Madeon | |
Number of songs: 4 | Total weeks on charts: 12
Appearing in a total number of: 7 charts | Total period running: 23 days
Appearing in a total number of: 7 charts | Total period running: 23 days
Songs by Madeon
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Biography
Hugo Pierre Leclercq (born 30 May 1994), known by his stage name Madeon, is a music producer from Nantes, France. He initially gained popularity by means of his video "Pop Culture", which was published to YouTube and subsequently received millions of hits in its first few days of broadcast on the Internet.
Leclercq's first EP, "The City", was released in 2012. His debut studio album "Adventure" was released on 30 March 2015, being supported by a 22-stop North American tour.
Leclercq started composing music at the age of 11, producing hands-up under the name of "Deamon" until 2010 when he began producing house music under his current name, Madeon, which is an anagram of his previous nickname. He won a remix competition for "The Island" by Pendulum the same year.
He went on to remix other electronic artists' tracks the following year. A clip of him performing his mash-up "Pop Culture", uploaded to YouTube on 7 July 2011, propelled him to international fame. It featured samples from thirty-nine songs mixed together on-the-fly using a Novation Launchpad. The clip quickly went viral and reached over six million views in just a few days.
During live performances, apart from the Launchpads, he also uses Novation's Zero SL MKII, FL Studio, and Ableton Live. His first live performance was in Paris in April 2011 where he was a support act to Yelle, and his UK debut was at The Nest in Dalston, London where he performed alongside the likes of Jacques Lu Cont.
Leclercq has been featured several times on 15 Minutes of Fame, a segment of Pete Tong's radio show on BBC Radio 1, with both his debut single "Icarus" and his remix for deadmau5's "Raise Your Weapon" given their first full play on the show. His live recorded performance debut was for Pete Tong's BBC Radio 1 gala event in Hull on 27 January 2012, where he played a 20-minute-long set.
A debut EP was scheduled to be released at the end of 2011, but then cancelled in favour of multiple singles. The first single, "Icarus", was released on 24 February 2012 on his independent label popcultur.
As a sign of his rapid rise to international fame, in 2012, he was invited to play four major American festivals, the Ultra Music Festival in Miami, Coachella in California, Lollapalooza in Chicago, and Electric Daisy Carnival in New York, as well as several UK dance music festivals, including the Dance Arena at Radio 1's Hackney Weekend 2012; he also provided support for Swedish House Mafia's headlining set at the Milton Keynes Bowl. Leclercq was listed at number 54 on DJ Mag's Top 100 DJs list in 2012.
Many of his songs have been used in media franchises: "Icarus" was featured in the US show Dancing with the Stars in May 2012 and 21 May 2013 (finals with Aly Raisman) and on the in-game soundtrack of Forza Horizon; "Finale" and "Imperium" have been featured in EA Sports' FIFA 13 and FIFA 15 respectively. Finale has also been included in the opening cinematic of PlayStation All-Stars Battle Royale; "The City" appears in Need for Speed: Most Wanted and "Technicolor (Club Extended)" in Need for Speed: Rivals. "Finale" and Leclercq's remix of "The Night Out" by Martin Solveig were featured on the official soundtrack of ESPN's 2013 Winter X Games event in Tignes, France and both received several plays on air. "Finale" continues to be used as the bumper music for X Games broadcasts.
He toured with Lady Gaga as an opening act during her Born This Way Ball. Leclercq has cited The Beatles and Daft Punk as his greatest musical influences. Madeon released a new single on 3 August 2013 titled "Technicolor." Madeon worked with Lady Gaga on three tracks, "Gypsy", "Mary Jane Holland", and "Venus" on her 2013 album ARTPOP.
On 25 February 2014, Leclercq released a track available for a free download on his website called "Cut The Kid", claiming that it was created circa 2011 or 2012.
In September 2014, a new song by Leclercq called "Imperium" was released unofficially as the part of the soundtrack for the latest edition of the popular football video game franchise, FIFA 15. On 18 October, it was officially released as a free download through an interactive feature on his website, similarly to the release of Cut The Kid. Imperium is the lead single from Leclercq's debut album Adventure.
On 8 December 2014, Leclercq released the second single from Adventure titled You're On, featuring Kyan. Unlike the two previous releases, "You're On" was not released for free, but rather, sold online through iTunes.
The same day, Leclercq announced via twitter that his debut album would be released in 2015, and be called Adventure, featuring the singles Imperium, and You're On. More information regarding Adventure was released on 20 January 2015 in a Facebook post. The album comes in standard, and deluxe versions with the standard version has 12 tracks featuring Kyan, Dan Smith, Passion Pit, Mark Foster, Aquilo, and the deluxe features previously released singles Icarus, Finale, The City, Cut the Kid, Technicolor, as well as a bonus track featuring Vancouver Sleep Clinic. The album will be released on 27 March 2015.
Through the email notification system for his website, Leclercq sends out email notifications to users about his upcoming releases.
On 15 December 2014, the music video for the single "You're On", featuring Kyan, was released as part of a trilogy of music videos for Adventure on his personal YouTube account. The video follows a young female named "Asteria" through a futuristic city, where she is mesmerised by a tower in the distance, (the same tower which is seen on the album artwork of Adventure). There, she meets a young male named Icarus and together, they discover an object of some sort, embedded in the wall, and they activate it. The video ends with a "To Be Continued" message, written in an alphabet created by Leclercq, and in English.
The second music video in the trilogy was released for the single "Pay No Mind" featuring Passion Pit on 20 February 2015. Continuing on from the music video for "You're On", the video follows Icarus and Asteria try to decode secret messages and find an escape from the futuristic city they live in. They successfully find an exit out of the city, and are last seen outside the walls, heading towards the tower in the distance. The music video for "Pay No Mind" was released on Leclercqs newly created Vevo channel.
On 10 March 2015, Madeon released the album's final single. Titled "Home", it's his most personal piece of work to date and came about after he locked himself in the studio for 24 hours straight.
On 18 March 2015, "Madeon's Adventure Machine" was launched. The web app allows anyone to mix selected stems from "Adventure" together using their phone, tablet, computer or Novation Launchpad. Madeon posted on Facebook, saying: "You can combine samples from my album and create new mash-ups/mixes. It's really easy and fun and all I've been doing for the past two hours basically."
On 24 March 2015, Hugo released a chance to hear the full album on iTunes First Play as well as Spotify.
Discography:
2015 - Adventure
Sources: Wikipedia, Top40-Charts.com Editorial team
Madeon in the news
