What role has France played in your careers to date?
Marka: I had no other choice but to launch my career in France really. I didn't exactly get a warm reception when I started out in Belgium, so I decided to come to France instead. I was lucky enough to get a bit of a major break in France too. I ended up supporting Céline Dion when she played Bercy Stadium in December '95. It was all very surreal, very Belgian, in fact... I didn't know what the hell I was doing there, but I did it anyway!
It's still one of our biggest dreams, you know, being recognised and accepted by the French public. Belgium has its own specific culture, of course, but when you think about it, we're almost French. Besides, there are no borders in Europe any more. Brussels is only a one-and-a-half-hour train ride from Paris – and we've got the same currency now too! You have to remember that the French-speaking community are in the minority in Belgium, though, so basing your career on singing for them is a bit like French singers limiting themselves to audiences in Brittany or Alsace! Some singers end up pursuing their career exclusively in Belgium, but personally I think that's a bit of a shame. Maybe they're scared about venturing out onto the wider scene or something, I don't know.
Jeff Bodart: Singing in French automatically makes you part of the French-speaking community around the world. So from that perspective I'd say performing in France is a necessity, a sort of rites-of-passage thing. I mean, when you sing the aim is to take your music to as many people as possible. I don't think there's any difference between a Belgian singer wanting to take his music beyond national borders and a singer from Bordeaux trying to make it on a national rather than a regional level.
Marc Morgan: France has played a big role in my career! When I brought out my first album, the title Notre mystère nos retrouvailles went down really well in France. But I wasn't allowed to use it as a title in Belgium because I came from a group and my label thought it would damage my solo image. I didn't have that problem in Paris though, because no-one knew me there.
I got a lot of help and support in France from people like Murat. I brought out an album on Fnac Musique and ended up appearing on all sorts of prime-time chat shows hosted by Drucker and Foucault. I thought it was really funny appearing on shows like that, where you get instant media access to 1 million viewers. And everyone sits there smiling and patting each other on the back – no-one ever says a bad word about anyone! It's weird, isn't it? You only ever get shows like that in France. But the drawback to all that, of course, is that you're suddenly catapulted into the "variety/mass entertainment" category which cuts you off from the real music scene. You end up getting pigeonholed, which is not something that's ever happened to me in Belgium. Everything's a lot more fluid there. Paris is still very 17th-century in a way. It's all about 'salons' and keeping up with appearances. In Paris you can sit there and slag someone off – but as long as you do it with a smile it's all right! I find it all quite amusing really. But when you're actually in the thick of it you have to put up a hell of a fight to keep your head above water!

Marka and Marc, your records aren't actually distributed in France, are they? Why not?
Marka: Well, I'd be delighted to sign another distribution deal in France which would mean I could follow my career here the same way I do back in Belgium. It's amazing, when you land a deal with a major label you're really excited about the whole thing – but, believe me, when they drop you, it's a very painful business! Being independent is obviously less stable and comfortable but I think the lifestyle is more in touch with reality and means I'll last longer in the long-term. I know the market for French 'chanson' is a very limited one. Let's face it, when you walk into a big record store you see all the r'n'b, techno and rap albums stacked up at the front but the 'chanson' stuff is hidden away at the back of the store. There are other ways of existing in the music business, though. There's room for singers who don't sell hundreds of thousands of albums as well as the big-name stars!
Personally, I'm planning to sell my new album via the Internet and I'd be happy if it sells as well as the last one (15,000 copies). That obviously wasn't enough for Sony, but it's enough for me! Maybe I'm not ambitious enough, but I'm happy to do things on a small scale and keep my feet on the ground.
Marc: No, it's true, my album isn't distributed in France at the moment. But I'm looking around for a distribution deal as we speak. The problem is everything's so show biz in Paris! I'm confident that I'll get a distribution deal in the end, but I know it's going to take a long time. In fact, I'll probably be working on my next album by the time this one ever comes out in France!… I thought it would be a bit quicker than this actually. But I know Marka's had the same problem as me.
The thing is, all three of us emerged on the French music scene at the same time, but none of us clocked up really huge scores in terms of record sales. But we were there, we made some impact. It's hard to get any kind of decent production budget in France though because we don't bring in enough profits to interest the major labels. My sales figures aren't constant and they're certainly not high enough to keep a major like Mercury interested. It's ridiculous, you end up with these completely surreal sales conferences at the end of the year where all the marketing directors get together and the big boss stands up at the front of the room showing all these different graphs! And it's like 'OK, Pagny sales are all right, we'll keep him! But Morgan hasn't done very well this year, so we'll ditch him!' That's the sort of cynical reality you have to put up with in this business!
Jeff: My album came out in France on Pias on February 19th and I'm really happy about that! I really hope Marc and Marka end up finding distribution deals in France, but it's a tricky business. Everything's so formatted here. You sometimes feel like you're up against a brick wall and there's no way round or over it. Personally, I've always had faith in my lucky star. Maybe that's a bit naïve of me but that's how it is.

Your albums all seem to be much more serious this time round. Is that a deliberate move?
Marka: Well, maybe you're right, maybe the lyrics to my songs are a bit stronger this time round. I tackle some pretty heavy subjects like death, for instance. But I think my new album has its share of strange off-the-wall stuff too.
Jeff: Yes, it was a conscious choice to do something more serious this time round. But I think it's more a case of musical evolution than revolution! It's good to call yourself into question every now and then and dig a little deeper creatively. That's why I called my new album Ça ne me suffit plus. I can't bear it when singers do the same album twice!... I wasn't exactly fed up with my 'nice, cheerful' image in the public's eyes but at the same time I thought it would be good if people saw a different side of me for a change. After all, everyone's got a multi-faceted personality – I know I do in any case!
Marc: I chose Je reviens de loin as the first single release from my new album because I felt like the title said it all. I felt like I'd taken quite a while to get back in the studio and work on this album so it really did feel like coming back from afar... Yes, maybe it's true to say that my songwriting style was a bit lighter before. This time round I knew I wanted to move on and tackle new subjects in my songs. The new album's definitely got a more serious side to it, but it's not all doom and gloom! A song like Tout le monde se quitte might come across as pessimistic but I think it's also about evolving musically too. I didn't know how to write songs like that before – and for me it's a question of making a strong statement without going overboard into the blues.

Has the fact of turning 40 influenced your new albums in any way?
Marka: Yes, I definitely feel turning 40 has made a difference in my day-to-day life. I have to admit I had a bit of a crisis about turning 40, in fact. I did get pretty scared and worked up about things. You know, I started asking myself all these questions like 'What am I doing?' 'Why am I doing it?' and 'Is any of it really worthwhile?' But I think that's partly to do with the fact that I didn't have a record label behind me any more and I had to manage everything on my own.
Jeff: Well, I hope not because I don't think the concept of maturity suits me in any way. Anyway, I can't stand the word 'mature'. My worst nightmare would be finding my childish soul trapped in an old man's body!!!
Marc: Yes, maybe age has had an influence on my new album. As you get older it's natural to want to sit back and take stock of things. I'm 39 now so it's natural I should want to move on and talk about different things. I've exhausted my stock of light, upbeat material. This time round I wanted to record songs, which corresponded to my personality and what's going on in my mind right now. I don't go in for pyrotechnic vocal displays or anything so it was important to find songs that really fitted in with me and where I am in my life right now.

Jeff, songwriting tends to be a bit of a collaborative process for you whereas you, Marc, seem to view it as a solitary affair...
Jeff: Well, I have to admit this is the first time I've written so few songs on an album myself. But don't get me wrong, I'm not about to go into early retirement on the songwriting front! It's good to have other people write material for you every now and then. Christophe Miossec managed to express certain things in certain songs that I know I would never have been able to say myself. La vie la mort is a really cynical song which I don't actually think I was capable of writing myself. I love working with other people, in fact. I've never considered music to be a solitary occupation.
One of the things I enjoy most is getting a bunch of people from really diverse backgrounds together, like François Bernheim and Christophe Miossec. I'd love to get two such radically different songwriters to sit down and work together. It's like Biolay and Miossec. They're always going on to me about one another but they're on different planets musically speaking. I'm their only link!
Marc: Songwriting's always been something I've done on my own. What happened this time round was I worked with Denis Clavaizolle as far as the music and the artistic production of the new album were concerned, but the songwriting was completely my own work. I had a few problems getting going on this album actually. Then, one day, I was messing around in doing a soundcheck and Jean-Louis Murat came in and listened for a while. He was really helpful, giving me advice and stuff and Denis, who's a good friend of his, opened up his studio to me. Denis really gave me a lot of help with the tonality and texture of the keyboards and that proved to be the key that unlocked the whole album really. After that, I went away and continued recording at home in Huy, building on the basis of what I'd already done with Denis. He really helped me sort things out.

Do you think it's possible to talk about "Belgian chanson" as a musical movement in its own right?
Marka: For me, there's no difference between Belgian 'chanson' and French 'chanson'. After all, we sing in the same language! Perhaps there's a slight difference between the two in terms of humour though. There's a very specific Belgian humour in the songs of Jean-Luc, the singer from Sttellla, for instance. But he's a bit like Boby Lapointe when you think about it, so he has strong links to French tradition too.
Jeff: I don't think there's such a thing as Belgian 'chanson', but I think you can talk about the Belgian spirit. Belgium's a very small country and the people really aren't jingoistic in any way. We don't have big cults around stars or a huge showbiz system or anything. People are very open to what's going on elsewhere and I think that means musicians experiment with a lot of different things – which is good because there's a wide variety of styles on the Belgian scene. One of the things I think we all have in common is our ability to stand back and get a sense of perspective!
Marc: You can probably talk about Belgian 'chanson' in its own right, but you have to remember that Belgian singers and musicians have to deal with the country being divided into a French-speaking and Flemish-speaking zone. And you can't always rely on Belgium's French-speaking community to generate enough sales.
Belgian artists have influenced my own work a lot and played a major role in making me want to launch my own musical career. Jacques Duvall and the group Télex are at the top of my list of influences. And then there's Jeronimo, who plays with me now, Daniel Hélin and the group Deus - even though they sing in English. I think one of Belgium's most distinctive characteristics is the way it stands at the crossroads of all these different languages. In a way the Belgian music scene is a lot closer to what's going on in the Anglo-Saxon world, but then again you have the situation where a lot of Belgian singers want to go to France and find their roots.
Take Arno, for instance, he's gone from doing this really quite violent music in English with TC Matic to singing in French and experimenting with stuff where he mixes his French, Flemish and English roots. Arno's from Antwerp, a town that's really quite in tune with England. Where I live in Huy, between Liège and Namur, it's completely French-speaking. Then you've got a lot of other Belgian artists like Maurane, Philippe Lafontaine, Adamo and Frédéric François who follow on from the traditional Belgian thing like the group Front 242.

What's the definition of "Belgian- ness"?
Marka: I'd say it's a mixture of melancholy and love of one's homeland. It's also about the interweaving of all the different languages in Belgium like on the song Je parle. But there's also a wider message going on there too, about engaging in dialogue with others. Belgians have really opened themselves up to foreign languages, even it's just a question of learning a couple of words to communicate – that's an effort that most French people never make! But it's indispensable somewhere like Belgium where you have two different languages living side by side. I'm sure the fact you only speak one language in France leads to a sort of over-protectionism of the "French" music scene.
Jeff: I think true "Belgian-ness" lies in not laying claim to your nationality all the time. As Brassens once expressed it perfectly in one of his songs, I don't have much time for "happy imbeciles who were born in such and such a part"! I think it's a good thing to express a certain pride in being Belgian, but you don't have to wave it around in people's faces or anything!

So what's your opinion of your two compatriots here with us now?
Marka: Well, I know Marc and Jeff really well, because we all worked together on Si ça nous chante¹. As far as Jeff's new album is concerned, I've given it a good listen and I really think the most beautiful songs on it are those he wrote himself. And I say that to encourage him to write more! I think what we all have in common is a real passion for performing live. But out of all of us I think Marc is perhaps the greatest all-round 'artist'. Marc's got a real artistic sensibility and, besides singing he draws and does a lot of other artistic things. He doesn't live for the stage in the same way as I do though. He's happy to do five or six concerts in a row – but then he's had enough!
Marc: Jeff's someone who can never stay still for two minutes. I think he's an entertainer in the real sense of the word. He's someone who follows on in the Charles Trenet tradition – and by that I mean he's someone who pours a lot of joy and energy into doing traditional 'chanson'-style songs. That's something I admire very much because I'm not like that at all. I'm a lot quieter and withdrawn and I tend to spend a lot more time in the studio.
I know Jeff and Marka pretty well because last December we got together to do our own version of Petit Papa Noël. I was more involved 'backstage' with the production side of things and that suited my personality better I think. As for Marka, he's someone who's really motivated by the live scene. He's a person who likes to forge ahead, who's always bursting with energy and new ideas. Marka's personality was made for the stage. He's someone who knows how to adapt to different kinds of venues too. Marka's quite happy performing in a cabaret-style venue like Le Sentier des Halles in Paris for a month. He's got an actor-ish side to his character and a real eye for seeing what looks good on stage.
Jeff: What I like about both my compatriots is they never take themselves too seriously. We recently did a radically different version of Petit Papa Noël for a Belgian TV programme, for instance, and we had great fun messing round with the song together. We did plan to appear on stage together with the same group at one stage, but unfortunately that never came off. One of the things I like best about Marka is the strength of his convictions. He's got his own unique way of performing a song which I just adore. As for Marc, I have an enormous amount of respect for his songwriting and composing talent. Music seems to flow from him with such grace and ease. As for my opinions of them both off-stage, all I can say is they're both great friends of mine!

¹A compilation which raised money for a local charity helping mucoviscidosis victims (EMI Belgium, 1999)

Jeff Bodart / Ça ne me suffit plus (Pias, 2001)
Marka /Avant Après (Viva Disc/ Sony Belgium 2001)
Marc Morgan/Les parallèles se rejoignent (Viva Disc/Sony Belgium 2001)