“No.” Until a few years ago, that was the most frequently heard word forCamille Dhont. At auditions – even at #LikeMe –, on preselections for JuniorEurosong and in The Voice Kids in 2013. But Camille is ambitious, a fighter.“How many times have I thought about quitting? Never. I can’t become anythingbut a singer. That’s all that interested me. People said: Go for plan B, adegree. No, I just want to keep going.”
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It paid off. When #LikeMe launched in 2019, it became an instant hit. AndCamille was there. From then on it went on an upward trend. This has alreadyresulted in two albums and five sold-out Lotto Arenas, and that is just aselection of the success. The Wevelgemse remains calm. But she also sayscandidly that just then her mother Isabelle becomes seriously ill, and thingshave not always been easy for her private life in recent years.
When she was eleven or twelve years old, her mother often had to go to thepain clinic. “She ran into a microwave. But the blow was so hard that itlooked like she was in a car accident,” she says. “With a whiplash as aresult. They put iron plates in and she had surgery on the neck. She was inpain all over. I know I had to wash mom, run errands and help where I could. Ifinished school at four, and Dad came home from work at six. Then I had tocook. After a year she was better.”
Coma
“Three years ago she suddenly had a cerebral hemorrhage. I remember well thatit started on Monday. She drove the car crookedly. I figured it out, it toldher: Mom, you’re driving diagonally. If there had been a car in the otherlane, we would have had an accident. I grabbed the wheel and held it straight.She thought it was a joke. A day later she no longer felt her left arm. OnFriday morning she woke up, and her entire left side was paralyzed. She rolledout of bed, called my aunt and they went to the hospital. Dad called me afterschool: You should definitely catch the train, you should not miss it. Then hetold me she was in a coma.”
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“When I saw her lying in the hospital, it was intense. I tried to keep up. Itwas something I had not yet discovered in myself, but I was very calm: It’sgoing to be okay, mom, just stay down. Until you go outside. Then you can’tkeep strong.” Isabelle rehabilitated for two years. Only the feeling in herleft hand won’t come back. In the meantime she is her daughter’s manager. Onthe advice of her psychologist, to see it as an opportunity to work withCamille full-time. Something the latter didn’t know until Goens told her.
During that period, one of her best friends, Arne Decock, died after beingelectrocuted on the railway. “Last time I saw him, we went to a Christmasmusical together. He had to move on quickly, and I was just talking tosomeone. I couldn’t say another day when he left. That stays with me. I askedhis mom if I could write a song, as something for myself. That came on myfirst album, Superhero.”
Abuse of power
From #LikeMe The fourth and final season will be released next year. Althoughit is a bull’s eye, there is a black page. One of the creators, Bart VO, hasbeen convicted of sexual offences. “With the main cast, nothing everhappened,” she says. “But I do understand that abuse of power is somethingvery dirty. When I was fourteen I had private singing lessons. Suddenly thegossip surfaced that the teacher would sleep with students. That turned out tobe true in the end. It didn’t happen to me, but he did try to flirt. If youcome with me, I’ll let you sing on a showcase. I never went into that.Recently I saw him again. He suddenly came back to be friendly. I thought: No,I think that’s a bit gross. Only then did I tell my parents. I was ashamed ofthat at first.”