Pigalle is left speechless: the leader of the group of the same name and Les Garçons Bouchers, François Hadji-Lazaro, died at the age of 66 from sepsis, after making history on the French alternative rock scene. The musician with the shaved head is dead “Saturday around 11:55 p.m.”announced to AFP a manager of his record company Universal France.
Pigalle singer “had health problems for some time”, said his close collaborator and saxophonist, Stef Gotkovski, praising “an outstanding musician, and very creative”.
The inspiration of Paris and Bob Dylan
His cheeky voice of Parisian titi will remain attached for the general public to the hit of the 1990s, In the room of the bar-tabac on rue des Martyrsa Time.news of the harbors of the capital at a time when, in the slums of Paris, one can still “buy everything sell everything/the best and the worst”.
Kid from the 15th arrondissement, contaminated by music while listening to Dylan, this autodidact with the build of an ogre, multi-instrumentalist singer, lyricist and composer, masters the guitar, but also the banjo, the accordion, the violin, the bagpipes, or the old one…
It is obviously in the corridors of the metro that this Parigot to the tips of his nails finds his first audience. He abandoned his job as a teacher to embark on music.
The text rock-punk of the 1990s
Frequenting the same bars and drinking glasses with other founders of text punk like the Wampas, or Bérurier Noir, he will tell his nocturnal vision of the capital in the songs of his group Pigalle, mixing howling guitars and neat writing, smiles and spleen. “Rip Old Canaille”, reacted Didier Wampas.
It is another lover of Paname, the designer Tardi, who sketched the cover of the Pigalle group’s flagship albumDistressed glances at the dreary and pitiful existence of Benjamin Tremblay, a dull character but oh so endearingreleased in 1991.
“We claim our French roots even if rock is part of our roots: it would be wrong to blush for French song”, declared in 1988 to AFP François Hadji-Lazaro, about the alliance of rock and realistic song that he prized.
He will also found Les Garçons Bouchers, who will sing a summer antitube, The Lambada we don’t like that (1990) and a punk cover of Come see the musicians by Charles Aznavour.
His musical imprint goes beyond his own songs: in 1985, he founded Boucherie Productions, in an attempt to snatch alternative rock from marginality, without compromising itself with show biz. It was about “one of the first independent labels for alternative bands who didn’t want to depend on a major””, explains Stef Gotkovsky.
A label which would play an important role on the Parisian alternative scene by giving a chance to many emerging artists, before filing for bankruptcy in 2001. Not without having produced a hundred albums and nurtured the debut of artists then in their infancy such as the Mano Negra, whose first single he published in 1988, The blackberry and the first album, Patchanka.
From Roland Topor to cinema and song for young audiences
Committed to the left, François Hadji-Lazaro had also befriended the intellectual Roland Topor, even releasing an album François relaxes Topor. His more recent solo albums are more focused on rock songs.
His physical appearance as a colossus with braces, smooth skull and round face, also caught the eye of directors, who entrusted him with supporting roles or extras: he fits perfectly with the atmosphere of The City of Lost Children by Jean-Pierre Jeunet, and also appears in The Pact of the Wolves by Christophe Gans. He has also composed film music.
François Hadji-Lazaro ended up joining the major Universal. In recent years, the former teacher, father of two children, had begun to mess with young audiences with book-discs and shows, including the albums Pouët en 2016 et Atchoum en 2018.