❤️‍🔥Alex Is Finally Coming Back to our HQ: The Church-Studio!

Hey,

I hope you’re doing well…! It’s crazy to realize that just a week ago at the same time, I was waking up in the old continent about to face my last day at the Eurosonic Festival! Last week went by like a huge wave being filled with major changes. And soon, Alex will be coming back to Montreal, to the HQ, as we’re about to embark on a new musical journey together. This is not the kind of news I could take lightly and here’s why:

Last time Alex stepped foot here for more than a few days for a music-driven trip goes back to when we did a live performance of the songs “Sorrows (If Only I Had Known)”, “Snowflakes in July” and “The Love That Moves”, back in July 2020. Almost 4 years ago…! This is how incredible and meaningful this trip is and will be, for him in the first place, and for us all as well, and this is why I wanted to share about this today, as it’s not to be taken lightly… Most of this has never been shared before. 

It’s currently Saturday morning, the sky is a dirty gray color, there’s loads of snow on the ground, it’s pretty much death surrounding me, but I’m listening to this song on repeat bringing life, hope, and greatness to my office: U2 - “Where the Streets Have No Name”! 

The story goes back to August 2009 as I was with Alex in a Montreal notary office. It was a warm and sunny August afternoon, and we were about to sign the papers making us the new proud owners of a former Catholic Church we had planned on transforming into the greatest art building the world had ever known, making Factory look sloppy and dated! 2009 was the year Michael Jackson died, the year Susan Boyle launched her career, we were still communicating on Myspace, Twitter was edgy, Barack Obama won his Nobel Prize, and the New York Yankees were on their way to their 27th World Series…! 

For us, it was the year where things started becoming serious, the year where we all had to make the commitment, to cross the bridge toward a lifestyle where there was no turning back. 2009 was when kids had to remain kids or become the women and men we were all striving to be for the previous three years before that! Well… At least, that’s what I thought… This incredible journey started in 2006, and music was the only thing we knew, the only place where we could exist, be ourselves, survive, dream, scream, and not care about the world we were in for a few hours. This was our world, our everything! Most of our friends wanted to study new media, cinema, photography, web design, so we all joined forces and created a beautiful monster called Hopeful Tragedy Records, which was more than the 6 of us on stage (back then Your Favorite Enemies), but an incorruptible unit which was so beautiful, determined, and powerful. The whole world was ours! 

Following tours in Europe, Asia, showcases at SXSW in Austin, Texas and playing at the Toronto Canadian Music Week, being the first ones to integrate live digital performances on our Myspace profiles and having our music placed in the world-class video game Final Fantasy, the time had come to leave our tiny home-built studio whether it was for the band, or for the video, photo, and web design departments. We thought that having a place of our own, to create a powerful and energetic creative environment would be the dream everyone deeply caressed, and what a better place for that than a former church?!   

Alex and myself thought this was the greatest idea of all times back then...! We decided to gather all of our friends, and to share this little wonder with them, asking if they wanted to move on with us. We’d need a five-year commitment, since this was a huge investment for us, and we all come from quite poor backgrounds… So if something went south, no one could help us out! Well… We lost some friends right after the meeting. It was too much of a commitment for them, which was very sad, but fair enough, of course. For all the others; champagne and hugs started to bloom in the room, all confessing what we dreamed of seeing happen...! What a moment! 

It was as early as 2010, and things started to go south for us at the church-studio, and the southern part of the south, which means really bad! For some of us, this church-studio was a stepping stone toward something even greater and better, it was a starting line, but for others, for many more than I’d like to admit, it was a finish line, a final destination. In reality, we had done great things already, for sure, but a thousand galaxies was still, in my opinion, separating us from where we wanted to bring this story...! Where the streets have no name..! At least, the finish line was not there yet…! 

The following decade has been filled with highs and lows, depending on the seasons. But in all honesty, the valleys took control over the mountains and those deep lows often lasted for more than a year, and the highs, the peaks, the unreachable became lower, and lower, to a point where, for Alex, those church walls started to remind him of all those unachieved dreams, all those empty promises, all those compromises, those small victories we had to fight so hard to simply get a slight hold of... It sometimes felt like we were begging for a drop of water after years in the desert and this had to feel like the best feeling ever. It was human nature at its worst, where we all pretty much became something we had promised ourselves to never become. Not really what we signed for in the first place, back in that office in August 2009! 

But here we are! Almost a year to the day, where Alex had his heart surgery, welcoming him back “home” for music again after almost 4 years! What a feeling! A few surprises are waiting for him, but please, don’t tell him, as we want this place to thrive, to shine, to become what it should’ve been like back in 2009: alive, colorful, filled with light, sounds, laughter, dreams and greatness! We want the walls to share a different story...! 

Myspace left the scene, Twitter became X, the post-Covid world is at war, it’s actually 0°C on a January 27, but I feel like the next few weeks will be so significant, so important, so meaningful, because we’re all ready for it, all aligned towards it, and all eager to go to hell and back as many times as we need in order to give birth to our best musical work thus far! Welcome back home, Alex! 

“Where the Streets Have No Name” is the song that Alex and I will always put on when we celebrate something above and beyond like a new album release, the first time we walked in our church-studio, first time we had a drink on the terrace of La Maison de Tanger, and so on…! But I’m listening to it right now, already celebrating this moment where we’re all together, working on what we were all born for, with the solid hope and faith that this will outshine and outlive us all! 

I want to run, I want to hide
I wanna tear down the walls that hold me inside
I wanna reach out and touch the flame
Where the streets have no name, ha, ha, ha

I wanna feel sunlight on my face
I see that dust cloud disappear without a trace
I wanna take shelter from the poison rain
Where the streets have no name, oh, oh

Where the streets have no name
Where the streets have no name
We're still building then burning down love
Burning down love
And when I go there, I go there with you
It's all I can do

The city's a flood
And our love turns to rust
We're beaten and blown by the wind
Trampled in dust

I'll show you a place
High on the desert plain, yeah
Where the streets have no name, oh, oh

Where the streets have no name
Where the streets have no name
We're still building then burning down love
Burning down love
And when I go there, I go there with you
It's all I can do

Our love turns to rust
We're beaten and blown by the wind
Blown by the wind
Oh, and I see love

See our love turn to rust
Oh, we're beaten and blown by the wind
Blown by the wind
Oh, when I go there
I go there with you
It's all I can do

Where the Streets Have No Name… Welcome back home, Alex! 

Let's be great to one another! 

Your Host and Friend, 
Jeff