Gojira have released the official video for ‘Mea Culpa (Ah! Ça ira!)’, the song they performed at the Paris Olympics this summer.
The band made history in July as the first metal band to ever perform at an Olympics opening ceremony. They performed a song that was popular during the French Revolution, during a segment titled ‘Liberté’ (in reference to France’s famed motto ‘Liberté, égalité, fraternité’) that celebrated one of the most famous events in French history, as well as the nation’s emphasis on freedom.
Gojira performed from the windows of the Concierge, accompanied by experimental opera singer Marina Viotti and nearly 300 classical musicians.
The song has since been nominated for the GRAMMY Award for Best Metal Performance. In September, it was projected on the Arc de Triomphe in Paris
The spectacle left viewers asking themselves if they’d just seen “one of the most memorable moments of 2024” or a “freakshow”. As heightened reactions on social media swirled, Gojira were forced to respond to claims their performance was “Satanic”.
Frontman Joe Duplantier told Rolling Stone: “It’s French history. It’s French charm, you know, beheaded people, red wine and blood all over the place — it’s romantic, it’s normal. There’s nothing satanic.”
Despite the controversy, it massively increased Gojira’s streaming numbers, with their monthly listeners shooting up to just under 2.7million a week after their performance, a growth of almost 50 per cent.
In other news, Duplantier recently shared an update on Gojira’s “ambitious” next album, saying: “We’re very ambitious in terms of writing songs and the quality of it. And we wanna take a clear step forward and upward with this album. So we’re putting all our love and energy on it.”
