Just_Me

THE STRAZIO of the summers on the Riviera for an overweight teenager, Catholic education, American origins: at 36, Mika made peace with Michael Holbrook Penniman and turned his wounds into "useful" pain by writing down his personal Book of Revelation. He who can't sing lyrics written by others, will get naked on stage, in a Revelation tour that will cross Europe, America and Asia where his songs "will take a different shape every night because my emotions will be constantly stirred up". Objective: to get to the bottom of a journey back to origins that began four years ago with a car that ran on a Florida road and two dogs in the back seat.

Direction?

Savannah in Georgia, in that Bonaventure Cemetery where all my ancestors are buried. It was so strange to see the surname Penniman on so many tombs in a place I didn't even know existed before ...

Had his father never talked to him about it?

Dad has always allowed my mother to take up most of the space, to define her culture, the ethnicity of the house. I had never really faced my American side. And that seemed to me the right time: these last were years of things that ended, a series of tragedies began to fall on my family. When you start losing the people you love, one after the other, what can you do? It is a moment of rediscovery but also of self-recreation. For two years I was drunk with these emotions, it was like always being psychologically "done", in a continuous confrontation with the things I feared the most.

The "Revelation" to which he has entitled the tour comes then from the pain? Yet his latest album, My name is Michael Holbrook, looks so cheerful ...

My songs must make you want to let loose but at the same time destabilize you. I would like people to dance with tears in my eyes at my concerts.

Aren't you afraid to expose your pain?

The stage is one of the strangest places in the world: you have to be without veils as in bed, but in front of ten thousand people. Yet I always felt comfortable there, the songs are the safest place to say anything. Growing up we understand more and more things about ourselves and we reveal them to the people around us: for most of us they are friends, for me it's my audience. In the Revelation tour I want to tell the true story of my life, through seven colors.

What color is Mika today?

Each of us has within himself all the shades of the rainbow. But perhaps today to represent me more is white, which is the sum of all the colors. Joy feeds on contrasts, it is only from the extreme melancholy that extreme happiness can arise. The euphoria does not come from that "on your hands!" To David Guetta.

And where does it come from?

Not from drugs, nor from hatred, nor from sport. For me it comes from music, which is like an electroshock. I like to think of my concerts as mass in a crazy church. That's why when the show ends I don't stay backstage to sign autographs: I step off the stage, put on a bathrobe and get in the car to leave the building before anyone else. I must protect myself because, after giving everything, this is the moment when I am most fragile. I don't want to risk being hurt.

In Dear jealousy he says he is "jealous of the man I was and of the man I could become". Who wanted to be?

Simply anyone else but not me! Jealousy is like a drug, it immobilizes you, it takes you away from the person you are, because it makes you believe that you will never be up to it, but also from what you could be. Do you feel that way now? Let's say that now at least I can talk about it ... (smiles) But aren't we all envious of what we see on social media? There is that girl with the biggest breast of yours or the guy who went on vacation in a more beautiful place, the one whose life is happiest ... An image can say more than many words but often says the wrong thing, or mind. And this is very dangerous. I also noticed him when I was the judge of X-Factor: the goal of so many people was to be able to show the world a different version, better than themselves.

When using social media has this in mind?

I try to tell what happens behind the scenes, where my music comes from. Many have understood this and my interactions have almost quintupled in the last eight months. Of course then there are guys who ask me for a selfie just to get more likes on Instagram ... It's crazy! (shakes his head)

He collaborated with Ivan Cotroneo in the writing of the show and one of the first singles taken from the album entitled Sanremo. What role did Italy play in its revelation process?

In reality Sanremo more than a place is a symbol for me, the story of a desire and a frustration. I remember the furious quarrels between my mother and my aunt who used to host us in her summer home in France, I would have been 14 years old: Mom loaded everything in the car and left crying while my sisters and I were in the back seat in silence, then we arrived in Sanremo and while others on the seafront smiled again I felt like a real loser ... So I was chubby, and as I walked feeling my sweaty thighs rub against each other I looked at all those guys walking along the seafront sure of themselves, I felt like crap . I wanted to be sexy like them and instead ...

But now he is a planetary star and they are looking at her from under the stage.

Yet I continue to bring the past with me: I think this is the only way to go on without crashing. This idea of getting rid of things is outdated. If memories become skeletons in the closet sooner or later they come back to haunt you. And I'm not just talking about emotions, but also about material objects. You can't just throw away a T-shirt that we don't like anymore or a plastic bottle, it will only end up somewhere else. The sooner we recognize it, the sooner we can start making a difference. And the same is true for people: we cannot tell migrants "leave, we don't want you in our country" because they will only move to another part like we would do if we were in their place.

Is there also a spiritual dimension in this revelation?

Yes a lot. I like to use my Catholic education as a starting point for discussion. Because you cannot have an intelligent spiritual comparison if you are not sacrilegious. Otherwise it's just rhetoric. In Tomorrow he sings "who cares about tomorrow". Don't you really care? In truth I think about it all the time (laughs), it will be the Lebanese part of my origins, this oriental melancholy! Tomorrow is always terrifying, and exciting at the same time, when you let yourself go. In the end everything is here, letting go.

"The idea of getting rid of things is outdated. And I'm not just talking about emotions, but also about material objects and people "

Interviewed on "Domenica In", the British singer-songwriter talks about his new album and opens on the battle of his mother: "It is terrifying to see a strong woman like her turn out to be fragile because of her illness"

It was she who discovered her talent. It was she who encouraged him during the most difficult moments. It was she who organized the first dates in Europe, when at home they lacked money and the family Toyota Previa became "the hotel" for sleeping in front of the theaters. Today Mika pays homage to his mother, Joannie, dedicating to him his most intimate album, "My name is Michael Holbrook", the result of a long introspective work.

"To change everything was the call from my father who asked me to fly to Dubai right away because my mother was sick," the singer told Domenica In. "I had just decided on the title of the album, it was a coincidence. And there I was really afraid of losing it. Now she is still fighting with cancer, it is terrifying to see a strong and combative woman like her turn out to be fragile because of her illness ».

"He suffered a very serious operation on his head," Mika reveals to Mara Venier. "Three weeks later, when he was at home, I picked up the microphone and, despite looking at me badly, I told her to sing for three and a half hours. He did, but a few days later he called me to tell me that I shouldn't have used that recording for something sad, he would never have forgiven me. "

But when he heard the finished piece, his reaction was surprising: "If I knew that such a beautiful thing would come out, I would have sung better, now everyone will think I'm singing badly," she said. Mika manages to snatch a smile even in such a delicate situation: "Today there is a smaller distance between what I am and what I represent as an artist. I rediscovered my true identity ».

Which passes precisely from his father, "held hostage for months during the Gulf War and returned home completely changed", and from his mother, "a constant support": "There was a bad moment when they threw me out of school: I had stopped reading, writing and speaking, I had lost my sense of value. My mom helped me find him and four months later I found myself at the Royal Opera in London ».

This album is for her.

reat moment of Mika. It was when he published Life in cartoon motion, an album that put him in the disparadero thanks to songs like Grace Kelly. But that of the success is ephemeral and it seems that the British of Lebanese origin disappeared from the map.

 
 
But it was not so, although in Spain it began to have less impact, in other countries such as Italy or France he became a judge or coach of programs such as Factor X or La voz. Now he returns with a new album, My name is Michael Holbrook. He has decided to present himself with his real name and the familiar thing has a lot to do with this return four years after his previous job.
 
It seems that these songs are joined by a reconciliation with their family past. “The revelation took place two years ago in a cemetery in Georgia, in the southern United States, before the grave of one of my ancestors in which my paternal surname, Penniman, and also his two Christian surnames, Michael Holbrook, appeared. I didn't know where to start, because I was in full creative crisis, in the sense that I had nothing to tell. So, as always happens in these types of situations, I told myself that I had to surrender to the unknown. And for me the unknown is my father's family. Seeing my name in all those graves exalted me. It was nice to know this part of my identity that I had not explored. I felt the need to defend my roots and I began to write: My name is Michael Holbrook, I was born in 1983, ”he said in the Italian edition of Vanity Fair.

 
There is the origin of his new album. And if we talk about family issues, if any, they are complicated. With 9 years he packed his bags to flee a country at war and things were not easy.

The kidnapping of his father
 

One of the first people with whom he had to reconcile was with his father. He has not hesitated to tell his relationship with him.

“I was seven years old and my father was a financial advisor. He was taken hostage in Kuwait, at the US embassy. He returned seven months later, completely changed. First we called him dad, then Mike. We couldn't call him dad anymore. The children no longer recognized that thin man with a beard who had lived very strong things, ”he explains. Although it seems that now there has been an approach.

Anyway, after that, things did nothing but complicate, especially in the economic.

“We suffered an economic collapse, we lost the house and even the creditors came to take the furniture. We moved to London, where we live in a 'bed and breakfast' for two years. We had to rebuild our lives from scratch. It is at this moment when all my problems explode, especially dyslexia, then a violent teacher and the expulsion from school, ”he tells about the harsh circumstances of those times.

His mother's project
He has also talked about the relationship with his mother who was the one who at that time told him that he had to work or it would end up being a failure which would mean ending up in jail. It's that hard. "I don't know why he said it, today it may seem like a funny phrase, but it became the obsession of my life," he said.

“The scarecrow of failure began to persecute me since I was a child. My mother put me in singing lessons, four hours of exercise a day. I didn't want it to be a pop star. I wanted her to succeed, which for her means cultivating a creative talent, finding satisfaction in artistic expression, which is like a super power that nobody can take away from you and that gives you true freedom, ”he continued.

A maternal absorption that ended up making his paternal relationship even more difficult. "This ended up pulling me even further from my father, because I had become my mother's project," he confessed.

She recognized his talent and he assumed responsibility and began to travel around Europe, even sleeping in the car when necessary, to find an opportunity.

A sister with problems
Mika has two sisters, one of them, Paloma, wanted to be an actress but did not have many opportunities because she was born with a semi-paralysis on the left side of the body. "For her I am a great pride, but also a cause for sadness," he admitted.

He has lived very hard times with her. One day he was called for being the closest relative to tell him that he had to say goodbye to her because he would not survive a fall from a fourth floor.

Finally everything went well and despite the injuries suffered in the fall, it went ahead. Now he has composed a song inspired by that moment in which his sister and his mother sing.

 
When he was with this process he received a call that warned him of the serious illness of his father, another signal that served to propitiate this family approach and, above all, this family reconciliation.

A new Mika
Apparently, being Mika was a great responsibility and a project with which I was not at all happy for what its origin had been.

“I started with the idea that Mika's character, my music, had been taken from me against my will. Then I realized that that was not true, that not everything was a construction of my mother. I wanted him. I have made peace with the last 12 years. The only way I can live and express myself is by creating music, writing, playing. Without this I don't exist, ”he confessed.

Now he has a new starting point and, without a doubt, this album will be the most personal of the singer.

We met Mika in mid-September in a hotel in downtown Montreal, the day after two highly charged shows that he had just performed at the Corona Theater, with no other special effects than his generosity, unbridled dance moves and his overflowing energy.

The British singer of Lebanese origin chose to "break" his new material and show on this side of the Atlantic - the Montreal performances were just after New York and just before San Francisco. His tour of the big European amphitheatres will begin in 2020, and he promises that he will come back home very soon.

"I wanted to start with audiences who give me something, who just do not want to take," he says, relaxed and warm. With the spirit I have right now, it was important to go to places that matter, where I have a connection. "

He was not mistaken: during the second night at the Corona, when the show was clearly over and he greeted the crowd for the last time before leaving the stage, the spectators continued clapping and shouting at him ... thank you.

"It's weird, it's me who is thanking and after, it's them who thank me," he said pensively, noting "the intelligence of the public."

"After four years of a rather complicated life, it's as if they realized that I wanted to do a great emotional thing to rebuild myself. "

Mourning and illness in his immediate family and relatives: the singer does not hide it, he has gone through a great period of personal turbulence in recent years. The idea that "what you take as things that will always be there begins to crumble" has shaken it. He admits, this disc, "born directly from sadness", allowed him to feel "less loser".

"I was able to find myself without the patina of years and find my happiness. And it's only that hard, tough happiness that can help me fight the reality of life. Not in the sense of career, but of real life, that we all have to live. "

The post-TV

We see him in the conversation, Mika also felt the need to prove that he still had legitimacy as an artist. This album comes after several years of intensive presence on TV - he has been judge for two seasons at X Factor show in Italy and coach at The Voice in France from 2014 to 2019.

Of course, he does not regret this experience, during which he really could be himself. "I was able to express myself in a world where there is very little opportunity to do it. I was not pissed off and I have no regrets. But he has "hard time imagining" that he will return one day, preferring the long-term work of music to the immediacy and ephemeral of TV.

"I had to separate from that so as not to become addicted. The goal now is to show that it is not because we saw him on the screen every week or that he did ads for Peugeot that he can not surprise anymore.

"It's a delicious provocation. When I announced that I was making a new album, people were saying "but what else has it to tell?" And I said to myself, "I'm going to break your balls." " Its goal ? Assert his place as "an artist who works in pop, but who is not led by the marketing of his own music".

"It's not dirty to do TV if we stay ourselves. It's not dirty to make pop and melodic music if our stories tell stories. "

He also made a record with very few collaborators "rather than collage", all songs were composed at home - "it was the rule, I did not want to work with people who did not come at home "- and was inspired by the colors to create the different environments of the disc.

"I decided to make pop talking about life, religion, sexuality, politics. How to give context to all these things without becoming heavy? Well colors, it's a very effective and universal way to create chapters. "

Authenticity

It is clear that this fifth album is that of the truth and the authenticity for Mika, and it is with this fire and "this energy that you saw in spectacle" that it will defend it. "It's like I tear up my own clothes. It is also to get back in touch with himself that he used his name, Michael Holbrook, as the title of the album.

"It allowed me to do some sort of reset on who I was. To recognize my father. To say thank you to my mother. To say "I am Mika, the son of my parents". To understand who I am and where I come from, otherwise I will never be able to continue, even if I have to go on my own. Oddly, Michael Holbrook helped me rediscover Mika"