How do you listen to music in prison and what do you listen to there?
20 Minutes
asked the question to detainees on the sidelines of the Trans Musicales festival.
A concert was organized and several prisoners were able to perform on the small stage.
If rap is the majority in the cells, it sometimes gives way to world music and reggae.
Music that "calms down" inmates.
They sat quietly for a long time, listening to the Nana Benzes before some of them decided to get up.
To the swaying rhythms of the quintet from Togo, these prisoners from Rennes-Vezin prison were able to dance, smile, laugh and forget for a few moments that their daily lives are walled in this thick concrete enclosure.
"It was super good, it was fresh, it puts the fishing", loose François *, at the end of the set.
Organized in the prison gymnasium by the Trans Musicales festival, this concert was open to around thirty prisoners from all walks of life.
He brought out feminine, feminist voices and hackneyed musical instruments that you never hear in this men's prison.
Music, the prisoners nevertheless listen to a lot when they are in the cell.
Which ?
With which device?
At what moment ?
20 Minutes
asked them.
The hi-fi still alive
The first of the questions we asked was how we listen to music in an environment where cell phones are prohibited.
“We have a hi-fi system in the cell where we can put CDs.
It's the family who brings us discs to the visiting room, it's authorized, ”explains Kenny.
To have the hi-fi system, you have to “canteen”, that is to say buy it at the “store” of the prison administration.
Others use the old game consoles that are on offer.
But some are not so lucky.
“I have nothing in my cell.
Before being incarcerated, I spent a huge amount of time on YouTube and I miss it.
So, we turn on the TV and we put CStar and W9 to get the clips, ”says Quentin, who has not been incarcerated for a long time.
Most of the detainees are around fifteen,
even about twenty records in their collection that they receive in the visiting room or by parcel.
“We have a media library where they can borrow CDs, but it's not used very much.
Some borrow from time to time, ”explains Chloé Boivin, cultural coordinator of the penitentiary establishment.
Rap, rap and… rap
If the media library is not wildly successful, it may be because it offers an eclectic choice a little different from the tastes of its residents.
“We have everything: classical, gypsy jazz, rock… We want to offer discoveries,” adds the cultural coordinator.
Because let's be clear, among all the detainees we interviewed, all spoke to us about rap.
But not only !
“Me, I almost only listen to US rap, a bit of Jamaican dancehall too”.
Mehdi has "about fifteen albums" in his cell.
Names ?
“Travis Scott, Migos, Meek Mill.
I have reggae too, Bob Marley.
Often, we put it in the evening after eating, it's calmer, it relaxes, ”explains the young man.
His friend Kenny is rather into French rap.
“Koba LaD, Gazo, Ninho.
I have a 50 Cent album too.
And some gypsy music.
" Music,
The whole world represented
Alongside rap, prison is also a mix of world music where each community likes to impose itself.
Gypsy songs, Caribbean calypso, Jamaican or African reggae echo through the cell doors.
“You have a lot of things between the renois, the rebeus.
Everyone listens to their sounds from home,” explains Lorenzo.
The solid fellow is “auxi”.
He is the one who oversees the prison gym.
It is therefore up to him to manage the music during bodybuilding sessions.
“We listen to rap like Booba, Drake or Nipsey Hussle.
But I don't just wear that.
For sport, I like deep house, catchy electro stuff without words so as not to think”.
He quotes in particular the DJ Kaytranada, follower of a rather dancing electro-funk.
2Pac t-shirt on the shoulders, Mick was a singer when he was “out”.
For him, music is essential in the cell.
"It's what allows me to escape, to think about something else", explains the young man before going to sing on the stage of the gymnasium on an instrument invented during workshops organized in partnership with the festival of Trans Musical.
François is a bit older.
Late 40s, the man is a huge music fan.
He even composes it on his computer.
In his cell, he also has rap.
“More like old-school stuff like Dr Dre, Beastie Boys, NTM or Assassin”.
He is the only one to have spoken to us about rock.
“I really listen to everything.
I have Blur, Noir Désir, The Verve too.
And Daft Punk, I love Daft Punk”.
Music “calms down” inmates
The man still looks like a UFO in this landscape ultra-dominated by rap.
Why such hegemony?
"It's young music where you recognize yourself in the lyrics," says Quentin, who is not yet 30 years old.
“Lyrics help you move forward, help you overcome your pain,” Lorenzo adds.
“Music is almost a way of life.
As soon as I get back to the cell, I put it on.
Otherwise, you have silence, as if nothing was happening, as if time was not advancing, ”engages Davy.
He even believes that the music “calms the prisoners”.
“I have the impression that it calms us down”.
Does the choice of music sometimes cause debate in a shared and often overcrowded cell?
" It happens.
But in general, we get along well.
"Sometimes it's a bit of a problem when the kids put on too much and you want to rest," recognizes Lorenzo.
Well, that annoys me.
»
The detention playlist
During our existence, we all have songs that remind us of a sad, happy moment, a person who left too soon or a milestone in our life.
For prisoners, these few CDs will hold a special place in their memory.
Listened to hundreds of times, these albums will become the playlist of their time in detention, like the marker of an era.
"In prison, time is slow, everything is long," recalls Quentin.
For two hours, time suddenly accelerated to the swaying rhythm of African music.
Before falling.
*All names have been changed.
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