The Premier

Visual arts, dancing, cinema, photography, fashion…the Parisian artist born in Lille with mixed Kabyle and British heritage and whose real name is Luc Bruyère, has explored them all. After studying art at the Institut Saint-Luc in Brussels with fellow artist Roméo Elvis, he went on to collaborate with visual artists such as Olafur Eliasson (now a household name on the international scene) and Kader Attia (who was awarded the Marcel Duchamp prize). He stood out as a talented dancer while working with choreographer Carolyn Carlson (his teacher since he was 5) all the way to Paris Opera to perform a duet with prima ballerina Marie-Agnès Gillot. He graduated from the performance arts school Cours Florent and went on to start a brilliant career in theatre working alongside established acts such as Béatrice Dalle and Joey Starr before turning to arthouse films (Le Prisonnier by Christophe Honoré). His tremendously intense journey is full of unexpected, extraordinary and magical encounters, such as with fashion photographer Craig McDean, who propelled him into the world of fashion, on the catwalks of Lanvin, Kenzo and Dior, as well as in Nike fashion campaigns.

The music was always a part of him, albeit silent, brewing inside, still waiting to be confessed. It first appeared in the form of poems he wrote as a teenager, guided by Rimbaud’s radiant flow and melancholy all the way to Patti Smith and the fabulous Just Kids, a love story with Robert Mapplethorpe in which he saw a bit of himself. Waiting in the background, music was his companion when he sang a capella for the first time on stage, aged 22 (in David Bobée’s Elephant man play) a song he had written himself. It followed him to the Parisian cabaret Madame Arthur where he played a transvestite in "Vénus de mille hommes", a Blue-Velvet type Lynchian character he made his own. It provided the momentum for his Berlin night outs, a city he lived in from 2016 to 2022, scouring counter-culture art galleries and underground gay clubs, leather-clad from tip to toe. Music has been a loyal partner since he was 14 and a tough experience coming out. He started dancing alone in his room as an outlet for all his rage. From techno music to Schubert’s Ave Maria, Madonna to Freddie Mercury, Disco music and hard-hitting German techno, angels and demons have all had a say in his intimate soundtrack. After buying a keyboard when he was 25, his own melodies started pouring out profusely, whether in Pigalle (Paris’ red light district) or Berlin, as if from a tap that had been shut for too long.

Music became a form of therapeutic comfort for Lucky Love, a bubble in which he lets his voice wander throughout the night in the instinctive melodies coming out from his electric organ. From 2020, as he travelled between Paris and Berlin, and without knowing it, Lucky Love started writing one by one the six songs that would end up making it to his first EP. There he conjures up all the musical styles that have crossed his path. Britpop, French chanson, immersive electro and Berlin’s own techno blend together to craft a singular musical identity that carries his unique signature. His visual flair and long-time passion for pop art, Renaissance painters and religious iconography inform his sounds, music and lyrics. Paradise and Love abound with depictions of fallen angels, Wim Wenders-type shots (Wings of Desire, original title Der Himmel über Berlin) and glowing Pietà images. His hypersensitive singing and spleen to die for would move even the most stoic of listeners. Hence Lucky Love’s aptly-chosen EP title Tendresse, the tenderness that emerges from his heart. All along the EP, his ample and clear textured vibrato voice surges from the depth of his lungs and rises atop layers of sounds and club-ready beats. We are reminded of the emotional tension of lyrical master Jacques Brel, Farinelli’s ethereal flights, as well as the atmospheric quality of James Blake’s voice.

His creative world folds out between brooding ballads (Tendresse, Love) and fired-up club tracks (Paradise), sung in English and French. Lucky Love is more than just a stage name, it’s a way for the young man, born with one arm, to stress how these two words can symbolise a world of opportunities. Not lucky as in a roll of dice, but lucky to be alive, a life he could have lost, as he sings on Lova, the gripping song that talks about AIDS and celebrates life*. Music helps him reach dizzy new heights which are also vertigo-inducing, a way to put everything under one and the same umbrella. The singer-songwriter also called on an army of five producers that all embody a shade of his musical DNA : Nomak (Christine and the Queens, CharliXCX), a virtuoso geek who connects post-apocalyptic techno, hip hop and hyperpop. Paco del Rosso (Damso, Silly Boy Blue), an electronica prodigy churning out Frank Ocean-type heavy Californian beats. Prinzly (Disiz, Damso, Bonnie Banane) and Ipon (Skrillex), have helped him reveal the sombre depth of his soul while Jérémy Châtelain (Camélia Jordana, Oxmo Puccino) contributed his experience in weaving a coherent thread throughout.