The Flemish singer and life artist Arno Hintjens saw his life as a santen stall: a colorful musical shop in which everything was possible. He sang in French, English, Dutch and Ostend. He mixed blues, rock, chanson and folk music into a vibrant whole that was always exciting and never predictable. Hintjens, who died on Saturday at the age of 72 from pancreatic cancer, caused a revolution in Belgian rock music with TC Matic. He stirred up halls with his non-conformist personality and exciting music. As a soloist he moved his audience to tears.
Arnaud Charles Ernest Hintjens was born on 21 May 1949 in Ostend, the seaside resort on the Flemish coast that he cherished for a lifetime. Ostend in the 1960s was the first stopping place for British artists to tour Europe. Eric Burdon of The Animals worked there as a dishwasher. Many musicians were brought to Belgium by impresario and hotel owner Freddy Cousaert. As a cook in the Cousaert hotel, Arno Hintjens met the Motown star Marvin Gaye in 1981, who had settled in Ostend during a period of personal misery. On a stone wall on the Zeedijk, the star Marvin Gaye and the aspiring rock artist Arno Hintjens philosophized about life and music.
Not an imitation of a blues singer
Arno Hintjens did not envision a career as a singer at the end of the seventies. He mainly played harmonica with the blues band Tjens Couter. His raucous voice and outgoing personality, although shy and stuttering in everyday life, made him the perfect frontman. When an audio tour of Ostend was launched in 2012 claiming that Arno had cooked “soul food” for Marvin Gaye, Hintjens nuanced that claim by stating that it was the organist Odell Brown who gave him the insight that he needed to broaden his musical horizons. . “In America you have a blues band on every street corner that is better than anything from here,” Hintjes told NRC† “I decided that I no longer wanted to be an imitation of an American blues singer.”
On stage, Hintjens regularly threw a well-meaning “god damn” in between
With the group TC Matic, Arno Hintjens and guitarist Jean-Marie Aerts caused a revolution in Belgian rock and new wave in the early eighties. Arno’s gritty voice was set against angular industrial rhythms and shrill guitar parts. Songs like ‘Oh La La La’ and ‘Putain Putain’ underlined Arno’s ability to create pan-European music, forging English, French, Dutch and his own West Flemish accent into one. In ‘Oh La La La’ from the debut album TC Matic (1981) all his enthusiasm was contained: “I see lovers / I see losers / And it’s heavy / And it’s funny / C’est magnifique!†
‘Putain Putain’ became the alternative European anthem with the words „Putain putain, c’est vachement bien / Nous sommes quand meme tous des Européens† On stage, Hintjens regularly threw in a well-meaning “god damn” in between, not as a swear word but out of unguarded enthusiasm. Later he would be praised even in France for his unpolished natural. He was called ‘Mister 100,000 Volts’, like a James Dean drawn from Flemish clay who unleashed his rebellious spirit in music. He also had a small heart, in love songs like ‘Elle Adore Le Noir (Pour Sortir le Soir)’ in which he linked the innovative sound of TC Matic to the tradition of French chanson.
French-language chanson tradition
The albums l’Apache and Yé Yé received much acclaim, but a European breakthrough by TC Matic was not forthcoming. In 1986 Arno (he dropped the last name) started a solo career in which he could lose all his love for blues, rock, soul, chanson and folk music. A worn cover of Adamo’s ‘Les Filles du Bord de Mer’ became a permanent fixture on his set list. The album titles Charlatan and Idiots Savants expressed his disinterest in pop star existence. The album was a great success la francaise (1995) that with ‘Le Danseuse de Java’ and ‘Les Yeux de Ma Mère’ claimed its place in the French-language chanson tradition. The song about his mother’s eyes moved the audience to tears, not least because of the gnarly-lived performance of the singer.
Arno confessed his ineradicable love for the blues on an album with the occasional band Charles et les Lulus. He alternated songs by Rufus Thomas and Sonny Boy Williamson with his own blues songs and the Arabic-tinged ‘Ants in my Tea’. He later honored the influence of the Rolling Stones with a personalized ‘Mother’s Little Helper’. He followed in the footsteps of Serge Gainsbourg with ‘Elisa’ in duet with Jane Birkin and sang ‘A Bouquet with Pisseblommen’ in Ostend. The albums Future Vintage (2012) and health boutique (2019) were produced by PJ Harvey known John Parish, who helped Hintjens in his eternal search for challenging instrumentations and original music.
In February 2020, Arno Hintjens had to cancel a planned tour to undergo surgery for pancreatic cancer. He did not complain about his latent illness; at most he downplayed his advancing age in the song ‘I’m Just an Old Motherfucker’. Arno scrambled up, it seemed. He continued to perform and work on a new album. †Save me, save me” he sang in the song ‘Court-Circuit dans Mon Esprit’. Arno Hintjens was not afraid of the devil. At most, he asked for some respite to accomplish his mission.