Born on 6 July: Heather Nova, sophisticated pop star for women

The Little Mermaid from Bermuda has caught us in her net over and over again. This daughter of the islands, born in 1967, spent a large part of her childhood on a 12-metre boat built by her father!

From her family's peregrinations from one Caribbean island to another, she has naturally kept her sea legs, but also an attraction for melodies that smell of sea spray, wide salty spaces and sunshine. In this sense, the bewitching six-minute melody "Island" (taken from her third album "Oyster" in 1994) is like a book of her life. And, as in Greek mythology, her voice, like that of the sirens in Ulysses' ears (in Homer's “The Odyssey”) captivates, bewitches and enthralls. Nothing less...

With Heather Nova, you're never far from the lapping of the water, the golden sands and the trade winds. A few examples? Her 1998 album has a title that suits her perfectly: "Siren". And Youth, the bassist from the English band Killing Joke, comes along to play his instrument. A few years later, she compiled her refrains from 2011 in a collection also bound for the open sea, "300 Days At Sea". Heather Nova has a way with ideas!

In 2025, she takes us to other shores with "Other Shores". Thirteen stripped-down, mostly unexpected covers. From John Lennon's "Jealous Guy" to the Bee Gees' "Stayin' Alive", from Buzzcocks' "Ever Fallen In Love" to Neil Young's "Like A Hurricane" (one of her heroes). And even ‘Message Personnel’, a mix of English and French, a song written by Françoise Hardy for an eponymous album in 1973.

(MH with Stéphane Soupart - Photo : © Etienne Tordoir)

Photo : Heather Nova sur la scène du W Festival à Ostende (Belgique) le 26 août 2022