Why Lou Doillon Is Not Frightened By Chaos

There was little doubt that Lou Doillon would make a name for herself in the arts.

She is the daughter of legendary French film director Jacques Doillon and Jane Birkin (the film starlet and singer, known for her extended affair and partnership with Serge Gainsbourg). Doillon was a success as a model and forged a career in theatre and independent cinema, but it is music that is her current focus.

“I am not frightened by chaos, I am not frightened by strangeness and I can most of the time find a balance in very unbalanced places,” suggests Doillon of her many creative exploits. “Sometimes my house when I was growing up was very unbalanced. It wasn’t always easy, but at least it makes you learn. On the other side, there was wonderful creativity that was going on at every level.”

"Among all the madness there would be two on the piano, and some learning their lines, some writing scripts, some editing movies."

“I literally lived in a two-story house with seven or eight people and among all the madness there would be two on the piano, and some learning their lines, some writing scripts, some editing movies. People were doing things all the time. My passion in life is to make sure that I am doing things. That is what they gave me as they were all very obsessed by a craft or many crafts. It was beautiful to see these people doing so many things. It was wonderful to see an evolution of work and a forming of energies - sometimes mad energy, but at least it was energy going along.”

The platinum-selling Doillon doesn’t write music in her native French tongue. The bilingual artist prefers to write in English. Part of this is to distance her songs from people tediously dissecting them to see if any of the words may be about her famous parents, but also is steeped in her love for music from when she was a teenager. 

“My love for music comes from my youth, when my cousin Alexander Birkin had a band in England, who all tragically died in a car crash. I started being obsessed with music through him and his mates' bands. In Anglo Saxon countries, youths have bands and venues to play. It is not like that in France. The French problem is always the same, that if you are not perfect at something don’t do it. It leads to French musicians struggling with spontaneity. None of my French friends had bands, but all of my English friends did. They were only 14 or 15 but it was on!”

Originally published on X-Press Magazine