Maxime Le Forestier made a name for himself on the French music scene throughout the 60s and 70s as an anti- establishment rebel, a sarcastic caricaturist and an analyst of human sentiments (at his best on albums such as Mon Frere, L'Education Sentimentale and Parachutiste). Le Forestier mellowed somewhat in later life, however, viewing the world through tender but still vaguely ironic eyes on Né quelque part (released thirteen years ago now) and a host of other albums.

Over the last few years of his career Le Forestier has devoted himself to performing the work of his "master and mentor" Georges Brassens (recording several albums as well as staging live concerts). But on his latest album, L'Echo des étoiles, Le Forestier has chosen to go back to his own work. Teaming up with lyricist Boris Bergman, guitarist and musical arranger Jean-Felix Lalanne and producer Jean-Pierre Sabar, the singer has got back in touch with his own sty. What's more, his new album includes an extensive cast of guest stars including Jean- Jacques Goldman (who not only co-wrote Affaire d'Etat but duets with Le Forestier on the song), Marc Lavoine and French pop diva Zazie (who provide some excellent backing vocals) and musicians Daniel Mille and Bernard Paganotti.

L'Echo des étoiles features twelve new songs, which transport the listener from Le Forestier's Parisian reality to several different foreign shores. Retaining his old humanist sensibilities, Le Forestier casts a critical but understanding eye over the world's troubles and the soul's ills, and shows himself to be as concerned as ever when it comes to preserving truth, sincerity and dignity.
One of the most outstanding songs on L'Echo des étoiles - indeed, of Le Forestier's entire career - is Chevaux rebels, a song that was originally penned for the Algerian singer Lounes Matoub by French writer and politician Jean-Francois Deniau. Sadly, the Kabyle star was gunned down before he had the chance to perform the song and his close friends ended up urging Deniau to give it to Le Forestier instead. Touched by this gesture, Le Forestier set Deniau's lyrics to music and turned the French writer's poem about freedom, beauty and rebel horses into a moving tribute to Matoub.

Le Forestier's songwriting talent comes to the fore on his new album and listeners will find that it has greatly evolved since his early days. Ambiguous metaphors, exuberant wordplay and a tendency to tack themes from unexpected angles have crept into his writing sty. This new approach is doubtless a result of his collaboration with Boris Bergman (long-time friend and songwriting partner of Alain Bashung) who has written or co-written at least half of the songs on the new album. "Boris Bergman has received a lot of complaints about his songs being difficult to understand. And his defence has always been, 'Well, do you enjoy birdsong? You do? And do you understand what the birds are singing?' I love the fact that you can always read more into the lyrics of his songs. It's inspired me enormously when it comes to my own songwriting," says Le Forestier, "Bergman's method of writing combined with my logic has produced some very interesting results. Whenever we work together, I'm the one fighting against being overly allusive and he's the one fighting against the songs being too clear and self- explanatory."
L'Echo des étoiles is a wonderfully eclectic album on which songs about love and mysterious fantasies stand side by side with songs about the death penalty and anecdotes from around the world. Le Forestier also includes several personal references, such as La Guitare a Paul (a song about a 12-string guitar given to him by French blues hero Paul Personne). In short, L'Echo des étoiles has moved on a long way from Le Forestier's last studio album, Passer ma route, released five years ago. The singer has not wasted the intervening years, although he is quick to point out that: "I can't say I haven't written anything in that time - but it's one thing to have an idea and jot it down and quite another to sit down and turn that idea into a song!"

ast year Le Forestier found himself with just four new songs - Chevaux rebels, Minimun que Minnie m'aime, J'aurai ta peau and Rue Darwin. He had just spent eighteen months on the road, performing Brassens and knew it was time to get back in touch with his own material. So the indefatigable singer hit the road again, playing a special "Tour de chauffe" (warm-up tour) with Jean-Felix Lalanne which took them to 38 small venues in the French provinces. This tour laid the foundations for Le Forestier's new stage show - which he will tour as a double act with Lalanne as of next spring. But, more importantly, the "Tour de chauffe" allowed Le Forestier to hone his new material, writing new songs on his guitar. The songs were then re-arranged in the studio and adapted for L'Echo des étoiles, but on the forthcoming tour Le Forestier assures us all the songs will be performed on two guitars without any backing musicians. If the worst comes to the worst and the song really requires it, we can always play the percussion part on guitar!
Le Forestier has spent many years experimenting with musical influences from the four corners of the world and L'Echo des étoiles finds his melting-pot sty coming together in a smooth, seamless way. The singer likes to remind us that even back in the days of his hero Georges Brassens, French chanson borrowed freely from other world rhythms: "Brassens's music is a mix of Italian songs he discovered through his mother, hymns, songs he picked up from Spain and Gypsy music from Saintes-Maries-de-la-Mer. As for me, the arrangements on my last few albums have really been about mixing all sorts of different flavours and musical influences. These days it's extremely easy to pick up on existing folklores around the world, but whenever I feel a song belongs too strongly to a country, I try and transport it somewhere else. L'Echo des étoiles , the opening song on the new album, features a lot of very Cuban-sounding brass so I asked my accordion- player Daniel Mille to try and give the song a different flavour, you know, bring in a bit of Eastern Europe or Argentina."
In short, Maxime Le Forestier's new album is a masterpiece of fusion and transfusion. A result of years of experience, musical know-how or competence? Le Forestier plumps for the latter, adding "I'm competent at what I do but my competence is limited to doing what I love. My sing greatest capability in life is finding new and easier ways of creating the music I love."