RFI Musique: Tant de temps features a number of well-chosen guest stars. Can you tell us how you came to work with them?
Jacno: Well, there's a track by a (German) band called Stereo Total. We were really happy with what we did together – so happy, in fact, that Stereo Total suggested they should do a German adaptation of the song. In the end, I decided I liked the German version twice as much, then one thing led to another and I came up with the idea of Françoise Cactus, half of the duo, doing a duet with me on another song on the album. So I went out to their studio in Berlin. I'll be working with Stereo Total again in the very near future, in fact, because I'm going to record a German version of the album. I don't speak a word of German, but working with genuine crazies like them is a real pleasure! I manage to sing in German phonetically with Stereo Lab coaching me – and apparently I've got a pretty damn good accent! It's funny, I can more or less see what I'm singing, because the lyrics are adapted from what I wrote, but at the same time everything's a bit vague. And that's what adds a bit of an edge to things! I'll be heading back out to Berlin to lay my Prussian vocals over the same mixes. I love doing this sort of thing, it's great fun and part of the novelty for me is that when you do something new you find you don't have the same tics you do singing in French.

And who were your other musical accomplices on the album?
There's also Tarik Benouarka, who's this really most extraordinary guy. Tarik added a bit of an Oriental feel to things. He's into this weird sort of mix of Arabic stuff, techno, even a bit of rap – and that's something I must admit I've never really liked! He's a very talented guy. It was Tarik who introduced me to Yacine Mekaoui who does these very Arab-style backing vocals. I love having that kind of tone to things, having something a bit different. But I have to say the album actually ended up sounding very homogeneous overall. It's been a long time since I've made an album like this, an album linked to a particular period in time. I think that's something that really comes across when you listen to it. My last album, French Paradoxe, had its merits, but it was basically just a jigsaw made up of different songs I'd done for films. Then when I turned it into an album, I threw in a track I did with Arthur H and a cover of J’suis snob by my great music hero Boris Vian.

Your new album Tant de temps finds you breaking out of your dilettante image every now and then. There are moments of real emotion on it, hidden between other risqué numbers like Le sport…
Yes, and I'm very much aware of that. I know when I've done a really powerful and emotional song, because I feel kind of funny afterwards. I'd already ventured off a bit in this direction on Faux Témoin, an album I made with Etienne Daho. That was my first decent album as a singer, but this time round I feel I've taken an even bigger step.

Talking of Etienne, I thought I could make him out in the backing vocals here and there …
Yes, it's him all right! We've been found out! Etienne is like a brother to me. The other guys involved in the making of the album were Thomas Dutronc who came along and played his chicken-thief guitars, completely brilliant, the way only he can do them. Then there was Paul Personne who came along and did a spot of slide guitar. Paul's a complete virtuoso. He turned up like he always does with a whole truckload of guitars, sat down and played and came up with the right thing immediately. I think it's a funny business getting involved on other people's albums, you don't have any responsibility. You start off just messing around but then it evolves into really writing something with each other. Le Bourdon, a track I wrote for Paul, was the result of him coming along and playing on this – really bad – album of mine.

As one of the original '80s icons, what's your take on the current '80s revival?
I suppose I don't really get it. The whole '80s thing is a bit of a mish-mash really. One thing's for sure, though, and that is that Rectangle was a totally weird, off-the-wall album, genuinely what might best be described as an invention. And, like all good inventions, it was an accident, something that came about completely by chance. For me, a career's a question of accumulation, piling up things as you go along. You keep what's good along the way, even if it's only unconsciously. Like the most beautiful woman in the world, you can only give what you've got! Personally, I don't understand people who get stuck on one particular period of their career. I believe in constant accumulation and messing around with new techniques.

Are you ever amazed at how long you've lasted in this business?
Well, when you're a bit of a Martian like me, you're always working out on the fringe so you never really ask yourself that question. If you do, you start accepting things I've always refused. I believe in getting get on and doing my stuff without calculating where it's going – or anything else come to that! And I like to hope that guarantees its quality. I don't actually like people going on about how long I've been around. The guy who's been working on my biography unearthed this whole discography that included all the stuff I've written or produced for other people over the years… And it really frightened me! There are periods when you bring out stacks of records. On average, I worked out I'd released nearly two albums a year! That's absurd!

I believe your biography, written in collaboration with Albert Algoud, is due out the same time as your new album?
It's coming out at the end of May. It was a very interesting thing to be involved in actually, in the sense that it went a lot further than the usual book full of interviews. I ended up spilling the beans on a lot of things – but not everything (Jacno bursts out laughing at this point).There are some things I couldn't possibly have told! I draw the line at implicating other people whether they're alive or dead! I think it's OK to tell everything if it just concerns yourself and what you've been up to. But I didn't want to harm anyone else in the process. I wasn't going to go round shooting my mouth off about who I'd slept with like Doc Gynéco did. I don't think that's very cool for the people concerned who didn't necessarily want their names to come up in that kind of book. I'd be stark raving mad if I came across a book by some girl about how she'd slept with Jacno! I'd feel like going round and slapping her in the face!