavy, ‘dark tranquility’ chansons. And now she’s announced a new album in September, and just released a vinyl single (and mp3s) with two new songs. Arlon, a song that might be about the village (but probably isn’t), is the winner. Again, it’s bass-heavy, drenched in echo, there’s a soulful tambourine and there’s electronica. It’s cold wave on a stove. It’s like making tender love on a concrete floor in an abandoned industrial complex.

Salomé Leclerc – Arlon (link works now)

Mark adds:

Salomé Leclerc is a great stage performer. Here are her best live performances in 2013 at Festivoix, Trois-Rivières (July) and Parc Marcel-Léger, Montreal (August).

At Festivoix here are ‘Partir ensemble’

and click HERE for Caméleon and HERE for ‘Garde-moi collée’

See how she manages with a supporting band of just two, who play multiple intruments. A short interview with Salomé is here

In memory of the famous (unrelated) Québec writer and singer Félix Leclerc (1914-1988) she sang his nostalgic ‘La Gaspésie’.

Salomé is appearing at the Festival Pully-Québec in Switzerland in June along with some other FS favourites – notably Ingrid St-Pierre, Les Soeurs Boulay and Catherine Major. The festival is held in Pully, a suburb of Lausanne, every two years. This may be the only opportunity to see these artistes in Europe in 2014. If you are in Suisse Romande next month, don’t miss it.