Gojira: More Environmentalists Than Satanists
In a new interview with Rolling Stone, Joe Duplantier voice and guitar of the French metal band Gojira (Read here) recounted the events leading up to the group’s performance at the Olympics opening ceremony, responding to accusations of Satanism that arose due to the dark nature of Gojira’s roughly three-minute performance, which fused metal with opera.
The quartet performed atop balconies jutting out from the walls of a castle, with fires burning from below and dozens of decapitated figures of Marie Antoinette adorning each window. With pounding riffs and raspy vocals accompanying the scene, it was unmistakably metal. Satanic, some might have thought. Not even remotely in the minds of the authors and the French band.
“There’s nothing satanic about it,” Joe Duplantier tells Rolling Stone, “it’s French history. It’s the French glamour: people being beheaded, red wine, blood everywhere – it’s romantic, it’s normal.” “There’s nothing satanic about it,” he laughs, describing the country’s pride in severing religion’s ties with the government.
“France is a country that made a separation between state and religion during the revolution. And that’s something very important, very dear to the foundations of republican France,” Duplantier says, noting that there’s even a word for it. “We call it ‘laïcité.’ It’s when the state is no longer religious,” he continues, “so it’s free in terms of expression and symbolism.” “It’s about history and facts,” insists the Gojira frontman. “We don’t look too closely at symbolism in terms of religion.”
In another historical misunderstanding among many viewers and beyond, they saw a scene from the opening ceremony as a parody of Leonardo da Vinci’s biblical painting “The Last Supper”, with satanic undertones.
The artistic director of the ceremony, Thomas Jolly, he assured that this scene has no connection with Christianity. “There is Dionysus who arrives on this table. He is there because he is the god of celebration in Greek mythology,” Jolly told French news channel BFM-TV on Sunday, responding to the accusations that have come his way. “The idea was to make a pagan celebration linked to the gods of Olympus. You will never find in me the desire to mock and denigrate anyone.”
Also in the interview with Rolling Stone, Duplantier drew attention to a cause for which he and Gojira are actively fighting: the protection of whales. Captain Paul Watson, an activist who works to enforce maritime laws and stop illegal poaching and is known for the television show Whale Wars, is currently being held in Greenland as a prisoner of the Danish government.
Duplantier was asked if he had the opportunity to meet with French President Emmanuel Macron after the Olympics opening ceremony to talk about his cause. “I haven’t spoken to Emmanuel Macron yet, but I would love to, because he and I have something in common right now, and that is knowing that Captain Paul Watson, co-founder of Greenpeaceco-founder of Sea Shepherd and founder of the Neptune’s Pirates and the Paul Watson Foundation, which pprotects whales and marine life internationally, he is currently being held in Nuuk, Greenland, by the Danish government,” explains the Gojira frontman.
And he adds: “I would like to meet with President Macron and the Prime Minister of Justice of Denmark, after all the noise and fuss of the Olympics, to talk about Paul Watson, who is in prison for trying to do the right thing, trying to enforce international laws that protect marine life. He could be in prison for the rest of his life. So that is my fight today.”
“I know that Emmanuel Macron supports Paul Watson and has asked the Danish government to release him today, so that he can continue to be an activist and educate people about the importance of preserving wildlife and not breaking international laws,” Duplantier continues, “He was arrested while simply trying to get between whales and a boat, as he usually does. I know he has a bad press, and people call him an eco-terrorist, and all that.”
Speaking about their personal relationship, Duplantier says of Watson: “But he is my friend. I know he has a good heart. And I know that what he is doing is very important. In a few days I will go to Copenhagen and I hope to meet the first Minister of Justice.”