Madeon has released his long-awaited album Victory, turning a turbulent chapter of his life into his most electrifying album yet.Ad 0:00 Click for sound 0:00 / 0:00 The French electronic music icon, whose real name is Hugo Leclercq, was working on a different project before personal upheaval inspired a creative reset.
During a recent interview with Zane Lowe of Apple Music Radio 1, he said he started Victory at a time when his personal life “felt like a mess.” In an Instagram livestream on the day he announced Victory, Leclercq described scrapping an earlier album as part of a “greater master plan,” but kept the details close to his chest.He also set expectations for Victory, mentioning that there was “a lot of stuff [he] wouldn’t have done on Good Faith” and that even the songs that sound happier “have a layer of darkness to them if you pay attention.” He delivers on that promise with Victory, which is angrier, faster and more cathartic than anything we’ve heard from Madeon in quite some time.
It’s the necessary counterpart to Good Faith: where that album was the patient reclamation of joy after depression, this one is what happens when that equilibrium shatters.The album kicks off with ‘Hi!,’ charging out of the gate with Mikey Freedom Hart of Bleachers, whose guitar is felt immediately.
“It’s urgent laptop rock,” Madeon said of the album’s lead single.“It has to be right now.
I love this music so much cause I didn’t expect it, it kind of erupted.” ‘Car Crash Baby’ follows and channels the frantic energy of early 2000s indietronica, with lyrics equal parts cynical and wounded: “I better fix my face, brighten my eyes / I talk a big, big game, but it’s all a lie / I pray they’re gonna love me, I don’t wanna die.” Together, the two pre-release singles made clear last year that this era would sound like nothing Madeon had done before....