Sipping a coffee in Curzon Soho wearing a tailored black blazer over a crisp white shirt, Hugo Pierre Leclercq looks more like a hungover boyband member than the future of French electronica. But the 19 year old DJ - better known as Madeon - is responsible for some of the most forward thinking dance music of the past 12 months. From the age of 11 he has been experimenting with electronica in his basement in Nantes, released under a monkier he first coined in 2006. "There was this trend at the time in France to have really dramatic names - like Justice - nouns and words that had a lot of impact, but which were quite impractical in an online sense and also maybe too pompous" he explains. "Madeon was something more timeless." Fast forward a few years, he's toured America with Lady Gaga and DJed everywhere from Coachella to Radio One's Hackney Weekend. After some preliminaries, including his thoughts on providing the intro music for last year's MTV Europe Music Awards ("I played a Brodinski track while Kim Kardashian was coming on") and being expelled from school ("I was kind of kicked out but let's just say 'there was a mutual parting of company'.") he talks to GQ about DJing through a power cut, French dance dialogue and his tiny squirrel doppelganger.

GQ: Do you always wear a blazer?

Madeon: Always. I want to be like a TV show character that dresses the same every day so they are instantly recognisable. Although, I did always wonder why DJs wear graphic shirts and jeans all time, but now I know it's because it's so annoying to carry a blazer around all day. I always have a backup blazer, but it doesn't fit as well. I cannot find clothes that fit me - I have to get everything custom made.

Describe the basement you work in.

It's actually quite cosy and small. There's a computer, keyboards, books, CDs. There's like a "Beatles sanctuary" where I put my collection of all the stuff I get from fans on tour. It feels small though because it is so full. The door leads out into the garden, which is great, because when I see the sun rising up it's a sign saying, "You should probably go to bed now. This studio session ends now." I don't like people entering the room, I don't want them unplugging things.

Has growing up in Nantes been important to your music?

It's a really interesting city. I'm not huge on Paris. Nantes is very culturally-oriented. We have a project in Nantes, Les Machines de l'île, that creates these huge mechanical elephants that march through the city. It's really cool. And there have also been times when Nantes had a thriving electronic scene, like Pony Pony Run Run and the Valerie collective.

Will you leave Nantes soon and move?

My heart says New York, but my pragmatic side says London as it's where most of the work happens. I'm still making my mind up. I'm touring so much that I'm never at home, so moving out is not a priority. I like Nantes, but seeing the world through touring makes you want to go further. That's the sad thing about touring: you get to see all these amazing places, but you only stay for a few hours.

I've been to Costa Rica, Tokyo, China... but I've only seen the airport and the hotel room.

But you still enjoy touring obviously?

I still love touring because it's instant gratification. Every night you get a crowd, you get this little challenge and you get a cool interaction with the audience. A studio session is more of a psychological pressure. Touring is easy. It's not

physically easy, but it's not as much pressure.

What has been your worst gig?

I would not name a worse gig - I might want to play there again - you obviously have difficult ones. The first time I played in Las Vegas I just didn't get what they were about, but the second time I had a much better idea. There are some countries where you need educating, like, "OK, this country has no clue about drum'n'bass.

It will never work." My favourite was at the Osheaga Festival in Toronto. It was just a really good vibe, and at one point there was a power cut: no light, no sound. My challenge was to keep the audience there. So I started typing messages on my laptop and trying to interact. At one point I was seconds away from starting a tap dance show or something. When the power came back, the roar from the audience was so satisfying and exciting. I knew it was coming so I had loaded a big track. It was starting a new set with a 15-minute build-up.

Do larger gigs, like at Milton Keynes Bowl, still prove daunting?

When I started touring it was somewhat paralysing, but you grow used to it fairly quickly. When you have a large crowd you don't see it as a large group of individuals, but just as one entity. At Milton Keynes, the crowd was like a radius of success. People at the front will dance no matter what, and depending on how good you are doing the radius will grow bigger. If the track works well then the people on the edges will also be dancing. It's like a meter of how well I'm doing.

Do you feel part of a French scene?

I don't feel like a French artist or part of the French music scene. We have a lot of great taste and we make lots of elegant music, but that results in snobbery and exclusivity. That has its advantages as well as its downsides. But you know, I've played a bunch of UK festivals and love it. The UK is really fascinating, especially the radio. There is such a wide range of music being playing that would never make it even on the night time playlist on French radio. It's really quite exceptional. In the charts you have really cool singles, as well as the UK is the king of novelty songs.

You've said that in France, listening to English language music is just a bunch weird words. It must be like us listening to "Gangnam Style"...

Exactly. "Gangnam Style" doesn't sound weird, it sounds just like all those other American songs! We obviously import a lot of American music and we're fine with not understanding the lyrics - we can guess the emotion. When we make French music, we take care with the lyrics - we want it to be like story or like poetry. We wouldn't have a song in French saying, "Everyone dance now, I'm having fun in the club." We'd want that in English! The way different languages work in music is fascinating.

Do you ever worry, at a young age, peaking too early?

Culturally, we have an obsession with youth, especially in the media. I try my best not to overexploit it. I've spent a lot of time refusing to do any any photos or any interviews that would mention my age. For a while, I was really protective of it. Of course, once you do festivals, you can't really hide it anymore. I didn't want the story to take over too much. Now that I'm 19, it's a bit more underwhelming. But back when I was 16, it was the headline. I wanted the first story about me to be my music, and the second to be about me as a person. As a potential fan, if you're presented with the story first, rather than the music, it may create a bad experience. With such pressure at a young age, I feel I have been relatively prepared. I'm not from a musical family, but I anticipated it: I studied stories and careers and prepared myself for the downfalls of a career. I'm realistic and ambitious of what lies ahead.

So you don't feel any pressure to release an album any time soon?

I've been in the studio for three months and written a bunch of songs and thought, "You know what? Not good enough." I thought I'd take three months off from touring - which is a big deal as touring is profitable - but I need some level of productivity. So I went to the studio to create. But I wasn't [thinking], "I need five new singles for the next 12 months." It was rather, "Let's study movie scores. Let's see what that is about." I'm glad I have this knowledge as now I have something else I can do. You can either cultivate spontaneity or you can be exhaustive in your knowledge and capacity. I'm more towards the latter. You know, my music sounds happy, but it's a painful process and I take it quite seriously. I do realise that if I keep on with this attitude forever - of scrapping songs and taking six months to finish a record - I'll pretty much have an album in 2035.

Have you got a good singing voice?

I'm not a fan of the teenage tone. I like the really young choir voice, the female voice, and the high-pitched male tone, but there's this awkward tone with the teenage voice that annoys me. I haven't really tried to sing though. Possibly I'll try, but I'm good enough with autotune! I only play keyboard in C major and I change the key digitally. I try to dumb down things as much as possible because I don't want to spend useless time on skills that you can fake with computers.

What's the strangest gift you've got from a fan?

Some fans in Washington DC gave me a bunch of stuff in a gift bag.

One of the items was a homemade plush of a squirrel dressed like me, wearing a blazer and it was called "Hugo Le Squirrel." It's now in the basement, of course.

*"Technicolour" by Madeon is out now. madeon.fr