The rocker Pat O’May presents his new album: Welcome to a new world

By editorial staff Guingamp published the echo of the argoat see my news

Pat O’May est un musicien bien connu en Bretagne, et ailleurs dans le monde. Certains se souviennent de l’événement organisé à Bleu Pluriel à Trégueux il y a tout juste quatre ans, pour célébrer ses 23 ans de carrière. Il a rempli la salle pour près de 4 heures de show en compagnie d’invités prestigieux, musiciens avec lesquels il avait travaillé au long des années, des Anglais, Irlandais, Américains et un bagad. Pat également écrit des musiques de films et la musique de reportages pour l’émission Thalassa.

Aujourd’hui l’artiste, qui vit et compose dans la région de Guingamp, sort un nouvel album « Welcome to a New World », son onzième. Rencontre autour d’un café à Châtelaudren.

Can you explain what you wanted to say in this album?

In fact from the start, I'm trying to make people travel, embedd them in a story, and this time, I wanted to make a story that would last an hour, a concept album.It was exciting to write in this way, more cinegraphic than usual by having all the images of this character, "No Face", who arrived in the middle of writing.During the writing itself, I am the victim of my inspiration, I do not control it, I let things happen and I exploit them, I do not calculate.This album is less Celtising, apart from the Uilleann pipe on the first title, and of course my guitar solos, it sticks to my skin.

Most fans are here in Brittany and appreciate the Celtic rock side and in this album it is not striking.

There is the Celtic side in depth, because it is part of my roots, but there are no Celtic themes, I really let the inspiration go as it needed, then I fired like On a wire, the pieces were composed in the order on which they are on the disc. In fact when I finished the first song I told myself that I was going to connect all the titles with a sound designer, something that I wanted to do for a while, but there it was really the theme of The album that made it possible to do this. At the end I ended up with this tablecloth that I put at the end of "I Shall Never Surrender", then I listened to the song, I had the guitar in hand, and the sound-design gave birth To "Grinch", the second song, and everything is written like that, as if there was a logic that escaped me and at the end of "grinch" there was another sound-design that Inspired the song that followed, and so on I pulled the wire to the 12th piece.

You left them a lot of space, the album has been released for a few weeks, it works well, the clip "In this Town" has already been seen tens of thousands of times, and you have already presented the album on stageAnd he was well received.

I am very happy with that, already it's very pleasant to read good chronicles, and there is a recognition of the work and the energy that we put on this album, musicians and Bryan with whom J'I mixed the album, I like to work with someone who has an external eye and skills that I do not have, and vice versa, we have completed each other, we mixed this in 3weeks, and because of the covid I could not go to the studios of Abbey Road, but Alex Wharton with whom I used to work for several albums, did a phenomenal job, the good chronicles recognize the workfrom everyone.

In this album there are very different songs, an acoustic ballad, more "metal" songs, some find zeppelin led or deep purple, you put a mix of all the music you listeninfluence ?

It came like that, again, I did not try to do this, yes, there are passages that make me think of Led Zeppelin, others to Deep Purple or Sons of Appollo, there is aLittle just as quite a lot of rock prog, there are more pop things than usual.It's funny, you create things and you don't know how people will react.I am told that there are references to Rush or other groups that I have never listened to.

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You have never listened to them but perhaps heard.What may seem paradoxical is that it is a concept album and we could expect it to be very linear and each piece has a different color.

Yes because it is linked to the very story of this character who has no primary sense, he has lost hearing, smell etc. His question will be "I was born like that or I became like that", obviously the answer is that he became like that, why? He realizes that he locked himself in a comfort of life and out of fear, prefers to stay in a comfort zone, and that is what is worse for a human being, "no face", It's you, it's me, it's everyone, that's all we live, I think we all want to make things happen and also contradictions, we are Sometimes terribly classic, we block ideas, new ideas will scare us. There are all these contradictions which are also reflected in the musical level. During the first song he tells where he is, during the second he wants to get out of this situation, so we have a more revolted piece. After there are more peaceful things, in the fourth piece he has his conscience that says to him "Look at this world, he is not as rotten, it's really beautiful, you just have to open to look at him". You have to be just receptive to what's going on around, as for inspiration, you have to look at what's going on to shoot it, exploit it, do something, it's really all that explains all these forms A little different, but which ultimately matches each other, I think this is the album that I made the easiest to listen to.

So there can be these color changes during the songs but this album, but we see it especially on stage, is linked, no break between the songs.About the concerts, when are you going to come and present the album in Brittany to us?

For the moment there is only one date planned in Quimper, at the Athena of Ergué Gaberic on November 20, there will be others of course, in 2022. I hope the public will comeMany, we had a difficult time, no concerts, and we need to play, people need that, we all need to breathe together.This is what happens in a concert, what will never happen in front of a TV or a YouTube channel, the concerts broadcast is different, like cinema, between seeing a FIM on its screen or ina movie theater.

Has your team have been changed?

We really expanded the technical team, for this album particularly, there are 4 people, Cédric au sound, Stéphane in the light, Philippe as guitar-tech, and Max who takes care of the drums and the bass, c'is pure happiness, and then there is the record company, management, it makes great changes that make it more time to focus on music, on the show that we have to do.

And you also have another team, the fan club that has been supporting you for ten years already, which has accompanied you, and which publishes a fanzine ...

Yes, it is a great team, which gives a lot of energy and whose members do not realize how important they are, I saw the impact that it had in relation to the press attaché, at record companies, my sponsors, having an active fan club, with this magazine which is really great, they are amazed.There is a structure, and we grow up together.

We talked about the album, but you also do something else in the territory, can you also tell me about the Guit-Ar-Camp which saw its third edition in July?

Yes, it's always a highlight during the summer, we started the first year with Dan Ar Braz, who is the godfather of the Guit-Ar-Camp, Fred Chapellier, Ivan Guillevic who made a special Pink Floyd, and Geneviève le Bas who made a conference on Pink Floyd as well. The following year we had Patrick Rondat, Hassan Hajdi, Judje Fredd. This year, Jonathan Noyce, the bass player of Gary Moore, Archive, Nono de Trust, and Philippe Kalfon, and luthiers, creators of effects, software. This is happening over 3 days, in Plouguernével in a great site, we sleep on site, we eat on site and we are immersed in the guitar during these three days. This is an opportunity to transmit through the Masters Class, to make beautiful meetings, there is a big nucleus that comes back every year, it's great, people come from everywhere, from all over France, and I am preparing the next edition. I would like to have someone to tell us about the manufacture of guitar microphones, I also plan to bring someone to talk about lamps, lamp amps, bring in a producer, a manager, journalists from Guitar, last year, we had a daily stone of the guitar chain. The goal is also to talk about everything there is around the guitar, we are not there only to give lessons, it's more meetings with artists, we play a lot of guitar, but he It's not just that. Last year with Christophe Babin we did something on how we went from the album model to his realization in the studio, this is something that we never share. I also made a master's degree on taking your guitar, these are things that we will not have with a classic teacher, and the Guit-Ar-Camp this is the perfect opportunity to be able to talk about this.

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In the coming weeks and months you will go on tour to present your album, there will be dates in the Côtes d'Armor?

Yes, there will necessarily be, but in 2022.

And what are you going to do with others now, film music, a new album, this one had started for almost two years, November 2019, so no connection with the COVVID?

No, no relation to the base, but it turns out that the central subject of the album, fear, the management of fear had a particular resonance with the COVVI.The other projects are the tours with Patrick Rondat, and with my group, for the rest I work a lot with directors who do things abroad and for the moment it is still blocked, since the beginning ofCovid, I didn't write anything for the image, contrary to what I usually do, at least 3 film music per year.

I come back to the next meeting with your audience, the concert at the Athena of Ergué Gaberic on November 20, will it be recorded?

No, not recorded, broadcast live by France Bleue Breih Izel and maybe France Bleue Armorique, we did this for the Live, the anniversary concert in 2017 and I remember messages received from people in the south of France which'were gathered about twenty to listen to the concert together, it's incredible.

Finally, can you give me good reasons to buy the album?It's the best ?

No, the best will be the next one, (laughs) is an album that can make you travel, an hour's trip.

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