Benjamin Biolay: Comment est ta peine?

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​Comment est ta peine? appeared in 2020 on Benjamin Biolay’s 9th Album named Grand Prix along with an official video clip filmed by Marta Bevacqua that featured franco-finnish dancer Nadia Tereszkiewicz, as shown below.
The title of the song translates literally as “how is your pain?” The French word “peine,” however, can mean many other things, depending on context. It can mean “sadness” or “sorrow.” It can mean “trouble” or inconvenience as in “ne vaut pas la peine.” In legal-speak it means “penalty.” The context of Biolay’s song suggests: pain, sadness or sorrow.
The song is presented in the form of a literary device called an “apostrophe.” Confusingly, this word has two separate meanings. When it is used as a grammatical symbol or punctuation mark, an “apostrophe” indicates possession (“Tom’s”) or a contraction (“it’s”). In poetry, however, it is a literary device used to address an absent party that may be an individual or a personified object (Yorick’s skull) or even an abstract concept (death). In the song, Biolay employs it to address an absent former lover in the immediate aftermath of a breakup. Biolay’s two references to a telephone, beginning verses 1 and 3, suggest that this event transpired recently. Biolay adopts the device as a platform to express his own feelings about the situation, which seems to be that he is not doing great but is okay (which may be more bluff than truth). Biolay expresses a similar emotional equilibrium about the human condition in his song La superbe. The accompanying video depicts each party dealing with the situation in their singular way (she is dancing on the beach and he is closeted inside in a blurry daze).
The song structure is Verse/Verse/Chorus, Verse/Verse/Chorus, Verse/Chorus. Verses have 6 lines, with a rhyme pattern of ABABCB, ABCBCB while each of the 3 choruses has a rhyme scheme of ABABABABB. The chords and progression repeat. Typical of Biolay, the song has clear structure and several allusions that invite the interpretive notes below.
​
Verse 1
J′ai lâché le téléphone
Comme ça
En ce beau matin d'automne
Pas froid
Ça ressemblait à l′été
Sauf que tu n'y étais pas
 
Verse 2
Puis j'ai regardé le ciel
D′en bas
Indécis, voulais-je y monter
Ou pas
Mais savais que j′étais fait,
Que j'étais fait comme un rat
 
Chorus
Comment est ta peine
La mienne est comme ça
Faut pas qu′on s'entraîne
À toucher le bas
Il faudrait qu′on apprenne
À vivre avec ça
Comment est ta peine
La mienne s'en vient, s′en va
 
Interlude
 
Verse 3
J′ai posé le téléphone
Comme ça
J′peux jurer avoir entendu
Le glas
J'aurais dû te libérer
Avant que tu me libères, moi
 
Verse 4
J′ai fait le bilan carbone
Trois fois
Puis parlé de ta daronne
Sur un ton qu'tu n′aimerais pas
Tu ne le sauras jamais
Car tu ne l'écoutes pas
 
Chorus
Comment est ta peine
La mienne est comme ça
Faut pas qu′on s'entraîne
À toucher le bas
Il faudrait qu'on apprenne
À vivre avec ça
Comment est ta peine
La mienne s′en vient, s′en va
La mienne s'en vient, s′en va
 
Interlude
 
Verse 5
Dis, comment sont tes nuits
Et combien as-tu gardé de nos amis
Comment est ta peine
Est-ce qu'elle te susurre de voler de nuit
Comment va ta vie
Comment va ta vie
La même, comme ça, comme çi
 
Chorus
Comment est ta peine
La mienne est comme ça
Faut pas qu′on s'entraîne
À toucher le bas
Il faudrait qu′on apprenne
À vivre avec ça
Comment est ma peine
La mienne s'en vient, s'en va
S′en vient, s′en va, s'en vient, s′en va
​Verse 1
I dropped the phone
Just like that
On this beautiful autumn morning
Not cold
It seems like summer
Except you're not here
 
Verse 2
Then I looked to the sky
From below
Undecided, do I want to go up there
Or not
But I knew I was “made,”
That I was “made” like a rat
 
Chorus
How is your pain?
Mine is like that
We don't have to train
To hit bottom
We have to learn
To live with it
How is your pain?
Mine comes and goes
 
Interlude
 
Verse 3
I put down the phone
Like that
I can swear I heard
The death knell
I should've set you free
Before you set me free
 
Verse 4
I did my carbon footprint
Three times
Then talked about your mom
In a tone you wouldn't have liked
You will never know it
Because you don’t listen
 
Chorus
How is your pain?
Mine is like that
We don't have to train
To touch the bottom
We have to learn
To live with it
How is your grief?
Mine comes and goes
Comes and goes
 
Interlude
 
Verse 5
Say, how are your nights
And how many of our friends have you kept?
How is your pain
Does it whisper to you to fly at night?
How is your life going?
How is your life going?
Mine is like that, like this
 
Chorus
How is your pain?
Mine is like that
We don't have to train
To touch the bottom
We have to learn
To live with it
How is my pain?
Mine comes and goes
Comes, goes, comes, goes


NB:

être fait comme un rat: means “trapped like a rat.” Rats are generally disliked, so when they are trapped it’s the “end of the line” for them with no possibility of parole or even life-in-prison. This is not “catch and release.”

S’en venir and s’en aller: these expressions recur throughout the song. The use of the reflexive verb (“se”) along with “en” is uncommon and is formal and archaic in France but apparently common in Canada. The subtle difference between “il vient” and “il s’en vient” appears to be that the former conveys a sense of a completed action while the latter implies an ongoing activity.

comme ça: a literal translation is: “like that” but it can also have a neutral or dismissive connotation and mean “so-so” or “it is what it is.”

J′ai fait le bilan carbone trois fois: the pertinence of this comment is puzzling although in combination with the following line (“Puis parlé de ta daronne”) it may represent the accomplishment of a housekeeping chore while seeking refuge in a practical diversion from the emotional context of the breakup.

Puis parlé de ta daronne: “le daron” and “la daronne” are French slang words with a long history that over time have come to mean parents (“dad” and “mom”). “La Daronne” is also the title of a French crime film (“dramedy”) in 2020 starring Isabelle Huppert that made it to the US with the curiously translated English title “Mama Weed.”

de voler de nuit: literally this means “to fly at night” or “night flight.” However, it is also the title of a 1931 novel (“Vol de nuit”) by Antoine de Saint-Exupery and a Guerlain perfume created in 1933 that was named after the novel. Even more to the point of Biolay’s song, however, in 1917 Calogero released a song named “Voler de nuit” on his album “Liberté cherie” and on a music video embellished with magnificent aerial pictures by photographer Yann Arthus-Bertrand. In that piece, Calogero sings: “To fly at night like St Exupéry, to see the world from above without looking down on it, to fly at night, to see what unites us, to make it known that we are all equal.” This may well be a sentiment that Biolay seeks to invoke in his song when he inquires rhetorically of his absent partner: “Comment est ta peine, Est-ce qu'elle te susurre de voler de nuit?”

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