With their side-project DVTR, Laurence G-Do (Le Couleur) and Jean-Cimon Tellier (Gazoline, Le Couleur) get crowds moving, as they scream and shout their message across relentlessly repeated, hard-hitting lyrics. BONJOUR, their debut EP, released in November of 2023, is a calling card announcing their noisy, festive, well-planned arrival.
“We had a lot of love and anger to expel,” says Laurence G-Do, to begin explaining the need for a side project after more than 15 years as the frontperson of Le Couleur. For her duo colleague Jean-Cimon Tellier, DVTR is an opportunity to go back to long-forgotten roots: “We didn’t set out to make fast music and complain about everything, we just set out to do what feels good, and right now that’s just charging forward with our heads down.”
Punk? Rock? Enraged? DVTR is hard to pigeonhole. “We often say we’re punk, but it’s really our energy that’s punk… and my pants,” Tellier jests. “You could say it’s a hybrid thing that shakes things up – a lot,” adds G-Do. “It’s intelligent yelling that’s rooted in fun, without being funny. The lyrics might sound funny, but if you look a little closer, you’ll get the underlying message.”
DVTR was born out of the need to create a space to welcome chaos, and the reception was mind-blowing. Although the duo was formed only a year ago, festivals are fighting to book them, and their audience never fails to show up. “I think it’s all about the artistic direction,” says Tellier. “We have a powerful brand that we cultivate on socials. That way, when someone mentions us to someone else, that person has no choice but to at least have heard about us.”
To them, there are two keys to success. The first is branding, an image that belongs to them alone, and enables them to convey a way of thinking and being that goes beyond music. “What we like is travelling, having a blast, and filming ourselves while we look for the most metal dude at a Metallica concert,” says Tellier, adding that in today’s music industry, music alone is no longer enough. “Any band who thinks they can be successful without socials is delusional. Do they think they are Mozart, back from the dead? It’s simply impossible that people will flock to you just because you’re playing music. Bands like that don’t exist anymore.”
The second key is the experience and know-how that allows having a side project. “Beyond everything else, we’re fucking good,” says G-Do. “We also have a ton of experience. We’ve been doing music for 15 years, and for 15 years the thing I’ve always liked the most is being onstage. I hate the studio with a passion. Giving people an experience live is what I’m good at.”
Select the image to play the YouTube video of the DVTR song “Les flics sont des sacs à merde”
Tellier agrees, and explains that one’s first musical project is often where artists make mistakes that they won’t make again. “We’ve been there before, so we know when we’re ready for the next step, or what we need to work on,” he says. “There’s no way we’ll accept doing a showcase for pros if we’re only half-confident about what we’re about to do.”
He readily admits that Gazoline taught him what it means to “be totally unprepared, be in the wrong place at the wrong time, and crash and burn… We know how important it is to be ready, because if a show presenter isn’t convinced the first time, you’ll most likely lose them for good. Even if your show has greatly improved five years later, they’ll most likely pass on you, just because they’ll remember their bad experience from when you weren’t ready.”
When DVTR was founded, Le Couleur’s energy was starting to get disorganized, according to G-Do, who reminds us that project has a more “cool and atmospheric” vibe. Although Le Couleur has an energy of its own, there was an emerging tangent that didn’t quite align with the band’s electro sound. “We were climbing over each other, jumping around, doing acrobatics and breaking stuff,” she says. “So, in short, we decided we didn’t want to de-nature that product just to express that energy.” Adds Tellier, “There’s no mosh pit in Le Couleur. Maybe that’s all that was missing.”
DVTR is touring all over the place, and they’re a must on every festival program in 2024. Unveiled to festival-goers last summer, the band was invited aboard the Festif! bus in Baie-Saint-Paul. “Clément Turgeon [the founder of Festif!] was on board with us from the get-go,” says Tellier. “We only had two songs out in the Summer of 2023, yet he knew we’d certainly be able to get the inside a bus at midnight, rocking.” DVTR underlines the immense contribution of their booking agent in addition to the trust of programmers and presenters. “He’s a bit scary, and looks like he likes busting heads,” jokes G-Do.
In the Fall of 2024, DVTR will tour Japan, Korea, and Germany, and release a deluxe version of BONJOUR which will include new songs. “We’re going to out an anti-Olympic song and music video soon, it’s insane,” enthuses G-Do. Tellier adds, “Things are going so well that we could work full-time on this band’s projects if we wanted to.”