French Canadian JOVM mainstays DVTR — Le Couleur‘s Laurence G-Do a.k.a. Demi Lune and Gazoline‘s, Kandle‘s Xavier Caféine‘s and Gab Bouchard‘s JC Tellier, a.k.a. Jean Divorce — burnt up the Canadian indie scene with the release of their debut EP, 2023’s BONJOUR. The EP amassed a plethora of rapturous reviews, landed on a number of Best of 2023 lists and earned the duo the first batch of a growing number of awards in Québec.
Building upon that momentum of the previous year, the duo released an expanded edition of their debut EP BONJOUR (BIS), which featured a couple of bonus tracks.
The Montrealers supported the original and expanded editions of BONJOUR EP with a frenetic and whirlwind world tour over the past couple of years, which has featured sets across the club and festival circuit in Asia, Mexico, Germany and Québec. They’re currently in the middle of an extensive bit of touring across France.
During this remarkably busy period, the duo released a live album on VHS (!) and added more awards to their already crowded mantle — the 2025 Breakout Artist of the Year at the GAMIQ Gala earlier this year.
And they’ve still managed to release new material. They began this year with “Né pour flâner (Born to loiter),” a song that further cements the duo’s uncanny knack for mosh pit friendly, catchy hooks, punchily delivered vocals and furious synth and guitar riffage.
Cementing their reputation for restless and frenetic creativity, the duo return with “Couleur peau (Your Next Token Asian Friend),” arguably one of the more defiant, feisty and perhaps somewhat straightforward punk songs of a growing catalog of breakneck rippers. The song sees the duo happily spitting on and trampling the outdated, ridiculous French concept of couleur peau (“skin color”), a term that according to the band only ever refers to white or beige skin. While calling out colorism, the song is also an incisive criticism of performative and wishy washy White liberals that sees the song’s narrator ready to cash in on White guilt. I’ll be your token Asian pal– if you ante up, the song says. But she’ll also call you out for it, as she’s cashing that check.
The accompanying video by Cedric Demers and Alexandre Normand feature DVTR’s frontperson insouciantly eating a buffet-style table of Chinese food while the song plays — with chopsticks and then a fork.