Meet matthiieu piriou | Singer Songwriter, Actor, Stuntman & Race Driver, Movie Director

We had the good fortune of connecting with matthiieu piriou and we’ve shared our conversation below.

Hi matthiieu, can you walk us through the thought-process of starting your business?
I like to feel things instead of thinking about them or processing them too much, so I can’t really say there was a thought process behind starting my own business. But there was an idea. An idea that I live in a country where you learn how to be safe instead of being yourself, and I never wanted that. It’s the metaphore of the bird whom has been given a comfortable cage where it’s safe from cats, and from anyone wanting to sneak up and hurt him – feeling safe makes him forget how high it can fly. I always wanted to fly, and to have the opportunity to do anything that could make me happy. I started with making a living on playing music and acting in 2017, then moved to Paris, worked as an actor at the Palais Garnier Opera House for two years, while singing at little venues, bars & restaurants.
I shortly noticed that French society is made so it can entertain people at a certain level of wealth, teaching them how to be just happy enough with it so they fear loosing it and keep on working for it for 40+ years, forgetting their sense of freedom, and more globally their inner humanity.
As I wanted to evolve in the artistic field, I accepted EVERY single opportunity given to me, started working as a stuntman, learnt piano so I can play professionally as I was requested to sing in places where I couldn’t play guitar. As I’m fluent in English and Spanish, I started making scenario translations, and gave online English masterclasses for French entrepreneurs. Doing all these things I like gave me the opportunity to improve myself and reach new goals everyday without having to face a routine, and I started to really like my life at this point.
Then COVID came, and after the first lockdown I decided to buy a camera so I can work on my own projects instead of depending of anyone. I started making videoclips – the first one being Julien Simoni “She wants to see the sun”, filmed in Tenerife during lockdown #2 – then a few commercials and institutional work, started filming live music sessions so all my musician friends stuck at home with covid could have decent videos put out to present to professionals when the world starts turning again. I started learning multicam livestreaming so we could make real live shows, bought a second camera, bought, sold, rebought and resold filming gear with the few bucks I could make out of it, until I saved enough money to buy a cinema camera (Red Komodo) which now enables me to be involved in much bigger projects (I’ve just finished a movie as a DP and have just been hired as Director, and will be going to Finland in September to shoot a multicam live event for Clash of Clans, in which international youtube stars will be trying to solve an escape game in real time.
For doing all these things, as French people like it when things get into the boxes and I couldn’t fit in one and wanted to free myself from that golden “birdcage” I told you about, i needed to start a business, which is what I’m working on right now. And I’m about to slowly let go what we call “intermittence du spectacle”, which is a kind of dole with benefits especially created for artists to truly become the artistic entrepreneur I’ve always been.
Indeed, to put it in a nutshell, I’ve never had any process behind starting my own business other than working hard on every single thing I loved and wanted to do, and creating a business out of it is more like the genuine and logical continuity to what I’m doing, a kind of formality towards happiness.

Can you open up a bit about your work and career? We’re big fans and we’d love for our community to learn more about your work.
When I was a child, I fell in love with music & movies. Movies like pay it forward, good will hunting or dead poets society, where somehow the protagonists have a vision of life based on emotion, on passion, on what we truly feel. If I had to quote something to define why I am where I am now, I would quote Robin Williams monologue in Dead Poets Society :

“We don’t read and write poetry because it’s cute. We read and write poetry, because we are members of the human race. And the human race is filled with passion. Medicine, law, business, engineering. These are noble pursuits, necessary to sustain life. But poetry, beauty, romance, love, these are what we stay alive for. To quote from Whitman. “O me, O life, of the questions of these recurring. Of the endless trains of the faithless. Of cities filled with the foolish. What good, amid these, O me, O Life? Answer: That you are here. That life exists an identity. That the powerful play goes on and you may contribute a verse,” That the powerful play goes on and you may contribute a verse. What will your verse be?”

Yes the powerful play goes on, and whether you become or not a professional actor, you will be the lead actor of your own powerful play called life. And whatever cards you have been given at the beginning, you’re the only one to see them, and you have to learn how to play with them. Some will loose with a pair of aces, some will end up winning with a straight flush even if they started with a five and a seven of spades in their hands. It’s what you do with things, how much you give yourself into them. It’s never easy to keep your faith and your head up while constantly facing refusals, especially in a world where what you are selling is yourself. There is no product, and we can only be better than others technically, so no one is really better at something. We are just doing our best, heart wide open to the world, hoping it won’t be too cruel. But we learn, it burns but a time always come when we raise from our ashes. As an artist, I’ve always given everything I had every single time I created something. Whether it is a song, a movie, a role of composition, I always try to reach the bottom of myself, to find every little thing I can play with to make it better, to leave the more I can leave in it. I’m now working on writing my second album, and am writing a script for a series so I can direct it and work with the family of friends I made myself through years living of music and acting in Paris. I’ve always written about life, about feelings, about happiness. I think there are already too many people talking about sadness and bad things, and I believe that every artist should guide people towards happiness. Yes we can talk about sadness, about sad things. But there’s always beauty and hope even in the saddest tears. Even if we are sometimes too weak to fight them back, we have to.

And if there’s something I learned along the way, it’s the simplest thing in the world, but the most important : we won’t have enough time. Whatever we want to do, there’s always more, and our time on earth is limited. So whoever you are, you should just wake up now, start thinking about what makes you happy and do it. In 2016, I was about to cross the promenade des Anglais when the suicide truck who killed 84 people on that same street passed right in front of my nose. I was not surprised nor shocked, but it made me realize how subtle it was, how precious life could be, as it could go away faster than the eye could flip. A few months later, I had a crazy accident, broke my jaw and almost every little bone inside my head. I started singing again the day my jaw was repaired, took me three months to recover, 4 to decide that I would – from then on – only do what I love and fight for that whatever it costs. 6 months after, I was climbing the alps with my bike, and running in the mountains at moire than 10 000 feet. Less than one year after, I was moving to paris, hired as an actor for the biggest immersive play happening in 2017/2018, and now I’m having fun making a living out of every single thing I love about life. Sometimes we need to fall so we can stand up for ourselves, and I learned it the hard way. But whoever you are, and wherever you are now, know that you don’t need to fall. You need to wake up.

Have you said to the ones you love that you love them ? Do you have any regrets ? Is there something you’re craving to do which scares you too much ? Get rid of these weights, be yourself. It is not hard to find something you like and make a living out of it. You maybe won’t become a millionnaire, but you’ll become way richer than that : you’ll become a happy (wo)man, which is priceless. I’m happy with arts, with making music – singing my life and trying to give as much leads to wisdom happiness as I can in my songs – with acting, doing stunts, inventing stories and making movies. This is how I contribute a verse. What will your verse be ?

Any places to eat or things to do that you can share with our readers? If they have a friend visiting town, what are some spots they could take them to?
I’ll wake them up at 5 so they can get ready and go see the sun raise at the top of montmartre. Then we’ll have a coffee in a little place named le déli’s cafe which sometimes opens before 6am. I’ll show them the old paris, all the places where you can still feel the vibe of the old Paris, the real Paris. If they want to have dinner, I’ll take them to le potager du père thierry, which is a little restaurant at the feet of the hill, with only 20 seats, serving food bought at the market every morning. If they want to party, i’ll take them to Aux Trois Mailletz, the oldest living cabaret in Paris. Upstairs you’ll have a girl walking and singing, followed by a pianist (from 7:30 to 4AM) and downstairs there’s a live show with a full band and a lot of great singers (till 5AM – a lot of french famous artists come from there, Zaz, Dany Brillant, … Even Nina Simone Sang there back in the 80’s). And I’ll take them out with people from paris, so they can burst the bubble you’re in when you visit someone who speaks your language in a foreign country

Shoutout is all about shouting out others who you feel deserve additional recognition and exposure. Who would you like to shoutout?
I want to dedicate this shoutout to my parents. One funny thing about them is that they are quite the exact opposite when it comes to work. One is an artist who understood a lot about how society and human beings run, and could sell ice to an eskimo ; while the other is a hard worker who always followed the line, and made her way to the top by being the smartest person in the room, sometimes without even acknowledging it. They taught me everything just by being themselves. Looking at my father I learned anything can be possible, especially if you don’t listen to people. Looking at my mother, I understood – maybe a bit late – how important dedication and hard work is when it comes to achieving something. Sometimes you will think that you spend too much time working, or doing this or doing that, but every second spent that way is invested in yourself, and this is priceless.
Also, I think about a few people I met down the road, which inspired me as human beings and with whom I’ll always be ready for a new adventure. Julien Simoni is one of them, because beyond being a great friend, he got faith in me at the very beginning of my directing career, flying me out to Tenerife to make his first music video – which has now reached more than 200K views on YT – and we’re now about to release the third. He is a true entrepreneur, coming from nowhere and wanting to free himself from a life which would make him unhappy. He is smart and really rational, truly human and always a good advice, and would be one of the firsts if not the first person to be there for anyone close to him even if he’s the most hardworking person I know, between playing music every night, giving piano lessons all day long, being a real estate investor and producing his own music. If you still doubted it, believe me, anything in this world is achievable.
I also couldn’t do this shoutout while saying a word about an little American girl called Madeline Fuhrman, who is maybe the person I’m the most connected with. You definitely should contact her to hear about her life journey. She is a singer songwriter, actress, designer, content creator, growth hacker, website creator – a lot of things I’ve forgotten – and a true dream maker. It’s always about doing, about creating, about imagining what we will be tomorrow, and she will be great, even more than she is now, even if she already glows in the dark. Her song “the mad one” could be a perfect resume of this shoutout.
Last but not least, I’d thank anyone who’d ever gave me a chance, every person who ever believed in me – I’m thinking about Yann Le Meur, who was my boss when I worked at the Opera House and has now become a good friend, but also to Maxime Mené, a great singer-songwriter with whom it’s always been a pleasure to work, as we always challenge and push each other to give the best of us to go beyond the notion of work, and building things we are and can be proud of. There’s a lot more people who I could say a few words about, and I know you know I love you, especially if you thought about yourself somewhere in these words.

Website: http://www.matthieupiriou.com

Instagram: instagram.com/mattyeuxpiriou

Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/matthieu-piriou-4b0798b0?originalSubdomain=fr

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/MattYeuxMusique/

Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC0MOmN1L6lOh_aLStGlklCw

Other: https://vimeo.com/matthieureal http://vraitograph.book.fr

Image Credits
Charlène François / Timothée Servant / Elle Magazine / TF1 / Eiffel Le Film (Martin Bourboulon)