Gojira Laugh Off ‘Satanic’ Claims About Olympics Opening Ceremony Performance: ‘It’s French Charm… It’s Romantic, It’s Normal’
The veteran metal band also said they were not able to rehearse on site at the Conciergerie palace before Friday's wild set.
Gojira performs during the opening ceremony of the Olympic Games Paris 2024 on July 26, 2024 in Paris, France.
When it comes to overheated claims that their explosive 2024 Summer Olympics opening ceremony set on Friday was somehow in league with Beelzebub, French metal band Gojira could take a page from Vice President Kamala Harris’ playbook. Just as the potential democratic presidential candidate and her supporters keep describing Republican rivals Donald Trump and his veep pick JD Vance as “weird,” lead singer Joe Duplantier told Rolling Stone that suggestions their eye-popping set was “satanic” is just, well, weird.
“It’s none of that. It’s French history. It’s French charm, you know, beheaded people, red wine, and blood all over the place — it’s romantic, it’s normal,” Duplantier said of the unexpected explosion of double kick drums, growling vocals, pyro-mania and raining blood-like streamers that accompanied the group’s performance of the 19th century French anthem “Ah! Ça Ira” from the windows of Paris’ Conciedrgerie palace during a four-hour opening spectacle.
“There’s nothing satanic [laughs]. France is a country that made a separation between the state and religion during the revolution,” Duplantier added. “And it’s something very important, very dear to the foundation of republican France. We call it laïcité. It’s when the state is not religious anymore, so therefore it’s free in terms of expression and symbolism. It’s all about history and facts. We don’t look too close closely at symbolism in terms of religion.”
In addition to the sight of a dozen decapitated Mario Antoinettes singing along as columns of fire shot up all around them, Gojira were joined by mezzo-soprano Marina Voitti, who floated by on the prow of a ship. With a few days to let it all soak in, Duplantier told RS that things are still feeling a bit “unreal.” He described getting a call from Olympic committee and opening ceremony composer Victor le Masne months ago and thinking it was a long shot that they would end up in the final cut because the whole thing sounded “completely unreal.”
“The amount of people that would see us live kind of eclipsed the moment. I wasn’t thinking about what it was going to be because it was just too mind-bending to think about,” he said, noting that the Olympic Committee could have picked a more well-known global hard rock act such as Metallica or AC/DC for the honor. “So the reality of the moment was absolutely mind-blowing from where we were, up there at the Conciergerie and the view we had of the scenery and all the Olympic teams, passing by on boats. It was pretty surreal… We never considered ourselves the biggest band in the world that would be worthy to play the Olympics or anything like that. It’s so weird.“
Not only didn’t Gojira pick the song they performed, but Duplantier said they were totally in the dark in terms of how they would fit into the full ceremony along the Seine River, including the fact that Celine Dion and Lady Gaga would also be performing that night. “We didn’t know what was going to happen at all,” Duplantier said, adding that they never got a chance to rehearse on site beforehand. “We just went back and forth with the composer of the Olympic ceremony, Victor le Masne. He threw us a tempo and a guideline. And then we did our thing.” The only time Duplantier even got a feel for the historic building was when he climbed up on the balcony he performed from for 10 minutes three days before to try out his harness, without his guitar.
Determined to represent and honor the metal scene, the singer said they didn’t want to “play a few notes to shock people,” but rather go all-in with the double-kick drums, growling vocals and a tempo breakdown at the end to really “show what metal is all about.”
While brushing off comments from such social media trolls as Andrew Tate and some talking heads on Fox News that the performance was inspired by the devil, Duplantier also had to shrug at similar pearl-clutching on the American right from Donald Trump Jr. and House Speaker Mike Johnson that the ceremony’s recreation of the “Last Supper” featuring drag queens was an insult to Christians. “I haven’t seen it, as surprising as it seems,” the singer said. “I have a family. I have children. So right after all that work and concentration on the Olympics, I was totally in the dark. I didn’t get to sit and watch the whole thing properly.”
Watch Gojira’s performance again below.
