François Hollande - a Gangsta rapping French president in the making?

François Hollande's speeches could be about to become more...er...interesting.

At least if one of Hollande's newly-appointed speechwriters lives up to his past reputation.

You see, Pierre-Yves Bocquet who is, predictably perhaps, an énarque - a graduate of the prestigious École nationale d'administration - and has been a high-ranking civil servant at the Elysée palace ever since Hollande was elected has another speciality.

Or maybe that should be "specialty" given his particular area of interest.

Because under the pseudonym "Pierre Evil", the 40-year-old has been leading something of a double life...as a music journalist, specialising in American Gangsta rap.

As such, Bocquet/Evil has produced a documentary "Black Music – Des chaînes de fer aux chaînes en or" with Marc-Aurèle Vecchione in 2008 for the Franco-German TV network, Arte.

And he has written two books; "Gangsta rap" in 2005 currently unavailable on Amazon.fr, but maybe that'll change now and the soon-to-be published "Detroit Sampler".




A fellow music journalist, Fred Hanak, describes Bocquet/Evil, who is apparently a fan of the hip hop duo Dead Prez (hmmmn) as "among the best rap reviewers in France".

So out with Hollande's somewhat bumbling and hesitant style so easily lampooned in Les Guignols de l'info on Canal + every weekday evening (even if they also have him "re-interpreting" some of the most popular songs around - see the video)

And in with the hip expletives delivered with a "flow" that'll appeal to the younger generation Hollande courted so much during his presidential election campaign?

Unlikely, as Bocquet says he'll "put on hold his private writing" and besides, "the only person who actually writes François Hollande's speeches is François Hollande. My role will just to be to 'prepare' them."

Shame.