Isabelle Boulay, The Beauty will sing (photo)

She never wanted to be a singer and it took some time for her to decide that this career was for her. It is partly for this reason that in 1992 she took part in the singing contest in Gramby so that others would make the decision for her. What a nice way to start a career when you have the audience of the most prestigious music contest in the country behind you.

One thing lead to another and success lead to opportunities. There was Starmania and then the album of the television series Alys Roby as a tribute to the first planetary star from Quebec and whose famous "Tico Tico" remains a must. Finally a first solo album Fallait Pas was released two years ago which despite decent sales (33,000 copies) was unjustly torn apart by numerous critics. One thing is for certain, her new album Etats d'amour won't receive the same treatment.

With sixteen songs/love stories, Isabelle Boulay seems very determined to stay in the music business even though she still dreams fondly of opening a little bookshop-cafe. For her new baby, Isabelle Boulay is working with a new and very efficient Quebeco-Americano-Italiano-french team! Now she is singing works by the winning duo Plamondon/Cocciante, who wrote the music for Notre Dame de Paris and the composers of the superb Je t'oublierai, je t'oublierai. Cajun Zachary Richard couldn't resist writing one of the most melodical songs of the album, Le banc des delaisses and Zazie, the French female singer of the moment, wrote three songs. On its own, Etats d'Amour will show you what the people from Quebec are capable of. We find a collaboration of artists-composers and performers among them some of the most famous like France d'Amour or Mario Peluso the very latest discovery. The record, which was produced by Frenchmen Gerard Bikialo and Olivier Bloch-Laine was recorded in Paris where Isabelle spent ten months in 1997 playing in Starmania. This explains the large participation by French musicians among them Jean-Louis Rocques, Renaud's accordionist. The beautiful redhead no longer hides behind the characters Alys Roby on television or Marie-Jeanne in Starmania. She shows us what she is really like and commits herself fully in one of the best albums available in record shops at the moment. After its spring release in Quebec it was released in France last November 8th.

Lili Fatale, The Big Adventure

Just a few weeks ago, on November 1st 1998, Lili Fatale received the Revelation of the Year statuette at this year's ADISQ gala. This was an unexpected prize for the new flag bearers of Quebec's undergound pop scene.

As soon as the eponymous album was released in September 1997, the critics announced the birth of a group to watch for. But the pressure was so sudden for the three group members that two months later, the day after they were awarded the Lion d'Or award (for new music professionals), the critics went back on what they had said. Their story could have ended there but instead Lili Fatale has grown and evolved. From a small studio band, the trio has become a supergroup on stage. In 1998 they played about sixty halls and festivals in Quebec and the rest of Canada, not to mention their European tour.

The adventure is just beginning. With the Canadian music award - the Felix- Lili Fatale has just recently obtained recognition by an industry that is increasingly opening up to new styles of music. As for France, the trio has seduced the French. Like others before them, Lili Fatale, arrived on the Old Continent for the first time to appear on a television show. They found themselves as Celine Dion's guests in front of 10 million television viewers. Then came the 1998 spring festival "Festival de Printemps" in Bourges(Central France) as well as the summer music festival "Les Francofolies" in La Rochelle(on the Atlantic Coast). Things are happening so quickly that there is already talk of a second album. Some songs are ready to go.

The mixture of techno and rock, influenced by the older brothers The Cure and Joy Division, remain the main ingredient of the group's music. The CD Lili Fatale (Sony), which came out in France last June, reflects the transformations which are taking place in French-speaking North America where, make no mistake about it, artists like Richard Binette, Uranian Valcenau or Nathalie Courchesne know how to amaze by the freshness of their compositions and by their well-defined energetic sound.

Marie Carmen, Rodin's Thinker

Marie Carmen is the symbol of popular music here in Quebec and with her fourth album she drives this idea home. France became sweet on her after her cover version of L'aigle noir, by French singer Barbara, when she opened for Michel Sardou at the Olympia theatre in Paris, and then in her thankless role as the rocker Sadia in the musical Starmania. But Miss Introspection fell apart mid-way through her contract and took things easy for two years. With her contract cancelled, Paris growing distant, physical fatigue which had been building up for a long time, a romantic break-up, as well as a professional one caused a violent and devestating collapse.

Back from this great turmoil, Marie Carmen has given us an interesting album, L'Autre, in which her voice seems to be even more enhanced than ever. The melodies are catchy. Like the successful tactic of the previous album the record companies placed their bets on another reprise to launch the new album- and it worked. French songwriter Jean-Paul Dreau's J'veux de la tendresse, previously made famous by Elton John, is aired non-stop on all the radio stations and has given album sales a real boost. Apart from this excellent cover however, the album doesn't offer anything new. Some will say it is indistinguishable from the first three albums. As for me I find L'autre, without being revolutionary, a very pleasant record to listen to, partly because Marie Carmen seems to have left behind part of her "perpetual thinker" side which she carried with her to every interview, making them particularly unbearable.

Another even more unexpected cover is One by U2 and the song Plus d'ici written by the French songwriter Martine Clemenceau. Less of "Who am I? and where am I going?" makes L'Autre a solid album with all of the qualities to become a hit and which may finally give us a taste for listening to what she is saying. The moral of the story is "keep your personal problems to yourself."

Pascal Evans (correspondent in Quebec)