L'IMPÉRATRICE - PULSAR TOUR 2025

Broken heart syndrome is no fictional disorder. The phenomenon has a name: Tako Tsubo (or "octopus trap" in Japanese). It’s an upheaval of the senses, an emotional burnout... It weakens the heart's main pumping chamber brought on by intense emotional distress: an earthquake or a natural disaster, or something less (literally) earth shattering like the loss of a loved one or the angst felt when one is spurned by a lover. Modern science is yet to find a cure.

Since the release of Matahari three years ago, L'Impératrice has been living in a permanent state of vertigo. That debut album was followed by a whirlwind tour through the band’s native France, and then onto Italy, Mexico, California... but not before two sold out nights at the legendary Olympia in Paris (where one night signifies an artist has truly arrived). It’s a journey that has broadened the horizons of all of those who sail in the Empress.

The world around us has altered in the last three years, and things have changed in the world of L'Impératrice too. Tako Tsubo is a breakup album, and Matahari's romantic streak - predicated on the idea of an idealised heroine - has made way for a landscape more anchored in reality. Opener ‘Anomalie bleue' records a case of love at first sight, when - pow! - a beautiful blue anomaly appears, flanked by the drab suited grifters and CEOs sitting in a workaday lobby.

It’s a song replete with virtuoso bass, vintage synths and glittering melodies - a tour de force that sets the scene for a collection that never lets up over thirteen pristine tracks. The colour blue as motif permeates Tako Tsubo - from the bruised heart of ‘Hématome’ to the nocturnal sky of ‘Tant d’amour perdu’, troweled onto the canvas with the melancholy of Picasso, and sometimes the playfulness of pop art bad boy, Yves Klein.  

Tako Tsubo also represents an awakening, or at least a realisation that the party might be over as we traverse these difficult days ahead. The intrepid, funky ‘Voodoo?’ - delivered in English - chooses to leave the party early in favour of reading Torture Magazine; ‘Fou’ is a delectable disco number that quietly rages against the ‘broken machine’ (“cassé la machine”). Sensual soul music with G-funk undertones is often juxtaposed against a mood of disenfranchisement.

Then there’s the sublime ‘Submarine’, one of the most recently written songs that questions the idea that we’re required to be endlessly happy, projecting aesthetically perfect lives online. Musically it’s built upon deep major seventh chords that are as welcome as a warm bath; lyrically it’s a celebration of fragility. It’s also up-to-date enough to reference the purgatory of lockdown.

At the centre of the album are two instrumentals: the title track - a 38 second heart flutter - and the preceding ‘Souffle au coeur’, a beautifully condensed odyssey, dynamic and quixotic, from soft, elegant chords to funk supernovas and back again. Singer Flore Benguigui has brought further range to the second album too, from the subtle simplicity of ‘L’équilibriste’ to the sassy satire of ‘Peur des filles’. ‘Digital Sunset’ too, which brings together retrofuturist production with the lightness of touch of a classic Bee Gees love song, is startling in its gorgeousness.

As for the elegance of the production, L'Impératrice has again teamed up with Renaud Letang (Jarvis Cocker, Liane La Havas, Feist), with the mighty Neal Pogue (Outkast, Stevie Wonder, Tyler the Creator) adding his mastery to the mixing. Travel has broadened the sound too. The framework of the French chanson which lay at the core of  Matahari has been partially eschewed for the exploration of other territories with more rhythmical caprice and syncopated surprises.

Perhaps most surprising is the deep exploration of the avenues of the heart, and in particular, the left ventricle. Ambivalent love, euphoria, sorrow and madness: so many symptoms which, taken together, suggest a bad dose of Tako Tsubo. It’s a syndrome that leaves the heart damaged, submerged, swollen. And more alive than ever.