Paris (AFP)

Figures, like Leonard Cohen and Lou Reed, or lesser-known but unavoidable faces, like Daniel Johnston and Michel Magne, fill the boxes of a flood of comics devoted to rock and song.

For Arnaud Le Gouëfflec, screenwriter of "Underground" (a book dedicated to "accursed rockers and high priestesses of sound", at Glénat), there is a "deep cousin" between the 9th art and guitars.

"There is a somewhat mysterious, a little underground common point, comics and rock are contemporary art forms, which were almost born at the same time," he explains for AFP.

Arnaud Le Gouëfflec, who has animated blogs and wrote novels, could have chosen another medium to tell about these marginal artists with major influence.

“But the graphic dimension of the project has become obvious,” he explains.

He cites as "model" the cartoonist Robert Crumb "with his biographies of the bluesmen of the delta and his capacity at home to go from a cartoon drawing to another more realistic".

With the designer Nicolas Moog, Arnaud Le Gouëfflec (also organizer of a festival in Brest) recounts the path, sometimes dented, of these musicians "points of contact, between the underground, the shadow and the mainstream, the light".

- "Dark part" -

We thus meet Daniel Johnston, manic-depressive whose first recordings, sometimes tinkered with, were cited by Kurt Cobain (Nirvana), Beck or even Tom Waits.

Women are not forgotten with Yma Sumac or Colette Magny.

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The common point of the graphic novels on music released in recent months is a rejection of hagiography, as in "Leonard Cohen sur un fil" by Philippe Girard (at Casterman) or in "Une histoire du Velvet Underground" by Prosperi Buri ( at Dargaud), with Lou Reed addicted to a slew of substances.

This ultra-realistic treatment on the substance (which does not exclude freedom in the form, one of the managers of Velvet has a snake's head at Prosperi Buri) is also found in "Les amants d'Hérouville" (at Delcourt).

It is a fresco around the unknown Michel Magne, composer of the soundtracks of "Fantomas" or "Tontons flingueurs" who founded the mythical studios of Hérouville frequented by David Bowie or Elton John in the 1970s. "Chez Michel Magne, he There is also a dark part, it is up to the reader to put things in perspective, to see the flip side of this creative energy, of this dream ", brushes for AFP Yann Le Quellec, screenwriter.

The work, designed by Romain Ronzeau, is based on the personal archives of Marie-Claude Magne, widow of the composer.

Certain photos and other documents are reproduced in this way.

This is another trait shared by all the books published recently: a lot of investigative work has been done.

- Indian Ocean -

The prize goes to Didier Tronchet for "The Lost Singer" (Aire libre / Dupuis), released before the first confinement.

The creator of "Jean-Claude Tergal" signs here the equivalent of the film "Sugar Man" which had resuscitated the career of Sixto Rodriguez.

With less repercussions however, since its singer escaped from the radars Jean-Claude Rémy (sponsored in the 1970s by Pierre Perret) turned his back on show biz a long time ago.

"There was quite a media exposure with the comics, his songs were broadcast on the radio, but he is now 80 years old and, for him, this singer is another character", described for AFP Didier Tronchet.

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Like his fictional double, the author found the artist (renamed Rémy Bé in the comics) in a remote island in the Indian Ocean.

"There was no trace of him on the internet when I started, he had touched me deeply in the 1970s and more than 30 years later, I still had the refrains in my head", relates -he.

"I had no idea that it would take so much time, distance, and that it would be so rich in emotion".

Because Didier Tronchet is also a composer and Jean-Claude Rémy played one of his pieces in front of him.

One more beautiful story.

© 2021 AFP