Record of the week-Arno/ "Santeboutique"

The only thing Arno has in common with this blog is the three languages. He does not sing in Portuguese, of course, but he delivers his songs in English, French, or Flemish sometimes. While I’m studying a compilation for a special Belgian show, here comes Arno’s new album, “Santeboutique”. And this column is for everyone. 

Arnold Charles Ernest Hintjens, of his real name is perhaps well among the 10 artists that symbolizes Belgium, since he sang with his band TC MATIC (from 1977 to 1986), «Oh lal la la», with his guitars in razor blades. For those of you who don’t know it. It’s simple. Arno’s definition is simply “a Belgian artist from the 1980s”. But you thought I wouldn’t stop there. Besides being Belgian, he’s from the coastal town of Ostend. Or better, Oostende, where he was born in 1949. This is where the blogger is stuck. Oostende is a city full of images, stories, artistic importance. Oostende, a great port whose ugliness is its beauty. It is the English Liverpool, German Hamburg, Le Havre français, or the Dutch Rotterdam. It was mainly the town of James Ensor (1860-1940), the world’s first expressionist painter (not Van Gogh), the son of Jérome Bosh and Breughel.

It is also the city of Spilliaert that the singer cites in the icy and superb «Oostende goodevening». Spilliaert (1960-1946), and his painter watercolour and symbolist, made this anguish of loneliness with a coldness that would drive to suicide. And this coldness still exists, as soon as the month of October arrives, these days. Frustration gains me when talking about Oostende. Arno, that’s it. The grotesque of Ensor, regional festivals such as the «Bal du rat mort». And the blacks and whites of Spilliaert in the musical colours of the strident guitars Paul Decoutere and Frans Van Aerts of TC MATIC. As I pointed out during a program, Oostende was also the city chosen by Marvin Gaye, to flee show business in 1980. Arno became a comrade and even the cook of the soul legend. The comercial successes of Arno, post Tc Matic are limited to Belgium with some cult titles Putain putain (these are really good, we are all Europeans! ), Bathroom singer, She loves black, Eyes of my mother, I want to swim, Chic and cheap. He developed a specialty of original covers and offset by French standards, which opened up a wider audience for him (Les Filles du bord de mer d'Adamo, Le Bon Dieu de Jacques Brel, Comme à Ostende de Jean-Roger Caussimon et Léo Ferré, Elisa de Serge Gainsbourg, Sarah de Georges Moustaki, Pauvres diables (Vous femmes) de Julio Iglesias, Knowing me, knowing you by ABBA, Get up, stand up by Bob Marley and Peter Tosh), and even both, the medley Jean Baltazaarr, La fille du Père Noël/Jean Genie by Jacques Dutronc/David Bowie, with Beverly Jo Scott. Abandoning English somewhat over time, his music remains a vast mix, the accordion alongside the electric guitar. It is on stage that he takes on his true dimension as evidenced by his live albums En Concert (French style) released in 1997 and Live in Brussels in 2005 where one finds performances of Les Yeux de ma mère. Loved by a trendy French audience, Arno was too Belgian for the English, I find a lot of Charlelie Couture in the work of Arno or Tom Waits. And Brel of course. This daily life of the people, but also a lot of what concerns his own life. Yes, you have to be Belgian to understand Arno 100%. But not to understand his music. I was afraid that at the beginning, his stuttering, his difficulty in searching for words, would discredit him in the eyes of the French public. But his music, very post punk and his texts, as well as his charisma on stage reassured me. And then there was always this image of the Parisians of the Belgian close to the innocent in the village. That’s when I like to have ridiculous prejudices because if France is not strictly speaking a country of rock, its amateurs know what they are talking about. It was not difficult to meet Arno one evening in the centre of Brussels. Even with his curved appearance, his stature of a meter 95, his santiags, dressed in black, pepper and salt hair, and the evenings spent in the Halles Saint-Géry district, he was rather endowed with a sense of humour that even his diction did not disturb. Among his 15 solo albums, sometimes irregular, «Santeboutique» will be part of his beautiful pages, where one can find the rock of his beginnings that dominates (Ca chante», «Lady Alcohol») or the funk («Flashback blues»), some texts «non sense» («Les saucisses de Maurice»), about the pathetic couple («Naturel», «Santeboutique»), and in the end an album without weak point, rock but produced for broadcast, and a little pearl for this year. 

ARNO/ “Santeboutique” (Excellent!)