Cannelle’s French electropop is for dreamers

Cannelle is a rising electropop singer-producer whose maximalist synth jams are as memorable as her ice blue tresses. Born and raised in the south of France, she popped up on my radar summer 2024 with her first ever song, “LUCKY,” and continued to impress me with her November single “CLOVER,” which captures the gossamer rush of being totally sprung.

Cannelle has spent the past year feeding her growing fanbase with a steady drip of eclectic singles (I recommend “FILLE” and “MP3”), and recently came to the U.S. to open for Ninajirachi on tour. When I met up with her in the greenroom ahead of her performance in Cleveland, Ohio, she admitted she’d been feeling shy at the show in Detroit the night before. “I wasn’t really used to seeing so many faces because I’ve always had smaller crowds,” she says. “But then I felt comfortable and people cheered me up and I feel like I gained new fans.”

A multi-hyphenate creative, Cannelle says she grew up listening to Bob St. Clair, David Guetta, Daft Punk, and LMFAO (her dad’s a big fan). Later, she got into American music through the music videos of Katy Perry and Nicki Minaj.

Cannelle tells me her debut mixtape will be out in the early summer, and include production from Oscar Scheller (PinkPantheress, Lily Allen), Warpstr (Bladee, Babyxsosa), and Chicken (feardorian, Isabella Lovestory). She co-produced some of the songs, and says the tape will be “around 15 songs,” all new, half in French and half in English, though she was still in the midst of recording when we talked.

“This mixtape is really fun. It’s made for dancing and dreaming and being young and self-confident,” Cannelle says. “I’m just super excited for this mixtape because I feel like people are gonna start to hear me have a Canelle sound after all these singles where I was trying stuff and figuring myself out.”

The FADER caught up with Cannelle to chat about childhood creativity, her start making music, and why she wants to make French just as cool as English.

The FADER: Tell me a little about your hometown and your hobbies growing up.

Cannelle: I mainly grew up in Aix-en-Provence, but I’m from a smaller village. That place was really my source of inspiration back when I was doing more creative direction, because I started music recently. When I was a teenager, I started to do self photoshoots. I’m home alone, there’s nothing to do, I don’t have a car, so I would just be outside, in my garden or in the, how do you say, the fields or whatever. I would take pictures all the time and pretend I was a fairy in the forest. My hometown, it’s really empty, but I’m trying to make it more active in my head.

I used to vlog all the time, before even knowing what vlogging was. I used to take my dad’s phone and film everything I was doing with my friends or with my sisters. Even before being on the internet, I wanted to perform and show people stuff. And I’ve always had a passion for music. I was playing synths a lot with my dad. He’s actually a musician: he’s a bass player and also a drum player and he does a little bit of piano. And my sister’s a DJ. So I grew up around the electronic sound, if I can say that, but obviously the French sound. Then when I found out about YouTube, that’s when everything made sense for me.

I was curious about your first music video [for “LUCKY”]. What was that shoot like?

I texted my friend, “Hey I’m trying to shoot this music video.” It’s my first song and I knew she had a cool apartment in New York, so I was like, “Can I just come to your apartment for fun?” She was like “Yeah, sure, pull up.”

We had a VHS camera, another digital camera, and we were just dancing and having fun. I didn’t think that it would get so much love cos it wasn’t a high-quality budget music video, but people liked it. I love doing DIY stuff.

In your Office Mag interview you said the reason you started making music is that you had an idea for a music video and you were like, “yo, I need to make this myself.” What pushed you to make that jump and actually make a song?

I felt it in my gut that I wanted to do something different with my life because obviously even if I had a passion for pictures and modeling and building a world — cos I was building a world on social media even before the music — I was like, “OK now we need the last piece of the puzzle.”

I’m still learning how to produce, I’m not a good singer yet, but I can try to make this happen. In my head, everything will come later. But I’ve always felt like an artist, even before the music. I don’t think making music makes me, all of a sudden, “oh she’s an artist” — I’ve always been an artist. [Music] was just the missing piece of my creative world.

Where do you get style inspiration?
It varies a lot, but from the magazines. I have a whole magazine collection back home. When I went to Japan I literally bought probably 20 photobooks, like it’s literally my passion to curate cool magazines and cool books, so I feel like a lot of these physical media helped me shape my style.
I’m always on Instagram or Tumblr. Like I’m not gonna lie about it, everybody takes inspo from people on social media. So like the girls and the gays on social media, and my sisters foremost, have been a huge important part of my style and who I am today.

What’s your sisters’ favorite song of yours?
Oh my god, I think it’s “CLOVER” and they also really like “hypnotic” [with RADA].

Your song “MP3” feels really distinct from the rest of your discography. Where was your head at with that session?
I really wanted to try to make a really hyperpop-coded song. When it comes to “MP3,” I feel like I took a risk because this song is so pop. I feel almost robotic when I sing it live, like “this is not even my song.”
When I was in the studio I just wanted to make something that sounds like a mix of American pop from the 2010s mixed with K-pop, especially with the lyrics and using very specific words.

What makes you decide to record a song in French or in English?
I feel like both are me. I love singing in English [but] I’m French. I’m not gonna just make a project that’s in English. I feel like I really wanted to also represent my country! Even if I have fans in America, I want the French people to sing my lyrics and do shows.
[At] my first show in Paris, hearing people sing “FILLE” for the first time? It felt so unreal and that’s why it was probably my favorite show so far because of the energy. And people singing to my songs in French, like it just hits harder, you know?
I decided to do both simply because it’s where I’m from and I don’t want to take that away. But I had a little bit of a difficult time at first singing in French, because I felt like it was a little bit cringe. When it’s in English it’s way easier because everybody speaks English. When I speak French it feels more personal, and it’s like, “oh the French people are gonna listen to me say this and they’re gonna think it’s stupid.” I think French should be cool as well and you know, to be cringe is to be free so I don’t care anymore.