Colorful melodies, long-awaited reunions with Étienne Daho and Zabou Breitman, other duets with Flora Fishbach, Alain Chamfort and Judah Warsky: the co‑writer of “Tombé pour la France” and “Épaule Tattoo” returns with an album that is at times philosophical, at times aquabonist.
“There is in Arnold Turboust something of Trenet’s fluidity, Gainsbourg’s detachment, a kind of tender indulgence toward others, demanding of himself; a humour without cynicism and a most pleasing musical diversity,” Françoise Sagan once wrote about Arnold Turboust, longtime partner of Étienne Daho (their fruitful and memorable collaboration on Pop Satori in 1986 and Eden in 1996) and the singer of the evergreen hit Adélaïde with Zabou forty years ago.
The Norman-born musician’s albums come and go, and the glowing remark from the late writer about the pop singer still holds true, just as a seventh record that is at once obvious, inspired and altruistic — no fewer than six duets across eleven tracks on The Romantic Life. “The Romantic Life to stay current, both at the beach and in the city, the elegant life, the beautiful life, a life of almost imaginary, dreamed sensitivity, a life, you know!
“Loads of doubts and electronic loops”
“One in the other/They entwine/At the ball of the romantic life,” he sings at the opening before linking up again with Étienne Daho on Laurie Sky, the unstoppable single performed by these two intertwined voices, where the lyrics speak of “memories from elsewhere, fees, pains.” A bit of philosophy here, a bit of aquabonism there, the sixty‑something shares Sens inique with his septuagenarian elder Alain Chamfort: “For in my view, the essence has only one moment—the moment of being there—then it’s bad to be there.”
As a renowned keyboardist, whose synthetic melodies have immortalized a few Daho‑era hits (Tombé pour la France, Épaule Tattoo, Les Bords de Seine), Arnold Turboust duets with Flora Fishbach, one of his clear proteges known for her fondness for the 1980s, on Les Lettres de Krakowie written by Edith Fambuena of Les Valentins.
Elsewhere, he traces another kinship with Judah Warsky (Il est très) while King Size signals the hoped‑for reunion with Zabou Breitman in a conspiratorial exchange that lands. Before Arnold Turboust closes the album with a splendid, spleenful ballad: “Loads of doubts and electronic loops/Like the soundtrack to a lunatic daily life.”
The Romantic Life (Panthéon/Universal). Release on October 16.
