Behind the gigantic enclosures, the public is compact, sweating. On stage, Marc Rebillet, in boxer shorts and round glasses, chants “Macron, motherfucker” against a background of heavy bass, taken up by the crowd. Besides the homophobic insult, what bothers the management of the Touquet Beach Music festival is that President Emmanuel Macron is in the audience. After his visit to Algeria, he decided to drop by his residence in Le Touquet and make a surprise visit to the festival.
Following cries of “Macron, get out”, the festival management tried to cut the singer’s microphone, without success. The controversy continues to swell, since the director of the Touquet Music Beach festival is now asking the artist to reimburse his fee, accusing him of having “taken the TMB hostage to make his buzz”, in an interview given to The voice of the North. But it would be a shame to reduce Marc Rebillet to his performance in Le Touquet alone: the artist is much more than a simple agitator.
Chamber music
The 33-year-old artist, born to a French father and an American mother, spent his childhood between Dallas and New Jersey, following classical piano training. He lives, stops the university, tries the Parisian life, then returns to the United States. This is where in 2016, Marc Rebillet began to film himself mixing from his tiny studio in New York. He then barely had his computer, a MIDI keyboard and a loop pedal (which allows him to record and make musical loops): but his eccentric personality and his fetish paraphernalia, tight underpants and a bathrobe, make his videos viral. just on YouTube, more than 2 million people follow his work.
Very quickly, Marc Rebillet comes out of his room and confronts his mixes to the public. His social networks get carried away, and he begins to scour the concert halls. During the confinement, he organizes every evening, in a bathrobe, musical lives from his apartment in New York. To replace some canceled concerts, he is setting up the Quarantine Livestream Tour, a live show on Twitch: it will bring together more than 1.57 million spectators and raise $30,000 for charity. His songs talk about confinement, depression, vaccination, with humor and chaotic energy.
Tireless, extreme, grotesque
Marc Rebillet has returned to the festival route after two years of pandemic: this summer, he has surveyed the Eurockéennes de Belfort, Pause Guitare in Albi, Garorock in Marmande or the Solidays, making the crowds dance in his path. In his concerts, no set-list or prepared show: the DJ improvises his titles, between funk, pop, electro and groove. His concerts are marked by gritty jokes, rock star jumps in the audience or sprayed bottles of champagne. It is not rare that at the end of the mix, half of the audience finds itself on stage jostling to dance with the DJ.
Beyond the image of the DJ who walks around in a bathrobe-slips-clapper on stage, Marc Rebillet impresses with his mastery of improvisation, vocal or musical, and an energy that seems unlimited. He superimposes his voice on all the instruments he can, mixes, slows down, speeds up and makes the crowd dance. His provocative character as a grotesque clown contrasts with his seriousness behind the mixing desk. Especially since the artist is used to insulting politicians: he had already attacked Donald Trump, calling for “go fuck himself”, or had evoked the situation of the Yellow Vests during a show at Trabendo, in Paris, in 2019.
From now on, between Marc Rebillet and the Touquet Beach Music festival, it will be played on the monetary and legal ground, the artist having been summoned to reimburse his fee. He explained on Instagram that he had “already insulted Emmanuel Macron on stage on several occasions”, and that the situation was therefore not unexpected for the organizers of the festival. The DJ is not likely to return to Le Touquet, but he will be in concert at the Olympia and the Salle Pleyel in Paris from September 5 to 8then passing in Lille and in Brussels before heading off on its North American tour.