RFI Musique: Previously, you got us all used to this Cabrel rhythm of releasing a new album every five years. But you seem to have broken the mould with this one, released just four years after Les Beaux Dégâts…
Francis Cabrel: Since I released Sarbacane, it’s true, I really stuck to this rhythm of taking a five-year break between albums to look after my kids and keep up my work on the local village council. But now all I want to do is write. That’s obviously going to shorten the gap between my albums!

Des roses et des orties feels like more of a quick, 'readymade' album. In any case, you don’t automatically hear all the work involved…
Believe me, a lot of work went into making it, though! There’s some very fancy stuff going on round those guitars. Maybe it’s the warm, organic sound of the guitars that gives you that impression. My last three albums were produced by Gérard Bikialo who’s a pianist. But this time round, it was a guitarist, Michel Françoise, who was at the studio controls. Michel played a lot on the album, too, and I added a few layers of guitar and mandolin. The whole thing took us a year from beginning to end.

I’m actually pleased if people think Des roses et des orties doesn’t sound very polished and produced, because what we were trying to capture on this album is a certain freshness and spontaneity - even though I think we ended up with the opposite! But don’t get me wrong, we didn’t get all finicky in the studio over semiquavers or anything, acting like Laurent Voulzy who spends two days on a reverb!

Did you finish writing all your songs before embarking upon the recording sessions?
Yes.

So you never wind up writing a bit in the studio?
No, absolutely not! I’m a very orderly kind of guy. I like to write in one place and record in another. I write in a room that’s specially set aside for writing and then I go off and record the song one I’m finished. Once the song exists, with its first trimmings, then I can go back into my writing room and change a few things or think about adopting a new outline. But I never, ever write in the studio. I don’t feel comfortable with the idea. Once you go into the studio, you’ve got the sound engineer, the musicians and the producer all buzzing round and there’s no way I can write or even think with other people around. My writing is a solitary pursuit that takes place in total silence behind closed doors with nothing to distract me. I’m not the kind of person who can sit and write in a bar or on a train. I don’t like the idea of people hearing me try out things with my voice or watching me scribble things on a piece of paper. I need to hide myself away to do that.

I’d say that Des roses et des orties is the most political - or perhaps I should say the most "humanist" - album you’ve put out to date…
I prefer to use the term "humanist". I actually made a point of sidestepping social and political issues on my last album because I felt we were all going through a very disruptive time. We’d just lived through all the chaos post- September 11 with this major clash between two worlds and there had been repercussions for everyone. Our lives all became more complicated and we had to change certain things in our behaviour. I didn’t want to weigh things down any more on my last album, Les Beaux dégâts. In fact, I deliberately avoided certain subjects which I left until now.

Des roses et des orties was actually written in 2006, wasn’t it?
In 2006 and 2007. As I said, once I’d written a song, I went straight off to the studio and recorded it, then I went back to writing another one and so on.

So you were busy writing material in the run-up to the French presidential elections. Did the themes the candidates evoked in their campaigns influence you in any way?
There’s not a single song on the album about the French presidential campaign, but yes, it was definitely going on while I was writing. The thing is, for an issue to affect me enough to want to write a song about it, it has to become part of me on a very intimate level… You live with a song while you’re writing it, composing it and recording it. That song becomes an integral part of you for weeks on end. An election campaign could never live inside me like that. But I can be moved in a fraternal way. I can feel real sympathy and compassion for homeless people or those suffering in Africa. That’s something much more human.

My songs make people think about politics and I wouldn’t like to be in a position where I didn’t air my political views. When on a song like African Tour I sing about an African guy deciding to flee his homeland and strike out for Europe - because there it is glittering away on the horizon promising work and a more comfortable lifestyle - then everyone thinks about what that African guy’s life will be like once he’s here, about how he’ll be received in this country and what the current French laws are…

So, no more political songs in the wake of September 11, but somehow those themes are right back in the spotlight now…
Well, it’s as if things are clearer now. I guess what I’m trying to do now is calm things down, you know, bring out a few soothing songs that might bring people together. At the end of the day, this album is intended to act like balm on an open wound.