An Inside Look at the Tales Series – a Format Dedicated to Sound Craftspeople
In music, there’s often a tendency to shine a light on the end result. The faces, the voices, the stages lit by overly hot spotlights. And that comes at the expense of the process. We almost forget that behind every unforgettable riff, every beat on repeat, there’s a constellation of craftspeople. People who shape sound, make invisible decisions, work late, sometimes have doubts, but keep moving forward because they know that one detail can change everything.
Tales was created for them.
A format that celebrates the people who make music: the sound engineers who save a take at the last minute, the managers who spot a spark before anyone else, the artistic directors who provide direction when a project is still looking for its shape, the technicians who set up a stage in record time, the musicians who support, reassure, and elevate.
Simon Clair – Through a Few Projects
For this first episode, we handed the mic to Simon Clair, a music journalist, writer, and documentary filmmaker. Former editor-in-chief of Trax Magazine, he now continues to explore the evolution of sound for Arte, notably with his series Auto-Tune. He looks back with us on his career path, his beginnings among jazz records and family debates, his relationship with writing, and the changes in the profession.
The Tales Interview
What are your earliest memories connected to music?
My father was a middle school music teacher, so there were instruments
everywhere at home. He also had a huge record collection. One of my first strong memories
is me as a kid, standing in front of his vinyl records, describing images or emotions to him — like “a
big city at night, it’s just rained” — and him suggesting Chet Baker, Kind of Blue,
Piazzolla’s Libertango. He’d make me a stack and say, “Go listen to this in your room and
see how it makes you feel.” That’s how I built part of my musical culture:
by trying to put names to sensations.
And when did you tell yourself, “Music will be part of my life, even professionally”?
As a teenager. I listened to Offspring, rock bands, and I felt things
so intensely that I told myself, “It can’t not be part of my life.” And
then I read reviews in music magazines, and discovered that you could get paid
to give your opinion on a record. I would later realize you don’t actually get paid all
that much (laughs), but at the time, I was fascinated by it.
Are there albums you still listen to in order to reconnect with that time?
Yes, of course. My father passed away two years ago, and I inherited his entire collection.
Listening to certain records reconnects me with him. For instance, Get Yer Ya-Ya’s Out by the
Rolling Stones, Kind of Blue by Miles Davis, lots of jazz records... I can still picture my father
telling me stories about those songs. It’s still very present.
How did you realize that your thing wasn’t playing music but writing about it?
I tried to become a guitarist, I went to conservatory, but I quickly realized that what
I was passionate about was the conversations around music, the endless debates with friends or
family. That’s where I felt I belonged: not in performing, but in
sharing, in writing.
Can you retrace the major stages of your career?
There have been several chapters.
First, discovering music at a very young age with my father. Then conservatory, which taught me
to understand music from a more structural perspective.
Then college, where I realized there were programs where you could write about music.
I started sending out pieces and writing here and there, until I became editor-in-
chief of Trax.
There, I developed a more editorial vision, less focused on my own articles. And
ever since, I’ve alternated between print journalism and documentaries.
Who was the first person or media outlet to give you your first break?
More than a person, it was a magazine. The first one to give me a chance was
Snatch. It stopped in 2015, if I’m not mistaken. To put it in context, it was a kind of
culture-only version of what Society does today: long-form stories, room for storytelling,
long formats that were focused on culture.
It was a magazine I read and really loved. And I didn’t necessarily think
I could have a place there. A chance encounter meant that one day, I was asked
to try writing a little piece for them. I was totally stressed out, so I wrote it super fast to
meet the deadline and be the model student. I think they liked that
model-student side of me. They gave me more and more things to do. And that’s where it all began for me.
I’ll always be grateful to them for trusting me at a time when I myself
wasn’t sure I belonged. That’s also how I met Quentin Guériot
(former CEO of Trax).
Can you tell us about that famous Jul cover for Trax?
I had just become editor-in-chief. We wanted to shake up the editorial line and open up to a
younger audience. Trax was getting a little too caught up in a circle of electronic music purists, and I
hate that whole “I’m better than you because I listen to this” attitude.
At the magazine, we genuinely listened to Jul, we liked it. And Marseille was becoming a city we
were hearing more and more about. So it wasn’t just a publicity stunt. But yes, the cover got
people talking. Some left, others arrived. I tend to think we lost the
least open-minded and gained the most curious.
What was the idea behind the Auto-Tune documentary for Arte?
It all started with debates among friends: is Auto-Tune cheating? Is it
singing? PNL had just broken through in France. There was a very strong
Auto-Tune aesthetic. We wanted to tell the story of that robotic, melancholy vibe while also responding
to the criticism.
It was also a way to explain what this tool has produced in terms of sounds,
imagery, and controversy.
Do you feel there’s growing enthusiasm for music documentaries?
Yes. Networks are looking to reach a younger audience. There’s also the YouTube effect:
a lot of hybrid formats are emerging. And paradoxically, alongside short
TikTok-style formats, there’s a real appetite for long-form content. The documentary about DJ Mehdi, for
example, did really well. It shows that you can explore a topic in depth, develop it, and that
the audience is there.
What do you think is the biggest change in the profession?
When I started out, the journalist was expected to stay in the background. Today, journalists are asked to have
a voice, to be visible, to be present on social media. There’s a real
self-branding dynamic.
Journalists sometimes end up with more followers than the media outlets themselves. That changes
the balance. And technically, too, everything has evolved: the software, the speed of production—everything
moves faster.
With 200,000 tracks released every day on Spotify, how do you avoid
feeling overwhelmed as a music journalist?
Honestly, you do feel overwhelmed. It’s impossible to listen to everything that comes out. The only
solution is to listen less, but listen better.
And listening better means taking the time to understand the track, its context,
what’s at stake around it. Why do these drums sound like that? What does it say about the musical
genre, the era, the artist’s journey?
Today, we’ve never listened to so much music, but perhaps never so poorly. Everything
becomes background noise. An album comes out, and two hours later everyone is shouting that it’s
the album of the year… then we move on to the next one. Over time, my relationship with
music has become slower, more attentive.
I’ve really returned to listening to records. Because it forces me to slow down. Going to get
one, putting it on, changing sides. That time is what allows you to really build
an argument, to write criticism with real substance.
Have you ever thought about creating your own media outlet?
No.. There are already a lot of media outlets. And I like teamwork. Creating a media outlet is
often a very solitary adventure at first. I’d rather reshape an existing outlet. And
honestly, I’d be incapable of choosing a name…
You juggle a lot between journalism, visuals, writing… Is that intentional?
I think journalism is, by nature, a profession where you wear many hats. You have to be curious,
know how to bounce back, tell a story in the best possible way. And yes, I like
multiplying perspectives and exploring different formats.
A scene you’d dream of documenting?
The sound systems scene in Jamaica.
An artist you’d like to interview in a long-form format?
Bad Bunny, without hesitation. He has a huge societal impact, and musically, he’s a
phenomenon.
Otherwise, I was lucky enough to interview Ryuichi Sakamoto. It’s the interview that made the biggest
impression on me. A well of wisdom, elegance, and intelligence. I would have loved to talk
with him again.
And if you could teleport your office anywhere you wanted?
Tokyo, Lisbon, but really, Paris. Even though I’ve lived elsewhere, it’s where I feel the
best. The city’s energy stimulates me
