Tiersen has been honing his musical aesthetic since he could stand on two legs. He started learning piano at the age of four, taking up violin at the age of six and receiving classical training at musical academies in Rennes, Nantes and Boulogne. Then, at the age of 13, he chose to alter his destiny, breaking his violin into pieces, buying a guitar and forming a rock band.
Yann Tiersen has collaborated with vocal artists like Claire Pichet ("Le phare" and "Rue des cascades"), Elizabeth Fraser ("Les retrouvailles") and Shannon Wright ("Yann Tiersen and Shannon Wright"). Other musicians he has worked with include The Divine Comedy, Noir Désir, Dominique A., Francoiz Breut, Les Têtes Raides, The Married Monk and Sage Francis
Tiersen got a musical education from the city of Rennes' annual Transmusicales festival, seeing acts like Nirvana, Einstürzende Neubaten, Nick Cave and The Bad Seeds, The Cramps, Television and Suicide. When his band broke up a few years later, instead of hunting for some new musicians, he bought a cheap mixing desk, an eight-track reel, and started recording music solo with a synth, sampler and drum machine, poring over the grooves of old records on the hunt for loops and orchestral strings to plunder.
As it turned out, though, the key to his new approach lay in his own past. "One day I thought, instead of spending days on research and listening to tons of records to find the nearest sound of what I have in mind, why don't I fix this fucking violin and use it?" Through the summer of 1993, Tiersen stayed in his apartment, recording music alone with guitar, violin and accordion, guided not by the classical canon, but by intuition and his vision of "a musical anarchy".
By the end of the summer of 1993, Tiersen had recorded over 40 tracks, which would form the bulk of his first two albums. 1995's La Valse Des Monstres, inspired by Tod Browning's Freaks and Yukio Mishima's The Damask Drum was the second album to be released on Nancy-based label Ici, d'ailleurs. It would be followed six months later by Rue Des Cascades, a collection of short pieces recorded with toy piano, harpsichord, violin, accordion and mandolin. Six years later, the record would find a much larger audience when several tracks, along with a couple of Tiersen originals, would be used on the soundtrack to Jean-Pierre Jeunet's film Amelie (2001).
Tiersen's commercial breakthrough would come earlier, though, and off his own back. 1998's Le Phare (The Light House) was recorded in self-imposed seclusion on the isle of Ouessant, where Tiersen spent two months living in a rented house. At night, he watched the Creach'h, the most powerful lighthouse in Europe, as it illuminated the surrounding scenery. "I was amazed how the rays of lights from the lighthouse revealed some hidden details of the land, how we can rediscover something we have everyday, just in front of us, by a light pointing on it," says Tiersen.
Le Phare went on to sell over 160,000 copies, confirming Tiersen's status as one of the most pioneering and original artists of his generation and commencing a run of successful albums like 2001's L'Absente (featuring orchestral group Synaxis, Lisa Germano and the Divine Comedy's Neil Hannon) and 2005's Les Retrouvailles (with guests Stuart Staples of Tindersticks, Jane Birkin and Elizabeth Fraser of Cocteau Twins). In this period, Tiersen also took his music out around the world, playing shows with a full orchestra and an amplified string quartet – a set-up captured on 2002's electrifying live album C'etait ici. And following the box-office success of Amelie, Tiersen's skills as a soundtracker were much in demand, leading to scores for the likes of Wolfgang Becker's tragicomedy Good Bye Lenin! (2003) and Tabarly (2008), a documentary about the French sailor Éric Tabarly, who ate his final meal on Ouessant Island before he meeting a watery end in the Irish sea.
Discography:
La valse des monstres (1995)
Rue des cascades (1996)
Le phare (1998)
Tout est calme (1999)
Black session (1999, radio concert)
L'absente (2001)
Le fabuleux destin d'Amélie Poulain (2001, Soundtrack)
C'était ici (2002, Live and Best Of)
Good Bye Lenin! (2003, Soundtrack)
Yann Tiersen and Shannon Wright (2004)
Les Retrouvailles (2005)
On Tour (2006, Live)
Tabarly (2008)
Dust Lane (2010)
Les Forges
Yann Tiersen Lyrics
Jump to: Overall Meaning ↴ Line by Line Meaning ↴
Des milliers de travailleurs se retrouvent sur le carreau
Les forges ne fonctionnent plus
Des milliers de travailleurs se retrouvent sur le carreau
Le soleil peut briller
Les oiseaux s'envoler par milliers
On ne les voyait pas auparavant
Personne n'y croit vraiment
Vraiment
Les forges ne fonctionnent plus
Plus de fumée, de poussière pour prendre la nuit d'assaut
Les forges ne fonctionnent plus
Elles n'imitent plus l'enfer, elles sont là sur le carreau
On pourrait regretter
Au moins être tenté
Et c'est peut-être ça précisément
Que l'on a tant de mal
Que l'on regrette surtout
À plein temps
Comme si tout était joué
Que mués on ne devait
Voir maintenant
Que des endormis et des gens
Sur le carreau
The lyrics to Yann Tiersen's song Les Forges address the closure of a forge and the impact it has on the workers who are now left without employment. The opening two lines state that the forges no longer function, and thousands of workers are left without jobs. The repetitive line emphasizes the despair and hopelessness experienced by those affected by the shutdown.
The following verse describes that despite the closure of the forge, the sun is still shining, and birds are flying as they did before, unseen. The sudden sight of the birds brings no comfort, however, and people cannot believe what they see. The line "personne n'y croit vraiment" (no one really believes it) reveals the reluctance to accept the new reality.
The chorus repeats the initial lines, reinforcing the idea that the forge is no longer operational and has been reduced to nothing more than an empty shell. The subsequent lines suggest that people might be tempted to regret the closure of the forge and long for the past, which may only be a nostalgic illusion. The final lines of the song evoke the image of "des endormis et des gens sur le carreau" (the sleeping and the people left behind) suggesting that the former workers remain in a state of limbo.
Line by Line Meaning
Les forges ne fonctionnent plus
The forges are no longer operational
Des milliers de travailleurs se retrouvent sur le carreau
Thousands of workers are left without work
Le soleil peut briller
The sun may shine
Les oiseaux s'envoler par milliers
Birds fly away in thousands
On ne les voyait pas auparavant
They were not seen before
Maintenant qu'on les voit
Now that we see them
Personne n'y croit vraiment
No one really believes it
Plus de fumée, de poussière pour prendre la nuit d'assaut
No more smoke, dust to take over the night
Elles n'imitent plus l'enfer, elles sont là sur le carreau
They no longer imitate hell, they are now on the ground
On pourrait regretter
One could regret
Au moins être tenté
At least be tempted
Et c'est peut-être ça précisément
And maybe that's precisely it
Que l'on a tant de mal
That we have so much difficulty
Que l'on regrette surtout
That we especially regret
À plein temps
Full time
Comme si tout était joué
As if everything was already decided
Que mués on ne devait
That we shouldn't have been changed
Voir maintenant
To see now
Que des endormis et des gens
Only asleep people and others
Sur le carreau
On the ground
Contributed by Nicholas I. Suggest a correction in the comments below.
@Zardmownd
La raza no lo sabe, pero este es un puto rolón bien pasadisimo de verrrga.