28 March 2024

SARASARA is a compelling French singer-songwriter/producer and programmer
who started her musical career in the United Kingdom. She released her debut
album Amor Fati in 2017, and her sophomore one Ongone in 2019.

The songstress just launched full-length number three. It’s called ELIXIR.
A wayward, imaginative, emotive and arresting avant-garde pop record.

“The album’s potent mix of cultural ideas fuses with dark industrial synths
and gothic atmospherics to shape her intoxicating, cinematic sophisti-pop.

Enthralling, groove-laden compositions recall the likes of David Bowie and Jehnny Beth,
but Sarasara found more influence in political writers Bell Hooks, the distinguished professor of race and class, Pierre-Joseph Proudhon, a French socialist, and the first person to declare himself an anarchist, and the French novelist Édith Thomas and bisexual pioneer of women’s history, among others.”

Meet the artist Sarasara herself, speaking about her new longplayer and more with TUTV. But as usual, we start an interview with a slice of music. Enjoy Warrior, one of the album’s top tracks.

Hello Sarah,

When did you start making music and
what or who triggered you to do so, Sarah?

“I guess I always had a creative mind. Not just music. I was going to the cinema twice
a week when I was little. I have always been reading a lot. I was very curious about everything. I went to the Music Conservatoire in my small town though, learned how
read it, never really liked it. I was not really fitting in. It was boring.

I have always been into experimenting and teaching myself things. I had a girl band when
I was little, with one of my best friends, Cyrielle, we were translating English songs and writing ours, sing them at school. I never spoke of this to anyone, she reminded me of it not so long ago and we laughed. I guess it was my very first experience with songwriting.”

Any specific reason why you picked SARASARA as your musical moniker?

“It’s just a nickname my friends had for me when I was younger, I don’t really remember who started it. I thought it would work as an artist name. I didn’t feel like using my real name, not that it’s a secret. I guess it was subconscious, a way to separate private life and work life.”

Which track would you play to people who never heard of you?

“Flatline from the second album, Orgone, and Poison from Elixir. I think those two are
the favourite songs I wrote. They feel like fully matured and finished. Probably because
I had enough time to work on them properly.

They feel balanced in terms of text, music, and space because of this, like a harmonious feeling to them. I am proud of the lyrics too. I wrote Orgone in English, the French translation came second, there is a recorded version of the album in English. I think
both deserved to be given a chance and should have been singles, but this was not
my decision.”

You just released your new album, named ELIXIR. What does the title stand for?

“There is a long definition at the back of the record’s artwork. Whether it be the Elixir of youth, the Philosopher’s stone or the Graal, I think it’s about finding answers, keys, and remedies to the poison. I guess that’s what I was doing at that time, trying to navigate my way through toxic people and behaviours that were affecting me.

Poison comes in many forms, it can be obvious or subtle, it can come from others but also from yourself sometimes. I guess this album is a part of me going through that process, and I thought that word was a beautiful way to sum it up.”

What do you want to express with the album’s
impressive artwork and who designed it?

“Thank you. I don’t want to intellectualise it too much as I think it is raw, spontaneous and it speaks for itself. I would just say that it is about an accumulation of anger and the growing urge to speak up about the feminine condition in the world as regards to events that were happening at that time, from America with women’s abortion rights revocation to radical Islam enslaving, torturing, raping women, extreme violent oppression coming from everywhere.

There is also my experience of the music industry as a woman over the years, you are the woman so you have a thing for the guy, you’re not making your music, you should perform like FKA Twigs (read normalise hyper sexualisation of women, no thanks), if you want your career to take off, you should go out with a footballer, I can introduce you to a couple.

Those are literal words pronounced to me. I write all the music I make, I have a PhD in Philosophy, what else should I do ? Do you know what I mean? Show me some respect. Microviolence as the norm is the worse, I was just done with it. I have a zero-tolerance policy now.”

Where you listening to other artists, for inspiration,
while writing/composing the record, Sarah?

“Actually, people like Johnny Cash, a lot of Delta Blues, Cajun music, I got interested in guitars and raw naked sounds. Blues lyrics and the use of text and words. Also people like Odetta, Billie Holiday, Gil Scott Heron. I was feeling like we have lost the human touch and the human component in the music that is made today somehow.”

“With everything that is happening with Ai, streaming, the tendency to aim at something uniform, driven by the profit component. There’s an artlessness about the music that is produced today, heading towards annihilation, there’s no point, no value to it. I guess I those music genres helped me remember why I loved to write in the first place.”

Are the songs in some way connected, or do they all stand on their own?

“From the Poison to the Elixir. They were written in the order that is on the record
apart from The Horrible Things, which came as an addition to the original group of
songs. A couple of other songs didn’t make the record also.

I guess you could say they are connected to each other, at least in time and intent,
but they are also separate and you could see them as each one representing its own universe and having its own script, like different scenes in a movie for instance.”

THE HORRIBLE THINGS is one of the album’s singles. What’s the song about?

“I guess it’s a song about seeing dysfunctional and unhealthy patterns in yourself
or in others and managing it by setting up boundaries and prepping for the worse.
If something does not feel right, it is most certainly because there is something wrong,
so stop ignoring the red flags.”

THE CALL is another highlight (actually my favourite), probably the most upbeat track of this new full-length. A different vibe from the other songs. Any specific reason for that, Sarah?

“This is one of my favourite too. It was upbeat from the start and it took a very cool punky vibe turn in the end. There is absolutely no specific reason for it. I believe that when you write a song it becomes its own thing, you have to trust the inspiration and your own work to lead you where it needs to be. As we were unpacking this one in the studio, that’s where it wanted to go, so we just followed and it took us there.”

Suppose the album would be the soundtrack
for a movie, which one would it be?

“I am not sure, maybe something between a Maya Deren Documentary and
a 70’s Pulp Horror. I have been thinking about making a film for it actually, we’ll
see how things go for the record this year.”

If you had the opportunity to work with another artist
on future music, who would you pick and why?

“I have been thinking about going back to French music and doing more things over there.
I love people like Benjamin Biolay, Pascal Obispo or Zazie, Magyd Cherfy, MC Solaar who just released a new album, they are all incredible writers. Maybe one day…”

What’s the next step for Sarasara?

“I feel emotionally exhausted and creatively dry after this record and I am not entirely sure what’s next, for it or for myself in general. It’s been all on me and I have not received much support for it.

Some gigs later this year and maybe a film, but nothing is crystallised. I just want to let it
have a life of its own and we’ll see what the universe makes of it. In the meantime, I’m going to live a little, I just want to enjoy spring and summer at home.

I just got back to France, recovering from 7 years travelling, taking it slow.”

Thank you, Sarah, for this interview.
May the road rise with Sarasara.

STREAM ELIXIR

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BUY ELIXIR

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Sarasara: Linktree