"Why Don't You Write Your Own Songs?"

In 2014, French outfit Nouvelle Vague - the crew famous for covering new-wave and post-punk jams in a bossa nova style - became the official sound of Le Meridien hotels, curating a constantly evolving 24-hour soundtrack to be played in the hotels, and periodically performing concerts at Meridiens around the globe.

"It's funny, because so many people have told us our music should be played in hotel lounges, or is like modern elevator music," offers founding Nouvelle Vague producer Marc Collin. "And I'd say, 'Yeah, it sounds like that, but can you imagine people in a hotel listening to Bela Lugosi's Dead or Too Drunk To Fuck?' And now they are playing in hotels, and I guess people don't listen too closely to the lyrics."

"I write for other people. I'm not some frustrated songwriter stuck playing in a cover band, not really able to express myself. It's not like that."

When Collin first came up with the concept of covering Love Will Tear Us Apart in a bossa nova style in 2003, he "never would've dreamed" that he'd end up getting played in hotels. The crossover success of Nouvelle Vague's self-titled 2004 LP was a "complete surprise", as was the acclaim for its 2006 follow-up, Bande A Part. But after 2009's 3 and 2010's French-language LP Couleurs Sur Paris, diminishing interest lead Collin to put the project on hold.

"The question was: what to do next?" says Collin. "The concept is very strong, very simple: new-wave meets bossa nova is Nouvelle Vague. That's why people responded to it. But, you can feel stuck, that you're doing the same thing. People tell you that they want you to do something different, but then, it turns out, they don't want you to change. You can't really change."

So, Collin laughs, it took him "five years to realise that [they] should just do a new album". On I Could Be Happy, though, they mix covers - of Cocteau Twins, The Ramones, The Cure - with a host of originals. "A lot of people always asked us: 'Why don't you write your own songs?' And I was always like: I am! I do soundtracks, other projects, I write for other people. I'm not some frustrated songwriter stuck playing in a cover band, not really able to express myself. It's not like that. But, I thought, it'd be interesting to see how the crowd would react, how the media would react, if we dared to do our own songs. To me, it's tricky to say: 'That was a song by Brian Eno, and now this is our song!'

"But a lot of people don't know the original songs. Obviously, when you are playing a hit, people get it: 'Oh, this is Just Can't Get Enough by Depeche Mode, this is a cover.' But, when you're playing something more obscure, a lot of people don't know the original, or even realise that it's a cover. We just played some shows recently and people reacted equally to the cover songs and to our songs. It's interesting. I think it means that people like our sound as much as anything else. We have a really strong sound. And it's our sound."