Monthly Archives: November 2013

Novembre Toute L’Année

  • Posted on 30/11/2013
  • /Under Musique

amantsparaFive years have passed since Vincent Delerm’s Quinze Chansons, a premier album including the downright gorgeous Et François de Roubaix dans le dos. Echoes of Roubaix can also be heard on Ils avaient fait les valises dans la nuit from his new CD Les Amants Parallèles which tells an histoire d’amour between un garçon et une fille in thirteen songs – actually, quite a melancholy tale with predominantly monochrome and (g)rainy moods. Though fine chansons like Robes, featuring Moriarty singer Rosemary Standley as raconteuse, capture the forlorn feel perfectly, Delerm gets a bit lost in his November frame of mind. And with hardly more than half an hour playing time, this love story is already over when most wouldn’t even have begun.

Vincent Delerm – Ils avaient fait les valises dans la nuit
Vincent Delerm – Robes

De La Jolie Musique

  • Posted on 27/11/2013
  • /Under Musique

Now there’s a name to draw attention, De La Jolie Musique. Of the Beautiful Music. Lush orchestrated music that is, in the vein of Jean-Claude Vannier, Francois de Roubaix, Eumir Deodato, John Barry… Violins, brass, that plopping 70s Fender bass, choirs, wah-wah guitars – are things turning bright orange yet? The band’s key member is Erwann Corré, a songwriter, arranger and multi-instrumentalist who adds up to eleven people in De La Jolie Musique to make his musical dreams come true. Plein Soleil is the highlight of the album Memoire Tropical. Very Melody Nelson-ish with that choir-sound, the trumpet and the long, long intro. It might be raining outside, with this beautiful music, the sun sets every night in a golden haze.

New Christine & the Queens video

  • Posted on 25/11/2013
  • /Under Video

Christine (Nantes-born Heloise Letissier) said about this track and video: “The Loving Cup is a song I wrote just after seeing Paris is Burning for the first time. I wanted to make a power song that could allow everybody who listens to it to be fierce. It is an invitation to join Christine and to recreate yourself to become exactly who you want to be without being judged: therefore The Loving Cup works just like a Vogue Ball. And the party is opened for everybody without exception: all we need right now is love and acceptance. The boy starring in the video could be anyone: he’s mysterious and never reveals the true reason of his transformation. But the fact that he needs to escape and have fun is good enough for us.”
The band was formed in London, where Heloise/Christine was down and out when she met a couple of drag queen “who helped me getting back on my feet. Because they were rejected, or because they had to fight to be just who they wanted to be, they usually are generous and welcoming with those who seem lost. And I think we really need this kind of human warmth nowadays.”
This danceable track (think Sia, think Florence) differs from the more downtempo song we’ve posted on this blog earlier (this one, this one) and it’s not in French. The album’s out next year, and it will include at least a couple of French tracks. Which is good.

Musica Nuda

  • Posted on 22/11/2013
  • /Under Musique

© Angelo TraniMusica Nuda, naked music, is an Italian duo (vocalist Petra Magoni, upright bass player Feruccio Spinetti). It’s a ‘vocal ‘n bass’ twosome who enjoy the art of silence in music. From the bio: ‘a basic and often underrated aspect of it, that leads to the true emotion and underline the value or a lyric, a story, the meaning of every single song, no matter if it’s dramatic, funny, energetic, romantic, sarcastic.’ Musica Nuda usually sing in English, they have worked with several jazz(y) artists, including French heroes like Sanseverino and Jacques Higelin, and recorded songs by Henri Salvador. On the just released new album Banda Larga they’ve expanded their sound, with wood, brass and steel. Listen to a spine tickling version of Des Ronds dans l’eau, written by Pierre Barouh and made famous by Françoise Hardy. And like Sky points out in the comments, this song does sound a lot like Frankie Valli’s Can’t take my eyes off of you.

Speaking of Françoise, she turns 70 next January. FillesSourires will mark that occasion with some very special posts. More on that later.

Musica Nuda – Des rons dans l’eau
Live version:

Faux French Fellas

  • Posted on 16/11/2013
  • /Under Musique

amourettesThe masterminds behind Les Chauds Lapins are New York’s Meg Reichardt and Kurt Hoffman who formerly worked with indie celebs They Might Be Giants or the Jon Spencer Blues Explosion. The songs of chanson genius Charles Trenet – »our quintessential art-pop guy« – inspired them to found their very own rive gauche French music hall of mirrors, echoing the surrealist wit of the 20s and 30s. Their 2011 album Amourettes features the funny, cheeky and irresistibly swingin’ Je t’aime, a vocal version of Django Reinhardt’s Swing ’39 with lyrics by the unforgotten Jacques Larue. If you’re looking for the missing link between faux French fellas Pink Martini and Nous Non Plus, this is it – a folie du jour to boot, and certainly a most sexy one.

Les Chauds Lapins – Je t’aime

Sophie Desmarais

1000_201303142056428stc21_MGD_4888Yes, feast your eyes and ears on this dear FillesSourires-visitors. Sophie’s an Quebecoise, an actress who also sings in this new movie called Chasse au Godard d’Abbittibbi. See IMDB for a short description, see this YT-clip too. Set in 1968, it means that Sophie wears lots of eyeliner and looks like a cross between Francoise Hardy and Anna Karina. And she can sing-sigh like the best of ‘m. Listen to the whole soundtrack, including tracks by Les Breastfeeders and FS-fave Ariane Moffatt, here.

François & Françoise

  • Posted on 12/11/2013
  • /Under Video

The new François Ozon movie, Jeune & Jolie, features four chansons by FS favorite Françoise Hardy, among them the solemn Première rencontre from 1973. Caution: Don’t listen sans parapluie et dix mouchoirs.

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