Tag Archives: Radio Canada

David in new interview: “I was supposed to be at the Eagles of Death Metal concert..”

by Dominika | Feb 14th, 2016 | no comments

During their rehearsals a couple weeks ago, the members of Simple Plan let a reporter from Radio Canada join them in their rehearsal space and talk to them about their new album, the changes that the music industry went through in the last decade and more. A very interesting part of the interview was when the reporter brought up the topic of the terrorist attack at the Bataclan venue in Paris, France that took place last November.

You may recall that Simple Plan were supposed to play in Paris just a couple days after the tragedy and were in fact supposed to be leaving the day after it happened, but canceled their plans after the security situation in France didn’t allow them to safely get there.

But according to this new Radio-Canada interview, David actually initially planned to get to Paris earlier and to attend the Eagles Of Death Metal concert at Bataclan on the tragic night. However, the members of SP had to attend the Simple Plan Foundation dinner with the auction winners that night, so he could not leave to Paris earlier. “It’s strange… life didn’t want me to be there,” said David (big thanks to Raph for the translation).

Below, you can watch the full French interview that is available on Radio-Canada along with some other quotes from the band members that appeared in the accompanying article.

L'entrevue avec Simple Plan

Après avoir vendu plus de 10 millions d'albums en carrière, Simple Plan fait le bilan d'un parcours bien rempli. –> http://bit.ly/1obIqK3

Zveřejnil(a) Radio-Canada Arts et divertissement dne 12. únor 2016

“The band comes first. We all have to make small sacrifices here and there, and Taking One For The Team is a really symbolic thing in the sports terminology, where the important thing is that in the end, everything is done for the team to win.” – Seb Lefebvre

“Finding out who we want to be in 2016, after 17 years of career, having experienced different styles, with the musical context that is evolving and new artists doing new things, it took a long time.” – Chuck Comeau

“Fatherhood inspires me to be just right. It is an aspiration, I do not want to disappoint [my children], I do not want to stumble.” – Jeff Stinco

“It is sure that if you sell 3 million albums, it helps, but it has never been the biggest thing for us. Our shows are our trademark, and albums have often been our business cards.” – Pierre Bouvier

“We had many difficult times together, personally or professionally. I would say that these moments, because we got through them by supporting each other, make our relationship much deeper and more solid now. So we’re going to have fun doing it and people will have fun listening to us and come see us live, and we will continue for as long as possible.” – Chuck Comeau

Jeff discusses upcoming documentary “The Event” on Radio Canada

by Dominika | Jul 1st, 2014 | no comments

Yesterday, Jeff Stinco paid a visit to the ICI Radio Canada radio station, where he was invited to talk about the upcoming documentary “The Event”, that he is producing and that will be coming out tomorrow, July 2nd.

The program will be documenting the behind the scenes of big summer musical events that featured performances of artists such as Louis-Jean Cormier, Woodkid, Éric Lapointe, Marie-Mai and Diana Krall.

Below you can check out some of the quotes from Jeff from this interview, regarding his upcoming documentary series, which were featured in the accompanying article on the Radio Canada website:

“We often see people backstage, moving boxes… We do not really know what they are doing. But in this program, we are interested in the human side, that these people live. Often, they are separated from their families for an entire festival.”

“I am less interested in the dramatic side of the show. I see something else. I see people who are experiencing challenges.”

You can listen to the full version of this (French) interview with Jeff from Radio Canada here and below you can have a look at a picture of Jeff taken during the interview:

New photos and interview from the backstage of Le meilleur de nous-mêmes

by Dominika | Jan 14th, 2013 | no comments

In the gallery you can now check out some more awesome pictures from last night’s “Le meilleur de nous-mêmes” ceremony, where Pierre, Jeff and Chuck received on behalf of the whole band the award for “Personality of the Year”:

The reporter Herby Moreau also attended the event and captured the atmosphere in the following video. In the video, Jeff says that he’s blown away by the people who took part in the award show – for example there were people who may have found a cure for AIDS, and that he was very touched that in this company SP has been chosen as the “Personality of the Year”. Towards the end of the video Pierre says that since they’re from Montreal, La Presse is a journal they’ve always read, even when they were young, so it’s very special for them (thanks Charbel again for the translation).

Video: Simple Plan accepting “Personality of the Year” award & fans’ videomessages

by Dominika | Jan 14th, 2013 | no comments

As you already know, last night Simple Plan took home the “Personality of the Year” at the annual awards presented by Radio Canada and La Presse. Along with the award the band received a DVD with wishes from fans from all across the world, congratulating them on winning this award, and a few of them were shown even during the ceremony.

Check out the video and the English translation below (thanks a lot to Charbel):

Host: It’s now the time to present you this year’s “Personality of the year” from La Presse and Radio Canada. They are 5 but together they are 1, ladies and gentlemen, Simple Plan!

Background voice: “Ever since the beginning of their foundation in 2005, the band formed of Sebastien Lefebvre, David Desrosiers, Chuck Comeau, Pierre Bouvier and Jeff Stinco, not only sold more than 10 million albums over the globe, but they have also given more than 750 thousand dollars for charity. During the JUNO ceremony in Toronto last April, the band received the Allan Walter Humanitarian Award, an honour the band shared with musicians such as Neil Young, Brian Adams, and more.”

Host: Congratulations, I can see you guys are touched.
Pierre: Absolutely, it’s incredible.
Jeff: It was a big year but to receive an award like this is a huge gratitude
Chuck: I’d like to applause every one who has or hasn’t gotten an award here tonight.
[applauses]
Host: Does every rock band have a relationship with their fans like you do?
Pierre: We only know Simple Plan, our own band, we don’t know what other bands do with their fans, our relationship with our fans is special, it touches us, I don’t think other bands are that close to their fans as we are, our fans are incredible…
Host: We actually asked your fans their reaction over the world and their response was monumental, we made you guys a DVD about that, it will be up on YouTube, until then here’s a clip of a few reactions we’ve received from all around the world.

Video footage:
Marian from Mexico: Hey SP, it’s Marian from Mexico, this prize makes me proud of you, congratulations!
Julia from Austria: You guys deserve it more than anything else, you helped me get through the though times.
Jen from Australia: You guys are an awesome band and such an inspiration to so many people, keep up the good work!
Dominika from Czech Republic: Congratulations upon wining this award, no one deserves it more than you, thank you for everything.
Emelie from Sweden: I just wanted to congratulate you, you really deserve it, I love you.
Hanine from Lebanon: I knew you guys would make it, congratulations, I love you guys!
Charu from India: I love your music, you can turn the bad days into good ones.
Yuka from Japan: For me SP is the greatest band out there, I will forever be grateful.
Amanda from New York: It’s good to see great things happen to great people who’s done so much for their fans and their community.

Chuck: Thank you
Host: People are touched all around the world, what you guys are talking about, they live it.
Chuck: It’s really the power of music, nowadays with mp3s, it’s often considered as a product, but we see it as so much more, it can touch people, put smiles on different faces, and we’ve seen it, it can save lives, we’ve heard many stories, and it’s not just us, it’s with many other bands, but to hear that …
Host: Does it change the way you write your music?
Jeff: Of course we feel a certain responsibility when we make an album, we know we’re gonna be heard, on our first album we did it for ourselves we didn’t know what we were up against, but know we think about our fans, we don’t wanna disappoint them, we tell ourselves that we can’t make an album that sucks, it’s not a possibility, they need it, and they tell us about it, and we try to give it the best of ourselves.
Chuck: *pinches Jeff* Oh boy that’s a good one, “The best of ourselves”.

[applauses] (“the best of ourselves” in French is actually the name of the show, this is why everyone laughs)

Host: When you received the humanitarian award at the Junos, you said the award was more important than any music award.
Pierre: For us, we’re lucky to have fans who show us their love.everywhere around the planet, but we wanna give back, we wanna make a difference like we’ve seen with our fans, with our foundation events, to see we can make things better just by making music, an impact in people’s lives, for me that’s more important.
Host: Are you guys gonna be together when you’re 70 like then Rolling Stones.
Pierre: Probably!
Jeff: On stage in our wheelchairs.
Chuck: Why would we wanna stop. We love what we are doing, we have fun, we can do extraordinary things.
Host: Your personality of the year, ladies and gentlemen, Simple Plan.

Radio-Canada/La Presse names Simple Plan “Personality of the Year”

by Dominika | Jan 14th, 2013 | 2 comments

After weeks of having to keep this a secret, I can finally announce that yesterday, at the annual Radio Canada’s and La Presse’s “Le meilleur de nous-mêmes” (“The best of ourselves”) event that gives out awards every year to personalities in Canada for their out-standing efforts in many categories (Sports, Arts and Entertainment, Science etc.), Simple Plan have become the winners in the most significant category – Personality of the Year. According to Radio-Canada, the band has been honoured with this award not only for their musical career but also for their humanitarian activities. Apart from that Simple Plan were also nominated in the “Arts and Entertainment” category, which eventually went to someone else (who he later mentioned “I can’t believe I won over Simple Plan!”).

Pierre, Jeff and Chuck were present at the event last night to accept the price on behalf of the whole band and to their surprise they were not only greeted on stage personally by the presenter of the award, but also virtually by a couple of fans, who’s videomessages were shown on the screen.

Back in December, about 15 Simple Plan fans from all around the world have been (in all secrecy) asked by Radio-Canada to record a short video congratulating the band on this important award. And as the fans have been chosen so that each would represent one country, they all had to record the message in their own language. Subtitles to all the messages were later added to them and the band members left the ceremony with a DVD of all of them to keep.

The video from the acceptance of the award should be available online soon. And you can check out the first pictures from the show below: